Is sexual promiscuity solely the arena of more liberal Christianity?

MournfulWatcher said:

As for the question of how we resolve the issue of promiscuity in our current culture, for Christians at least, I would say we should encourage younger marriages. No, I'm not talking teen marriage, more like being married by 18-22 or so. I actually know quite a lot of other devout Christians who have gotten married at this age, despite both the husband and the wife still being in college. I even know one couple who are having baby this August and the wife is 21 and going into her senior year of college.

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If I married the guy I was dating at age 18, I would be in a sorry state today. I’m glad that I wasn’t pushed into marrying him!

If the right person is there, then it may be good, but not everyone is prepared at that age to know who would be a good partner in marriage for their lives.

redleghunter said:

I think the author of the article in the OP makes the best point here:

There has never been a time when Christians lived perfectly by the sexual teachings of the faith. What’s happening now is that Christians are flat-out denying those teachings. The relationship between sex and the body is not incidental to Christianity; it is close to the center. It is only in the past 60 years or so — since the arrival of the Sexual Revolution — that this has been disputed within Christian churches.

Since then, generations of Christians have been catechized not by their churches, but by the culture.​

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Anecdotally I disagree with this. My peer group as a young guy when was a bunch of WWII vets, many of whom were Christian. And while their churches growing up taught abstinence until marriage, they ignored it, often times quite proudly. The girl in every port... well that was pretty common with many young soldiers, many of whom were Christian back in the 40's. Even my Dad, who grew up some years prior to this said similar things

Today's sexual behaviors among Christians are nothing new, its just that folks are finally being honest about the issue rather than hiding it away.

ViaCrucis said:

I doubt you'll find any mainstream church, regardless of being called "liberal" or "conservative", that condones sex outside of marriage.

-CryptoLutheran

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I guess it matters on how they define marriage.

mnphysicist said:

Anecdotally I disagree with this.

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The OP article quote I provided actually confirms the anecdote you provided.

hedrick said:

I note, by the way, that the title of this thread is probably not the best. There's a difference between premarital sex and promiscuity. Most surveys, including the Gallup poll quoted, simply ask about sex before or outside marriage. Gauging whether it's promiscuous requires additional questions.

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I agree. Until Christians can recognize that difference, they will not be taken seriously in the modern world... at least on this particular point. People are tired of the external, guilt-heavy ethics.

LaBèlla said:

This isn’t a liberal or conservative issue. They’re individual decisions. Most Christians aren’t virgins upon marriage and many aren’t abstinent while single. They want to have sex and they do it.

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Disdain for purity culture seems to be growing, so maybe this is effecting peoples attitudes. If anything, I think this is a good thing. It was misogynistic from the start. It seems to me many people have a more realistic sexual ethic whether they are liberal or conservative, and I think that's a good thing. The sky isn't falling.

Athanasius377 said:

Moralistic Therapeutic Bachelorette

Discuss.

Before posting understand that Rod Dreher is an Eastern Orthodox believer and I don’t know if he actually wrote the headline. Please read the entire article because there is nuance in the body of the article not present in the headline. And remember, this is Christian forums not Twitter.

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I saw quite a lot of promiscuity in a conservative Southern Baptist ecclesial community of which I was a member. It wasn’t the norm but it wasn’t unheard of either.

Why do you suppose Paul banged this drum repeatedly? I suspect because Christians then needed to hear it just as much as Christians now. Or in other words, that it was as much of problem within the early church as it is now. Sex has always been pretty attractive.

FireDragon76 said:

It seems to me many people have a more realistic sexual ethic whether they are liberal or conservative, and I think that's a good thing. The sky isn't falling.

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Anything taken to extremes can be harmful. I wanted my daughter to have a healthy attitude regarding sex and the marital bed. I didn’t want her head filled with guilt or religious dogma that would cause issues later on.

You have to establish the natural reasons why sex within marriage is ideal and provide concrete examples which reinforce your point. Preferably your own.

When addressing faith you must keep in mind that you don’t follow it perfectly and you know better. Nevertheless, you fail. And you must extend the grace you’ve received from God and others.

There’s no use in putting on your church face. They live with you. They know who you really are. You’re wasting your time.

I told my daughter honestly that they were practicing on one another. Teen sex is experimentation. Nothing more or less. And the probability of remaining together is slim to none. It happens on occasion. But it isn’t the rule.

We addressed self-respect and regard. And she attended a one-year etiquette class that met weekly and reinforced the same. Now she’s 28, abstinent and looking forward to marriage.

If you don’t know how to shape a soul and.mold your child. You have no right to complain when they deviate from your ideal if you’ve never the laid the foundation and reinforced it. That’s just wishful thinking.

Athanasius377 said:

Moralistic Therapeutic Bachelorette

Discuss.

Before posting understand that Rod Dreher is an Eastern Orthodox believer and I don’t know if he actually wrote the headline. Please read the entire article because there is nuance in the body of the article not present in the headline. And remember, this is Christian forums not Twitter.

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There are so many people out there who think that, whatever they do, they can do it with impunity, and then fall back on "Jesus still loves me." Of course, Jesus loves us all just the way we are, but he loves us too much to want us to remain the way we are. Frankly, I never watched any of the Bachelor/Bachelorette shows. Or any of the bastardization of marriage shows-90 day fiance, and so on. I think it's disgusting to trivialize marriage.
Personally, I'm in a dilemma, because my wife has terminal cancer, and I have already been approached by someone who wants to be 'my next'. I have always liked this person, but I don't know, I want time to allow my wife to live her life, for me to give her the sacrificial love that marriage demands, and to grieve when that time comes. So 'my next' is the furthest thing from my mind. I'm more like thinking how and where am I going to live, because where I live now, I won't be able to live in retirement, which is only a few years away.
I believe this lady has pushed too far too soon, and I'm sure when I tell her this, she's going to get mad. But that's not my fault.

Anyway, marriage is too important to treat so trivially.

I also blame inappropriate contentography, it affects the brain of thousand of teeneagers who don't get fill so they look for sex.

buzuxi02 said:

Societies that have or (had) success in curbing pre-marital sex made sure they gossiped and had no problem accusing a loose woman of being loose. Compare 1960's Italy or Greece with today., Those people made sure their sons didnt end up with some loose women as they would be given all sorts of well deserved labels. Today the loose and the players are celebrated.

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So pre marital sex is all the woman's fault?

LoreneDD said:

It seems odd that posters have ok’d their own promiscuity when younger but condone those same women when they are older. Very odd reasoning in this thread.

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Again... It's all the woman's fault?

parousia70 said:

So pre marital sex is all the woman's fault?

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Don't make assumptions of stuff buzuxi02 didn't made.

parousia70 said:

Again... It's all the woman's fault?

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Who’s the finger pointing at with the rest pointing back at those pointing the finger? Whoever the victim is that’s the Inn of the cross that Christ meets them at.

redleghunter said:

Well that Luke fella should have known better to go on such a show to find a Christian wife. I’m sure he knew of and watched previous seasons. It’s garbage TV and Luke should have known better.

What the “entertainment” industry loves. Put an unrepentant “fornicating Christian” on display.

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Did you catch on the video clip embedded in the article how the wind cranked up just when she got all indignant about Luke calling her out on her behavior? I was expecting her to call down fire and have thunderbolts coming out of her fingers to zap him! It looked really contrived.

actionsub said:

Did you catch on the video clip embedded in the article how the wind cranked up just when she got all indignant about Luke calling her out on her behavior? I was expecting her to call down fire and have thunderbolts coming out of her fingers to zap him! It looked really contrived.

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Sorry to say what the OP linked is all that I could take.

redleghunter said:

Sorry to say what the OP linked is all that I could take.

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That was the clip in the article that the OP linked. It was pretty weird.