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Do you think what she writes about is more the rule or the exception? Do you think it applies across most religions?
Here's an excerpt from the article, para. #2 .....
Quote:
I can recall several steamy backseat sessions with good little Christian boys who fumbled around clumsily with my bra straps and gave kisses that were too firm and full of teeth. Bless our little Christian hearts, we'd ride the repentance and sin see-saw -- either feeling so much shame and guilt that we'd promise never to make-out again, or planning to sneak out just so that we could. We were taught (and believed) that sex was a sin, masturbation its fiery counterpart, and you were meant to keep yourself pure until marriage because, after all, "True Love Waits." This Bible thumping abstinence teaching only made us want to have sex more! It was the equivalent of talking about chocolate cake recipes when you were on a strict sugar diet.
I don't see any reason not to think it's the rule. Sexual desire is primal and near-universal. Sexual abstinence has never been a match for it.
In my teens I was simply afraid of the anticipated shame or I would have plowed a wide swath through the Christian girls I knew. I am aware of a couple of dudes whose desire overcame their timidity, and I knew the good Christian girls they were involved with. My premarital years were a miasma of furious sublimation, and I regret thusly wasting them.
Location: In a little house on the prairie - literally
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In my experience, the religious females were invariably more horny, sexual and sensual than those there were not. Somehow they all seemed to comply with the "Three Date Rule".
Once I figured that out, I was like a kid in a candy store, and specifically targeted those who professed to be religious. I didn't see a whole bunch of inhibitions or guilt partaking in all that premarital sex.
Oh, BTW, I'm not talking about high school. I mean the 40-55 year olds who were coming out of a long term marriage just like me. Sunday morning sex normally didn't happen until the afternoon, as they 'had' to go to church.
I never did figure out why they could be so hypocritical, but truly I didn't care.
Still, it was a lot of fun.
I'm now in a happy monogamous relationship, so those days are over at this point.
I'm with mordant here, lack of anything sexual at all, heck even just normal conversation with the opposite sex alone, is one of the things I hate the most about growing up in a strict Christian household. It really is a shame how they turned what can be a beautiful expression of love or more generally just a function of humanity into acts and thoughts labeled perverse, ungodly, and socially unacceptable.
It's kinda funny though. I think my record for keeping my mind clear of sexual thoughts when I was trying to be more serious towards god was about 1 day max. It just shows you how ingrained it is into basic human psychology.
Do you think what she writes about is more the rule or the exception? Do you think it applies across most religions?
Here's an excerpt from the article, para. #2 .....
From my experience when I was at a church school..kids will be kids and when I was in the choir for a short while in my early teens, it didn't seem to have changed very much.
It was a brave thing to do to lay it all out in public as the author has done. No anonymity involved here, like when hiding behind an obscure computer name and taking on some fanciful personality which one would never do in person. She even has her picture included in the article and in her replies to the comments.
In general, if one is in need for some type of mental or well-being help, don't expect to get it by joining a religious organization. They are not equipped to provide that. They can only essentially prescribe what is tied to their dogma, and too much of that is just about suppression of natural behaviour.
This all sounds very familiar. The desire/guilt seesaw is incredibly common, especially as related to anything sexual. The degree to which someone transgresses their religious rule may vary, but the emotional whiplash effect is in my opinion a shared feature of a religious upbringing. In many cases it can last well into adulthood.
Sex is often the most pronounced example, because the desire is so powerful, and the rules about it are so strict, especially if taken literally. I mean, Jesus states that sexual desire is morally equivalent to actually doing the deed, so if a teenage boy really believes that, he feels a need to do an awful lot of repenting. Then you start to feel like something is wrong with you because you are trapped in "habitual sin". So you repent, and you cry, and you beg God to fix you, and then next time you see a cute girl in the mall... back to square one. The amount of guilt, shame, fear, and self loathing this can produce is tremendous. And this is all before you actually even talk to a girl.
So I went and read the whole article. Nailed it. Hole in one. Her take on the guilt seesaw and the masks required for church life are spot on. It took me until well past 30 to develop real meaningful relationships with other adults that were not based on this holy facade, and like the author, I find it wonderful to be free of that mess.
-NoCapo
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