A Religious and Ethical Perspective On Sexuality

“A Religious and Ethical Perspective On Sexuality”

A Redemptive and Integrative Approach

This paper seeks to take a redemptive and integrative approach to a religious and ethical perspective on sexuality. This is deemed necessary because there is a wide perception that all the religious fraternity and religiously informed ethicists has to bring to the table on this matter is a prohibitive stance of “Thou Shalt Not!”

Admittedly the religious community has played it own part in the ‘demonisation’ of sexuality. The Puritans with their very best intentions who went as far as to instruct that if either partner made the slightest sound during intercourse that would indicate they were experiencing pleasure the silent part was to report that person to the clergy and the staunch dogma of ‘procreation only’ approach in other religious quarters of today serve as examples this demonization.

I wish to affirm that human sexuality is very much a part of God’s creation as is the circulatory system or the nervous system. An adaptation of a religious song will serve to make this point. “This is the day, this is the day that the Lord has made, that the Lord has made, I will rejoice and be glad in it… this is my penis, this is my penis that the Lord has made, that the Lord has made, I will rejoice, and be glad for it.” Most religious persons would sing blushing red in the face or would simply refused to sing that part as I have myself witnessed.

THE BIBLE DESCRIBES MAN AS AN INTEGRATED WHOLE AND COMMITS HIM TO A BASIC HONESTY/PURITY. THIS PURITY IS THE FOUNDATION OF BASIC COMMUNITY LIVING. Anything that threatens this basic integrity becomes a threat to the community.

Our sexuality then cannot be separated from our spirituality or our psyche or our emotions.

Sex is not a commodity but a function a relationship, a relationship that is intended be characterized by commitment and longevity in the context of marriage.

The New Testament goes beyond the Old Testament by internalizing the whole sexuality of a person and placing it within the context of motivation. Jesus emphasized that to entertain lustful desires toward a person of the opposite sex outside marriage means to be guilty of adultery (Matt 5:27-28).

Sex is intended to be an adult act. Engaged in by persons who duly recognize and consider the causes, consequences and responsibilities of this act.

Sex finds its ultimate expression and definition in procreation. Ethical obligations require persons to take sufficient responsibility for actions which will produce a new life, so as to ensure the proper care and nurture of that life.

From this Biblical based function of sex the Bible recognizes homosexuality as an aberration of the function of sex.

The commercialization of sex, be it prostitution, sex object based advertising, popular music, print, voice or video media raises ethical concerns because an extremely high premium is placed on human life and this commercialization serves to devalue human life in that sex becomes a mere compartment of this life, an individual becomes an object for gratification or a part of the anatomy becomes an economic tool separated from the integer of the body.

It takes that which is a deeply personal matter and cheapens it. It robs the persons of dignity and undermines the human value of the individual.