The birth control pill first became available for public use in 1960. Today, some 60 years later, the idea that we might safely and reliably prevent conception during intercourse has become so ingrained in our social consciousness that it’s hard to remember, let alone believe the great controversy the pill created when it came along. Canada did not legalize it—or any form of contraception, for that matter—until 1969, almost a decade later.
The Catholic church was famously opposed to the pill when it exploded on the scene, and to this day it teaches that any form of artificial contraception is intrinsically evil. Protestants were more ready to accept the pill, but even so, most Protestants traditions had only started embracing contraception some 20 or 30 years prior (the Anglicans, for instance, did not formally approve of birth control until the Lambeth Conference of 1930).
Many scholars have traced out the connective tissue between the advent of the birth control pill, on the one hand, and the sexual revolution of the 60s, on the other. Never before had there been such a safe and reliable means of preventing pregnancy, especially one that put the power in the hands of women themselves. The role this played in the social transformation that occurred in the 60s and 70s—changes in how men and women related to one another, changes in deeply-rooted sexual mores, changes in dating and marriage and family—is hard to overestimate.
Among those changes, I would argue, is the modern assumption that the psychological function of sex is separate from its procreative function, that the pleasures of intercourse, the human bonding it facilitates, and/or the emotional well-being we experience in a sexually fulfilling relationship can be enjoyed in a way completely separated from the possibility of begetting children. Even the notion that sex could be “fulfilling” without it “fulfilling” its most obvious purpose of procreation is one that could only have a stall in the marketplace of ideas, I think, because the pill made it conceivable (no pun intended), conceivable that sex could happen with no risk or potential of making babies.
(In saying this, I am not meaning to suggest naively that prior to the 60s, no one had sex except when they wanted to make a baby. I am well aware that things like fornication, adultery, and lust have existed since Genesis Chapter 3; nor am I under any illusions as to which of the professions is oldest. The fact, however, that past societies always censured such carryings on, and controlled them through a range of strict social taboos, proves the point I am trying to make. In previous generations, traditional social mores around sex existed primarily to protect the children that were all kinds of likely to be produced by the sex act, and more broadly to protect the community from the problem of having to care for babies that their parents had no intention of raising. It's no accident that the decline in our hang-ups around extramarital sex coincides so exactly with the rise of reliable, safe, and readily available birth control.)
At any rate, the modern view of sex—that the act of intercourse is somehow separate in function from the act of procreation—did not only create a social revolution. It also caused one in the church (the Catholic prohibition against the pill not withstanding).
When I became a pastor 20 years ago, it was not uncommon for preachers to preach from time to time on “God’s design” for sex. I’ve certainly heard more than one such sermon. Though I’m still cringing from the worst ones I’ve heard, the best of them were very tactful, sensitive, and honest, talking frankly about the pleasures of sex, the bonds it creates between people, and wounds it can create when it’s misused or abused. For the life of me, however, I cannot remember a single sermon on sex that spoke eloquently, passionately, and enthusiastically about the plain fact that the reason we humans do it is to perpetuate the species. (I lump myself in with this critique. I once preached a verse-by-verser through the Song of Solomon, and, if I recall, I did not once name baby-making as sex’s primary purpose … but more on this in a moment).
If we have followed the culture in bifurcating the psychological and procreative functions of sex, then whatever else we’re doing, we are being, in the strictest and technical sense, unbiblical.
I believe that a fulsome, sober, and unbiased reading of the Scripture would leave most objective readers with the conclusion that the reason God gave people “the gift of sex” (as so many of the aforementioned sermons like to describe it), was so that they would, and could “be fruitful and multiply.” That is to say that biblically, sex was expressly designed for the purpose of procreation, and all the other attendant goods of sex are there primarily to serve this main purpose. Sex was made to feel good (to put it crassly) so that people would be better motivated to procreate; sex forms a deep psychological bond between the partners (a little less crassly) so that the children formed by the act of intercourse would have a better chance of being raised by both parents, and so on.
Let me pause at this point to make it clear where I am not going with this line of reasoning. I am not trying to argue that contraception is wrong. I am not trying to argue that God wants us not to have sex unless it’s to make babies, or that it's a sin to have sex that is intentionally non-procreative. I have many friends, Christian and non-Christian alike, who have not had children, some for health reasons, some, tragically, because they could not conceive, others by choice, others still by some personal combination of the above. If what I have written adds pain to an already painful circumstance, or guilt to couples who have nothing to feel guilty about, this post will have failed pitifully in what it’s trying to do.
All I am trying to do is to point out that the witness of the Bible gives us to understand that the ultimate reason to have sex is to have children. Conservative Christians often argue that one reason to denounce same-sex sex is because, the exegesis of specific passages aside, the Bible is oriented exclusively toward heterosexual sex. I would argue, however, that this is not saying enough. The Bible is not oriented toward heterosexual sex, in and of itself. The Bible is oriented toward procreative sex. If we have embraced other reasons to have sex, reasons that have nothing to do with having children, it is only because we have done what Christians do on all sorts of ethical issues, something I am arguing in this series that we can and should do in regards to same-sex sexuality. We have taken the clear witness of the Scripture, on the one hand, and then integrated it with our experience of life in the world that is, on the other.
Let me make the case briefly for the first point in that preceding paragraph—that the Bible is oriented exclusively toward procreative sex—before moving on to the second. There’s not room for a full treatment of the relevant data but suffice it to say that the creation mandate in Genesis 1:27 clearly indicates that humans were to be fruitful and multiply. By implication, then, sex would be necessary if people were to fulfill this part of their human calling. From this starting point, the Bible gives us no positive example of people engaging in intercourse for non-procreative purposes. Every instance where a couple is unable to conceive is presented as a tragic loss (Abraham and Sarah, Jacob and Leah, Hannah and Elkanah, etc.). By contrast, all the examples of non-procreative sex we find in the Bible are presented as horrific examples of what not to do: Onan withdrawing before ejaculation, the Persian Emperor requiring Esther to “sexually please him,” Ammon’s rape of Tamar, and so on.
Evangelicals often reach for the Song of Songs at this point in the discussion. “Not so,” we will say. “The Song of Songs is a whole entire book of the Bible celebrating God’s gift of sex and it contains no mention of childbearing whatsoever.” When we say this, however, we are giving away how deeply the contraception revolution of the last 60 years has shaped our view of sex. No ancient reader would come away from reading the Song of Songs, I think, believing that all the joy and pleasure these lovers are finding in each other was not, fundamentally, about bringing bouncing babies into the world. It’s no accident that the poem’s imagery is shot through and through with images of flourishing gardens and fruit-laden trees. Nor is it just a throwaway line when, at the outset of the poem, the beloved tells her lover that she intends to bring him “into her mother’s house,” to the place where her mother conceived her (and, by implication, the place where all mothers conceive (3:4, see also 8:2)). This is about as clear a reference to the woman’s (fertile) womb as you could expect in a poem as lyrical and symbolic as this.
Whatever else it is, the Song of Songs is an epithalamion, an ancient near eastern fertility poem, and if modern readers like us overlook all the thinly-veiled references to the fertility of this couple, it is only because we have learned to think that making love and making babies are two fundamentally different activities.
Admittedly, the picture does change somewhat in the New Testament. Contrary to popular evangelical sensibilities, though, the change is actually away from sex altogether (not, rather, a change towards non-procreative sex). Jesus clearly upholds the path of singleness and celibacy as an ideal way of following him (Matthew 19:12), and Paul underscored this teaching of our Lord (1 Cor 7:7). In both instances, though, Jesus and Paul each make it clear that only those who can receive this yoke and walk this path (those who have the “charism” of celibacy, as Paul might say it), should do so. Those who cannot are enjoined to marry and, by implication, have children (or at least have sex in a context where the possibility of childbearing exists).
Again, to be clear: I am not meaning to argue that Christians who marry must have children, or that there is anything wrong when married Christians have non-procreative sex, whether its because they’re using contraception, or for some other reason.
All I am saying is that the witness of the Bible is oriented exclusively towards seeing sex and procreation as, essentially, one and the same thing. The reason to do it is to have kids, and all the other reasons people might do it are actually there, ultimately, to serve that first reason. I do not agree with the Catholics on this one, but I am willing to admit that they are applying the witness of the Bible far more consistently than the Protestants do, when they forbid contraception. A plain reading of the whole counsel of God on the matter would certainly point you to that conclusion.
So why do Christians (excepting the Catholics) use contraception, and approve of it, and counsel newly-weds to do so (or at least, we don’t counsel them not to), and all of this without blinking an eye at the fact that our use of contraception moves fundamentally against the warp-and-woof of a biblical view of sex?
My answer is that we tend to take what I am calling an “integrative view” of contraception. An integrative view is one that acknowledges and honors the witness of Scripture—in this case, that God’s intention for sex is that it produce children—but also acknowledges the fact that we live in a world where things do not always fit neatly and tidily into biblical categories. There may be health reasons not to have children. There may be reasons related to one’s Christian vocation. There may be circumstances where it’s not possible or advisable for a couple to try to conceive. They may simply be unprepared or ill-equipped to have children. And in those instances, wise Christians acknowledge that it would not be wise or kind to suggest that such couples refrain from having sex simply because they’re not willing or able to have children when they do.
As with my previous examples of pacifism and divorce, an integrative view on the question of contraception takes the biblical witness with all seriousness, but then seeks wisely to integrate it with the complicated realities of our lived experience. And whether we realize it or not, this is what Christians are doing when we use contraception.
Of course, this series is not about contraception, per se. It is about a Christian response to LGBTQ+ identities and same-sex marriage. My ultimate point is that I think it is possible to adopt an integrative approach in our response to LGBTQ+ issues, in a way similar to what we do with these other examples I’ve discussed. If I have dwelt longer than necessary on the issue of contraception, it’s only because with this question we are getting closer to the heart of our ultimate theme. If we can find ways to integrate the witness of the Scripture and our posture toward non-procreative sex for heterosexual people, is it not possible to do something similar when it comes to our posture towards LGBTQ+ people and their experience of their sexuality?
That is not a rhetorical question. In coming posts I hope to unpack it at length and draw some conclusions. At this point in the discussion, however, suffice it simply to say this: if we really wanted to apply the Bible’s teaching on sex with the strictest of literalism, we would not simply reject same-sex sex, we would also reject any form of contraception that artificially closes heterosexual sex off from the possibility of procreation. And if we don't do so on the later, perhaps we need not do so on the former, either.
0 comments:
Post a Comment