Real Sex: The Naked Truth about Chastity, by Lauren Winner, Brazos Press, 2006. $14.99.192 pg.
Sex is a hot topic and is a reliable standby for talk shows, TV shows, and magazines; but is our culture really having any discussion about sexuality? In Lauren F. Winner’s book, Real Sex: The Naked Truth about Chastity, Winner proposes a sexual revival in the most unlikely place: the Christian church. Proposing that a vast set of truths uncomfortable to pop-culture hedonism are being ignored, in this view sex is not what we see on the big screen: a self-serving, individualistic practice, but instead something inextricably social. This view of sex invites a discussion of the consequences of modern sex and the consequences of churches’ refusal to discuss it, and urges for an honest national argument over sexuality.
Confused churches
Real Sex battles three mainstream attitudes toward sexuality: the repressive, rearguard attitude of many churches, apparent in their purity balls and dogmatic abstinence, the free-for-all carnival of pop-culture, and the growing justification of that pop-culture attitude within the church in the face of the old intransigence. Unlike many Christian commentators, Winner’s fix isn’t simply a cut and paste of rules from the canon of Christian thinkers, nor does she ignore teachings that are difficult to reconcile within a modern world. Instead, she argues that the sex becomes something different when viewed from the context of a larger redemptive story: God’s love and work within the church.
Consequently, Winner has little to say for a skeptical audience that isn’t sold on the Bible. Rather, she tries to understand the teachings of the Bible within society today. Given the predominantly Christian character of America, the failure of churches to provide a healthy alternate view of sexuality is a big problem. The author decries the tendency to either simplistically condemn sexual activity or generally avoiding the topic of sex altogether, creating the impression that sexuality, sex, and even bodies, are sinful things.
An outline for a new debate about sexuality
A new dogma of sex
Though Real Sex is aimed at a Christian audience, its arrival at a time when believers find themselves largely powerless may convince them to attempt a second sexual revolution. Unlike the free love revolution of the 60’s, however, Winner’s book emphasizes freedom to love within the context of sexual responsibility.
Society views sex in an individualistic manner, “yet when we realize that sexual love is a primary force in constructing a household, and that households are primary components of constructing community, it begins to appear, indeed, that sexuality should have a public, communal face.” Culture must develop its relationship with sexuality from public discussion, especially discussion within the religious public; while the current treatment of sexuality is obviously dissatisfactory for Winner, the old censorship of public discussion, and its prudish successors, didn’t work. The primary question is what the conclusions of discussion will be; implicitly, they will be substantively similar to what Christians already believe entering the discussion, and this attitude may prove problematic in the real world.
Social sexuality
If this new public discussion is to occur, however, a likely area will be sex education, which today is primarily concerned with what type of “protection” to use against pregnancy, whether it is abstinence or contraceptives. According to Winner, despite abstinence programs, 52% of girls have sex before they are eighteen. Preaching isn’t working because it lacks the communal aspect of sexuality that can only be found in a discussion of sex. So if America’s teenagers are going to participate in sex, then they should be encouraged to contemplate what sexuality is.
This new approach reaches beyond the school doors, however, into churches, temples, and homes. If discussions of sexuality are to be instituted within the schools, society first has to be comfortable with sending their teenagers to school to discuss sexuality. America can’t reach that comfort level until the rest of society begins the discussion, and if the church takes that role, it may get to influence the outcomes. Real Sex is a first step to creating a new understanding of sexuality within the context of a community; the only question is whether society will listen to participants that already have the answers.