Just brainstorming some practical considerations.
– Both of these things are true: 1.) There is way more to life than sex. 2.) Sex is very important.
– Just how important it is, especially to a male, particularly to his emotional well-being, is a question that could use some illumination. I say this as a Christian guy, frustrated on the religious side by what seems like dismissal and avoidance, while taking no comfort in the popular, even if quietly held mindset which normalizes and rationalizes males looking at and talking about women in a certain way; a perspective that, when pressed on the issue winks at the male proclivity toward a pornographic outlook on the world.
– I wonder if one reason sex doesn’t get talked about more is that it would be hard for many people to do so without revealing details about their own personal sex lives. That’s a very practical consideration.
– Perhaps another reason for a lack of conversation is that nobody has it figured out. Or at least they don’t feel like they have it figured out. Maybe the questions and comments I pose here reveal more about my own sexual psychology than most would consider comfortable or prudent to reveal. Then again, maybe this conversation needs those boundaries pushed.
– I believe it was in his book ‘The Four Loves’ that C.S. Lewis suggested that part of people’s problems with sex are due to taking the subject too seriously. Essentially, he suggested that humor should be a key part of sexual intimacy.
– When I think about sex, not pornographically, but practically, I think about awkwardness and vulnerability. The intimate connection is as much about shared awkwardness as it is about shared ecstasy.
– Is purity an illusion? Forget people in general, how many Christians do you know who made it to their wedding day both virgins? How many Christians do you know that by that by that day had still done nothing more intimate than kiss? My problem is not teaching pre-marital abstinence, but in teaching it furthering the illusion that it is the norm.
See also:
Andrew K. Banks 