If sex is wrong, why did God create it? This is the question that Pope John Paul II treated in his Theology of the Body which he delivered in public addresses between 1979 and 1984. The pope saw a great need in contemporary society to understand the experience of humanity with sexuality and to give the Christian answer to the question.
In fact, the Roman world in which Christ lived was very nuch similar to our contemporary world. Divorce was common; Marriage was not common; Roman men preferred to stay single and enjoy a non-committed life. Evils such as abortion and infanticide were everywhere as was homosexual "life style". In the midst of these moral diseases, Christ referred to Genesis and declared that "what God has joined together let no man put asunder."
The pope, following Christ, takes us back to “the beginning” as narrated in Genesis. We discover, there, 4 experiences of man:
Original Solitude;
Original Unity;
Original Nakedness; and
Original Sin.
In Genesis 2, we see how God after creating everything went on to perfect his creation:
Then the LORD God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him." So out of the ground the LORD God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all cattle, and to the birds of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for the man there was not found a helper fit for him. So the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh; and the rib which the LORD God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man." Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh. And the man and his wife were both naked, and were not ashamed.
Original Solitude:
First, the positive element: man was alone with God. God walked in the garden and spoke with man. Man enjoyed a unique relationship with God - a relation that is different from animals relation with God. This uniqueness is based on the fact that the human is created "in the image of God."
Second, the negative aspect: Man was not perfect. God brought all creatures to man. Man gave each animal a name. In the Old Testament language, this means that man had power over all creatures. But still man was not satisfied with animals. This original experience, the pope calls it Original Solitude.
Original Unity:
Since man was not fulfilled by his loneliness, God put him into deep sleep and made a woman from man’s flesh and brought her to him. Man saw the woman and said "This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man." The woman is different from the man. She complements him. Man at last finds his perfection in this partner who is made from his body. The pope calls the experience of this relationship, Original Unity.
Original Unity: It expresses love and intimacy between man and woman. It is here that the man-woman relationship reflects and mirrors the eternal relationship in God of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. God is a "relatedness" or "relationship" of persons who subsist eternally in love. Here more than ever we find the meaning that they are created in the image and likeness of God. The masculine and feminine attributes are meant to distinguish the man and the woman, yet unite them. We notice that there are differences between men and women, not only physically, but also psychologically. Women have strong abilities in making relationships. Sexually, a woman relates the sexual act to feelings towards her partner more than to merely his physical attractiveness. Men on the other hand, like to achieve results. Sexually, a man often takes the initiative in intercourse. So Adam is attracted to Eve not only physically but also psychologically. He "cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh."
Original Nakedness:
We read "And the man and his wife were both naked, and were not ashamed." In their original state, Adam and Eve had no barriers between them in their communication and life. They were free as children experience freedom. There is a lot of talk today about freedom. However what we mean is choice, not freedom. I choose to go to work, and do my shopping. These are choices that we make every day. But freedom is deeper than mere choice. The experience is particularly strong when we do not "follow the crowd" and lose our freedom. Freedom means surrender to love and trust. This is the experience that little children have - they just trust everyone around them. This is why they can run naked. Christ invited his disciples to be like children in order to enter heaven. Original nakedness is the expression of true freedom. And only true freedom can beget true love. In freedom, one lets go of his own life in love for the other (human), and the "Other" (God). Freedom is a sign of the mature person. The more we love the more we become free.
What did the writer of Genesis mean by “ashamed”? What is shame? According to author Roger Scruton, there is such a thing as "moral shame" and such a thing as "sexual shame." Moral shame is my experience when I do something wrong and somebody else discovers my wrongdoing. Sexual shame is different. If I perform a sexual act that I know is wrong, then I may experience sexual shame. Scruton says that sexual shame arises "from the thought that we are being judged as a body, a mechanism, an object." Shame then can protect us from getting involved in wrong sexual acts.
Original Sin:
Original Sin, as we all know, is an act of pride and mistrust. It is a wound that we carry in our souls and bodies. We are good, not evil, but since the Fall, we find evil attractive (concupiscence). We can avoid evil with much inner struggle. This is the experience of great saints too like St. Paul himself (Romans 7). How does Original Sin affect us? Contrary to Original Solitude, we find it hard to experience God. Some people doubt his existence. Contrary to Original Unity, we find it hard to get along with each other and accept each other for who we are. Contrary to Original Nakedness, we find it hard to do good things - We easily lose freedom and try to control our own lives: "This is my life and I will do with it whatever I want."
Redemption:
Christ, the Word of God, enters human history and becomes one of us to redeem fallen humanity from the consequences of Original Sin, and to restore to it the 3 positive original experiences, i.e. Original Solitude, Original Unity, and Original Nakedness.
How is redemption possible in the Theology of the Body?
From Original Solitude, we learn that the human body is symbolic. The word
Symbolic comes from a Greek word that means "to be thrown together." We know from the experience of Original Solitude that it had a positive and a negative aspect. Positively: Although Adam was part of creation, he sensed that he had a unique relationship with the creator, and that he was essentially different from, and superior to the other creatures. Negatively, Adam was unable to find another body-person like him. He was solitary, alone. From these two aspects or dimensions, we learn that we are made of matter like animals -this is the visible dimension. However, we have an invisible dimension. We can communicate with God. Like God we have thoughts- we know that we know. These two dimensions are distinct in man but not separate. The human body is, therefore, more than just matter. It points to the spiritual, and the intellect. Unlike animals, humans live in a world of symbols expressed in language. For humans, the senses have physical and spiritual meanings. The sense of touch for example helps us do our duties. We would not be able to drive a car without it. But note how it is used in communicating love. People who love each other touch each other, hug each other, and kiss each other. Unlike animal bodies which simply make present the animal body, the human body makes present the whole person. The world of symbols we live in is confirmed by Original Solitude. From all the creatures, Adam could not find another body like his. He could form a partnership only with Eve. Only Eve`s body was symbolic.
From the experience of Original Unity, we learn that the human body is nuptial. When Adam saw Eve, he felt he could be one with her. She was different and he realized her body complemented his. In fact a man’s body is more muscular than a woman’s body. There are also the sexual differences. The man enters the woman in sexual intercourse, and she receives him in her body. And they become “one flesh.” This is why John Paul II says the human body is
nuptial. The human body, according to him, is meant for love. Sex involves caressing, touching and communicating love in words. It is again an act in the world of symbols. John Paul II concludes that the human body has a language. Sex is a unique form of language. Sex speaks a sensual language but also speaks a language of love.
From the experience of Original Nakedness, we know that the human body, before the Fall, was free. Original Nakedness is symbolic of freedom which is the basis of true love. Without freedom a man and woman could not give nor accept the gift of love. However, every human body is affected by Original Sin. The most radical effect and consequence of Original Sin is the experience of death. But God is a God of life. “God did not make death and he does not delight in the death of the living. For he created all things that they might exist” says the Biblical Book of Wisdom. In addition to death, Original Sin causes disordered sexual desires. The man sees the woman as a sexual object, and she sees him too as a sexual object. Sin can make it hard to see how the human body is symbolic. Today, our culture promotes an image of sex as body momentary pleasure. We see this in TV, the internet, magazines and mainly in the huge industry of pornography.
From the experience of loving Jesus Christ, we start to know that the human body is redeemed. His body died on the cross to renew ours. God, who is totally beyond our sight, is now visible to us. As creation is God's act to pour out the Trinity's eternal self-emptying love, the Incarnation culminating in Christ's bodily death and Resurrection, is God's loving act to restore humanity to its original image - In Eastern Christian terminology, it is called "Divinization of Man."
"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." says the opening verse of the Gospel attributed to John the Apostle. Words, if spoken sincerely, proceed from within one person and reach the heart of another person. A word is from heart to heart. "But what if a word were actually a person?" Asks Anthony Percy in his volume "The Theology of the Body made simple" And his answer is "Yes...This would be a word-person. Jesus is this person...He is the word spoken by the Father to us." We receive the word of God through two ways: Scripture and the Sacraments, but especially in the Eucharist.
Let's briefly mention a few contemporary questions with sex. Divorce, premarital sex and pornography. They are rampant in our society, so how do we deal with them?
First: Marriage is a covenant. How do we understand a covenant? Take for example the Old Testament stories of covenants. God commits his very life for his people, and the people in turn, commit themselves to God. Go back to the beginning in Genesis. On seeing the woman, the man undertakes a huge change in his life. He clings to the woman. The man and the woman form “one flesh.” i.e. they form a covenant – each gives the other not something, but everything - The whole person. The same sexual act takes place in marriage. When a man and woman have intercourse in marriage, God is there. It is a
sacred act. It is
indissoluble. This is why all marriage whether Christian, Jewish, or Muslim is indissoluble in the eyes of the Church. However, the Christian marriage is a sacrament in which the man and the woman participate in the New Covenant established by Christ. Not only it cannot be dissolved if entered in properly, but also is a
participation in God’s very life. True love is not mere feelings - It is commitment and enduring sacrifice more than mere feelings. It is being one flesh as Adam and Eve experienced their Original Unity. John Paul II says that man becomes the image of God not so much in solitude as in communion. Moreover,
the sexual act invites God: It is unitive and procreative. Man and woman participate with God in creation. Their love being fruitful participates in creation and in bringing up children - It mirrors the Trinity "a communion of love." Because God is within the other, marriage may be called a voyage of discovery of the infinite. The word “enthusiasm” comes from two Greek words en (within) and theo (God) and so means the “god-within” When a person is really enthusiastic, it seems as though there is a God-within inspiring that person. The married couple can face each other with the enthusiasm of love as they embark on the discovery of God within each other. Contrary to the culture of death pervasive in this society, the Church proposes a culture of life and a "civilization of love" as expressed by Pope Paul VI. In divorce, we destroy the commitment of love and harm its fruit, our children. Recent studies have shown that children of divorce are more confused and prone to problems in their marriage than children of faithful marriage.
This leads us to the discussion about premarital sex. Sex does not belong only to the physical senses. Rather, sex belongs to the world of symbol, communication and love. Nor can sex be reduced to an experiment. It is meant for life-long relationship between one man and one woman. Sex is the seal on a relationship, not its beginning. When a man and a woman experiment with sex outside of permanent marriage, they can confuse lust for love. The giving of one’s body to another is always something of a lie, unless it is part of the total giving and commitment of all of oneself forever. Premarital sex and adultery (seeking sexual gratification of a married person outside marriage) are wrong because, in varying degrees, they contain this lie. Adultery also hurts the spouse whose spouse is involved in the sexual act and promotes a masked polygamy. The solution to premarital sex is to consider what God does (he loves) and gives (dignity). In this deepest of all relationships, man should not go the cheap way but consider that the woman he loves is equal and equally blessed by God's love who gave her dignity as a child. Man better abstain from sex that makes her an object of his desire, and wait until they are married to express that love as an eternal gift of self and exclusive to her and fruitful as God's creation of us was so fruitful. The fruit is yet another dignity called a child. And in fact the family they build will resemble the family of God (man and woman beget a fruit of their love that is full of life and not only passing emotion.) True Love Waits is a message that has attracted today many youths in North America.
How about pornography? “Pornography focuses only on the visible and erotic.” writes Percy. It reduces the human person to an object and excludes the invisible dimension of the human person. Notice too that in pornography we destroy the symbolic and nuptial experiences of the human body. In our contemporary society, many people have become isolated rather than experiencing the community. Both husband and wife work all day that by the time they are back from the office, they are both exhausted and hardly communicate. In this context of isolation, it is easy to turn to pornography or extra-marital sexual affairs as a shallow substitute for real sexual fulfillment. The solution to pornography’s slavery is to go back to the beginning: Original Nakedness. No following of “the crowd” and nurturing of mutual love between husband and wife.
Original Solitude; Original Unity; Original Nakedness; and New Life in Christ. Four experiences that Pope John Paul II invites the world to experience and live.
George Farahat
October 2008
References:
Theology of the Body made simple, by Anthony Percy, published by Pauline Books, 2005·
Marriage, Divorce and Nullity, by Bishop Geoffrey Robinson, published by Dave Communications, copyright (c) 1984
·
Theology of the Body,
http://www.christopherwest.com/
