Why Christians Care So Much About Sexual Sins

Some time ago at a mall, I happened to be walking behind a beautiful woman--a woman that, by almost any American's standard, would be considered attractive. She was not dressed particularly provocatively, but I did take note of the fact that she was beautiful. As I walked along maybe fifteen or twenty feet behind her in the same direction, I watched others as they watched her. Women did not seem to notice her, but a large percentage of men passing the other way or sitting adjacent gawked at her. Some tried to hide it from the woman or from their own wives, while others unashamedly whipped their heads all the way around and made crude gestures as she passed. I didn't hear whistling but I certainly expected it at any moment. Watching these men do this struck a moral nerve in me that caused disgust toward those men but then serious regret for the times that I've done the same thing. (Sins always look worse on others than on ourselves.)

After this experience, I began to contemplate what it must be like for that woman. Is it like this everywhere she goes? Is she used to it? Does she like it? Does she feel trapped or subtly victimized? What I think is so terrible about this is that this apparently innocent woman was essentially reduced to an object. But why?

I suppose that it is possible that she is a known prostitute/cat-strangler/voodoo priestess in town and that I'm the only one who didn't know. In that case, it would make sense that people would turn and stare at this woman they had heard about--but why only the men? My intuition tells me that this is about sex. This poor woman has been reduced from a person with hopes and dreams to a mere object of fantastical sexual pleasure in the minds of the passersby.

Everyday in every town in our nation, women are objectified just like this woman. You can see it. Next time you see a woman jogging down the road, watch the lingering eyes of some of the drivers as they pass. Some will honk, some will slow down, and others will nearly drive their cars into the ditch or on-coming traffic. This rightfully ought to produce an inner sense of disgust and perversion toward the sin of lust (in ourselves and in others).

beef tenderloin

A thought experiment

C.S. Lewis reasoned through two possible explanations for this sexual obsession by way of a thought experiment. In Mere Christianity [1], he imagines a land in which the residents attend bizarre food peep shows. The people sit in a theater with a curtained stage. On the other side of the curtain is some delectable food--let's say, a tenderloin. The crowd sits in eager expectation, hooting and hollering, waiting for the curtain to open just seconds before the lights are turned off.  This behavior seems bizarre to us. The question Lewis wants us to consider is, what might be the cause for the food obsession? 

• One group theorizes that the cause of the obsession is starvation. They have been deprived of adequate food for so long that they have become obsessed with the thought of their next meal. Since food is an analogy for sex, this is the position of sexual libertarians. They blame puritanical Christian religion for starving us of our natural inclinations and need for sex. Abstinence is the problem, and sexual exposure is the solution. Christians have stigmatized human sexuality to the point that it has caused a sort of neurosis of starvation.
• Another group, on the other hand, might argue that the bizarre food obsession is caused by gluttony. The problem is not a lack of sex in culture but an excess attention to it. This is the position that many Christians rightly take today, arguing that our society has become so sex-obsessed that a perfectly good thing (sex) has become this bizarre freak show. Lewis writes, "Starving men may think much about food, but so do gluttons; the gorged, as well as the famished, like titillations."

Which of the two positions is supported by the sociological and historical evidence? Are we living in a culture that has been deprived of sex or a society saturated with sex? It is difficult for me imagine anyone arguing for the former. America is the largest consumer of pornography per capita in the whole world. The statistics regarding the consumption of sex and pornography in America are staggering.

Why Christians care so much about sexual sins

There is so much more that can be said on this topic, but C.S. Lewis' illustration explains why Christians care so much about sexual sins--they lead to total societal obsession. Christians want to stand against the tide of sexual obsession in society, because it leads to the victimization of our neighbors, and Jesus commands us to love our neighbors (Matthew 22:34-40). Women, like the one at the mall, are reduced to the status of a plate of beef tenderloin.

Societies obsessed with sex develop such pathologies as homosexuality, bestiality, pedophilia, rape, sadomasochism, prostitution, and sex trafficking. These are all activities that lead to individual and/or societal victimization, and it disproportionately affects women and children. In addition, these activities and lifestyles contribute to psychological and physical harm, and they jeopardize public health through the spread of disease and addiction. The proper Christian response is not motivated by self-righteousness, "for there is no one righteous," (Romans 3:10) but from a desire to protect our neighbors, their children, their wives, their mothers, and their daughters from being victimized. [2] Christians desire to have a preservative effect on society that protects everyone, especially the most vulnerable among us. We care so much about sexual sin, because we want to do our part to create a society in which our daughters don't be come slaves.

A wise man once told me that sin will always take you further than you want to go, and I've learned that that is as true of society as it is of the individual. I don't think sexual libertarians really want to go to where their theories will take them.

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[1] Mere Christianity, Book 3, Chapter 5.