Interestingly, my best friend and I were talking about this last night.

Heh. That happens to me a lot--something comes up somewhere, and then I hear it in a bunch of very separate places, for a few days. How did you get on the subject?

Well, Best Friend called me to ask if she should fly to [another city] to meet a guy for a fling. A married guy. I told her that I wouldn't make that decision for her, because I don't know at what point the consequences of such a decision are too great *for her.*

And so then we started talking about the consequences of sex in general, and how we were both raised to believe that you wait until marriage. So first we used to think premarital sex was BAD. And then that attitude fell by the wayside. So then we used to think that sex with someone HAD TO be with someone you loved, who loved you, and that it had to be DEEPLY SIGNIFICANT AND LIFE-CHANGING EVERY TIME. And then that attitude fell by the wayside.

Which is the point where I said, okay, I used to think I would never have a fling -- just fun!sex with someone I wasn't in love with, but now I've done it, and I have no problem with it. But I still draw the line at picking up a total stranger and having sex with him.

And she said, oh, you'll get over that, too.

But I really don't think I will. That just seems so creepy and squicky.

Paul was, actually, not a woman-hating bastard, and I can explain further if anyone likes, or you can wait for JZ.

Gee, I wish you would, Teppy. Every time I start, I end up shutting my browser window in frustration, and not just because I itch when we hold historical figures to today's standards, but that's a part of it.

Well, it's not even a question of holding a historical figure to today's standards. It's a question of context. Paul was writing his letters to very specific communities of people at very specific times in history. He was addressing *that community's* issues at that moment. He was NOT proclaiming how all Christian communities throughout the rest of the world, for centuries upon centuries, should function.

I think it is completely indefensible organization - utterly morally bankrupt.

You're throwing the baby out with the bathwater. I think their views on sexual subjects are indefensible, but I have a tremendous amount of respect for some of the church's work on poverty, human rights and peace issues. They don't believe respecting life stops after the baby is born, as our president seems to, and I appreciate the consistency. Without John Pauk II's support for the Solidarity movement in Poland, we might still have a USSR.

(And then there's Dorothy Day and the Catholic Worker movement -- I had a sort of mentor in college who was involved with a similar group, and I saw how much his faith backed his work for some very liberal causes -- he co-founded a punk activist group that's lasted almost 20 years, among other things.)

most of what I hate has been driven by the religious right. Suspension of habeus corpus, justifying torture, war mongering, oppressing dissent, disenfranchising gays, disenfranchising blacks. These aren't just political issues. The Conservatives have grounded these choices in their religious beliefs.

I think the only thing on that list with a religious basis is the anti-gay sentiment. Everything else has more to do with imperialism and profiteering. True, some religious people love the idea of converting the heathens, but I don't think that's a primary motive for most of it.

(Also, religious groups tore down slavery and helped fight prejudice, as much as they helped build it.)

For what it's worth -- I'm not religious. I'm not built with that capacity for belief, and I can't convince myself that any current religious myth is any more meaningful than those of the Romans or ancient Egyptians. But I also remember that people acting in the name of God have done tremendously good things as well as tremendously bad ones.

Also,

Creationism isn't just another reasonable idea. It's anti-scientific. It's wrong.

On this we agree. It comes down to what I was saying about sex ed -- tell kids the facts in school, and let their parents and churches handle any alternate beliefs.

I'm also going to ditto all of what Hec just said.

As the conversation progressed, it became clear that, in her head, condoms meant the sex was more sinful then sex without condoms. Both were not okay according to how she was raised, but condoms were a bigger sin.

Yeah. I knew women in college who couldn't prepare for sex (i.e. by having birth control around) because that would mean admitting to themselves that they actually planned to have sex. They could stand "Oh, whoops, I seem to be in bed again! Wow, I was really drunk last night!" but not "I think I'll be seeing Jimmy in the altogether soon , need to shop for condoms."

[x-post with Connie!]

wrod.

I see the concept of sex must wait until marriage as a problem because of two reasons:

1)it makes ( in many people's minds) marriage=sex. sorry, my marriage is more than sex and I would be married even if there suddenly was no sex. and keep my vows of faithfulness.

2) I 've seen too many people get married before they were ready. because of sex. most failed.

and a third reason - Like I said before - if I waited until I got married - I would have been 32. I hope that I had enough reason before than to deal with sex. and since I was in no way an early bloomer(20 or 21?) I think my judgement about being ready , was pretty good.

I've typed and erased about ten different thoughts here, so I guess I have no overall point, except that I'd better figure something out by the time she's a teenager.

You and me both.

I've had good sex and emotionally healthy sex, but those things were not always with the same partner, and damn if I know how I'm going to be able to explain how fraught the whole thing is.

(I don't, actually, personally believe in sex-for-the-sake-of-sex. This is not to say I've never done it, but it's not really what I'm wired for.)

But I still draw the line at picking up a total stranger and having sex with him.

Let me explore your lines for a moment -- how about being picked up by a total stranger - is that a total skeeve too?

But I still draw the line at picking up a total stranger and having sex with him.

Let me explore your lines for a moment -- how about being picked up by a total stranger - is that a total skeeve too?

Totally. Actually, I didn't consider them 2 separate things until you asked that -- me picking a stranger up and a stranger picking me up are equal in my mind.

Huh. I guess that's one thing coming of age in the 80s did for me, condoms were easily available and frequently used. We had coin operated dispensers in the dorms.