[Note: This is one post in a series on David Gushee’s book After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity. The aim of these posts is to help you start conversations with people in your community. Invite someone to read this book with you and discuss it together. You don’t need to agree with each other or the author to benefit from doing this type of activity.]
Chapter 7: Sex: From Sexual Purity to Covenant Realism
In this chapter, Gushee invites the reader to reflect on the typical evangelical approach to sexual purity and to consider an alternative path forward. Gushee’s chapter does a particularly good job of tracing the (often negative) influence of Christian purity culture.
One of Gushee’s contentions revolves around the implications of “purity.” When we frame our discussion of sexual ethics in terms of “purity,” Gushee suggests that we implicitly tell ourselves that every “mistake” will result in our dirtiness. The results of this framework can be destabilizing to people. This is especially true for young people whose hormones are activated at puberty (10-13 years old) but must maintain abstinence physically and mentally until they are married. Statistically, more people are getting married in their late twenties than ever before. Gushee suggests this puts an unrealistic burden on people.
The problem of purity culture is exasperated by people who engage the entire issue without every seriously reflecting on the detrimental effects it has on LGBTQ people (especially those who are still closeted in our communities of faith). Gushee suggests that post-evangelicals must find a way to remedy this entire situation.
Gushee pushes for a much more inclusive sexual framework than the vast majority of evangelicals find acceptable. Instead of focusing on “purity,” Gushee encourages embracing a covenantal approach to our sexuality. According to Gushee, responsible human sexuality that is not coercive or exploitative should be endorsed as a baseline, but not embraced as the ultimate ideal. Instead, he argues that Christian sexuality should focus on covenantal relationships instead of simply human flourishing or happiness.
Intriguing Quote(s)
“Purity language is about what is morally right and wrong, but it deploys a language more visceral than customary ethics-talk; it lives in the neighbor-hood of dirt, disgust, pollution, and revulsion, not merely objective wrong-doing. As used in the evangelical subculture, it brought sexual shame to a whole new level.” (124)
“Sometime in the 1990s, the cultural tide began shifting. Moving just a bit with the times, some evangelicals adopted a kinder, gentler rhetoric of “love the sinner, hate the sin.” But, in the end, this was not that much kinder or gentler—hating the sin involved plenty of disgust-producing rhetoric that inevitably, and sometimes literally, bled into gay and lesbian people’s lives. The role of disgust in dehumanizing people must never be underestimated.” (127)
“Sexual-ethical perfectionism errs on the one side. Sexual libertinism errs on the other. Evangelicalism erred on the one side to avoid erring on the other. I hope that the covenant realism proposed here manages to find a middle way.” (135)
Conversation Starters
Have you ever seriously reflected on your views about human sexuality? Why or why not?
How do your views on sexuality impact people around you?
What would you keep or change about the way issues of sexuality have been dressed in your life (church, family, school, etc.)?