Sex - 1 Corinthians 5:1

Moving in to chapter 5 is a really interesting change of topics because Paul goes right into his receiving reports “that there is fornication among you.” Sex is such a remarkable subject because there is nothing else like it in this life, I don’t think. A sexual relationship can be absolutely incredible and hugely fulfilling. In fact, it is so important that Dr. Phil once said, and I agree with him, if the sex life is healthy then it’s only 10% of the relationship. But if the sex is unhealthy, then it is 90% of the relationship.” On the other hand, sex can be weaponized, traumatic, and horrifying. That is a lot of power for just one aspect of human behavior.

Let’s imagine a line where “0” is in the middle and to the left of “0” is marked by  negative numbers with the highest value being “destroying a life,” as in the case of rape, molestation, and assault. Then on the right side of “0” we have increasing positive numbers with the a value of “intimate connection with your eternal companion” at the ¾ mark and the highest value being “create a life.”

“Destroy a life”_-6__-5__-4__-3__-2__-1__0    1     2     3     4     5     6      "Create a life"

 With the value “destroy a life” I mean to emphasize the significance of the consequences of rape, molestation, assault, humiliation, betrayal, etc. While you typically can’t kill someone with sex, you can make really ruin someone’s life with it. That might sound like an exaggerated opinion, but in my experience both personally and working in women’s health for the last 20 years, when someone is sexually assaulted as a child, their whole lives are altered almost irreparably. Childhood sexual assault is horrific and horrifically common, and when it happens, the child’s brain reconfigures itself so that the child can cope with the trauma of what happened, and protect itself from further trauma, especially if it is repeated, which many times it is.

With a brain that has been hardwired to protect itself from sexual trauma, the victims usually end up with altered world views and negative behaviors that are both self-destructive and meant for self-preservation. Tell me that a person who has been the victim of sexual assault has the chance to live a normal life after they have had their bodily autonomy violated, been caused physical pain, and had their brain makeup changed.

 If we took a “normal” person to the doctor’s office, broken their arm and then gave them surgery that changed the way that their brain works, that victim would not be expected to walk away from that experience without any change in who they are or how they handled life after that. That person would no longer have any feelings of safety, and their brains would have been changed so that dealing with this trauma would be more difficult. Now imagine all that trauma being related to sex, something that is supposed to be great. 

Whether we are talking about being groped on the bus or being a child sex slave, the consequences of any sexual misconduct are life changing. I have personally known so many people, both men and women, who experienced childhood sexual assault and had their whole lives altered by sometimes even single events. I’ve known so many people that decades later do the stupidest things and I can trace it back to consequences relating to that childhood trauma that they were victims of. All of this is to demonstrate just how absolutely life-altering negative sexual experiences can be. 

The inverse of this is actually quite appropriate because if sex can destroy a life, then ironically, it is the only way to create life as well, which is why it is the highest value on the positive scale. Along with creating life, there are also the positives of building a physical relationship with you eternal companion, which can be amazing. I honestly think that sex is one of the reasons why spirits alone can not realize a fullness of joy without their bodies, sex and food, both are big deals.

I can’t think of a single aspect of life that has power like sex does, both to create and to destroy. And unfortunately, I believe that more people experience the negative aspects of the “sexual quality of life” scale than the positive. That might be one of the reasons why Heavenly Father has so highly regulated the sexual aspect of the human experience. I mean really, if we think about the purpose of the commandments, the whole reason we are given them is because they are the universal laws of happiness. God gives us these commandments because obeying them keeps us safe and happy, whereas breaking them leads to unhappiness.

This has been really insightful for me and I’ve learned a lot just thinking through why Paul even needs to address the issue of “fornication among you.” Paul is really difficult to understand in this chapter and honestly the only reason that I know what he’s talking about at all is from the IM. The IM explains saying, “The word fornication was translated from the Greek porneia, which refers to any sexual relations outside of marriage. Porneia is also the root word for pornography. One instance of fornication that Paul had learned of involved a Church member who was in a sexual relationship with his stepmother. Such a relationship was forbidden in Old Testament law and was viewed as being wrong even among non-Christians.” 

This is not to say that Christians have a monopoly on morality or anything like that, but even among those who had looser interpretations of sexual behaviors, this was pushing it. I think that one thing that should be addressed is that just because someone is a Christian or a member of the Church doesn’t mean that they are exempt from sexual misconduct or even just temptation, sometimes just the opposite is true. It’s like that C.S. Lewis quote that goes something like “a man who gives into temptation after 5 minutes doesn’t know the power of temptation like the man who fights it the whole time and never gives in.” Something like that.

The rest of the chapter covers Paul’s disapproval of how this man who was having sex with his step-mother was handled by Church leaders in the area, but we’ll cover that tomorrow because this has been pretty informative for me already today.