To be touched, to be kissed, to be played with. How can we forget that we are covered by skin? Perhaps because we’ve been taught that we are “covered by sin”?
A dear friend who has the utter misfortune of being married to a beautiful woman who loves God more than anything else (including him, poor fellow), confessed to me the other day that he has forgotten how it feels to be touched by someone who desires nothing but his pleasure.
He loves his wife, and knows that she thinks that she loves him as well (how can she not, being so well versed in the theology of love), but she has the habit of opening her Bible instead of her legs when they go to bed, of longing for a spiritual experience instead of an orgasm, and of expecting him to understand that she loves him more because of her love for God. That he is not yet an atheist is really admirable.
Perhaps she should leave the Psalms and turn to Shakespeare, who understood that “They do not love that do not show their love.” And he can quote Otomo No Yakamochi , who wrote that “It’s better never to have met you in my dream than to wake and reach for hands that are not there.”
But I suspect that all of this will not help. “We cease loving ourselves if no one loves us”, said Madame De Staël. Being loved by God is not quite the same as being touched, being kissed, and being played with.
This is a brilliant post. I share your views on and agree with every word and sentence that you wrote. That this man is not atheist is in fact a miracle that his wife should thank her god for.
As much as we have been told that sex is bad and sinful in all aspects until marriage, let me say that I think sex is definitely a large, large part of a relationship. I am willing to say that sex is close to 60% of a relationship. Not necessarily the actual act, but the enjoyment, comfortability and openness that it produces within a relationship when it is handles correctly. Your poor friend.
Yes - You cannot have a negative (sinful) view of sex outside of marriage, and then expect this view to disappear when married.
But we all know that sex should be treated with the respect it deserves, as it involves the emotional life of another person (and the possibility of new life in a heterosexual relationship).
I also think that the decision not to have sex before marriage does not necessarily mean that you have a negative view of sex - it’s simply a decision. But if it is because of a negative view, it will most definitely be carried over into marriage - as with my poor friend.
A big part of the problem might lie in the fact that women are taught from childhood that sex is evil, and bad and disgusting. This unfortunately stays with you unless you have a mother like mine, who was secure in herself and loved her body enough not to make us feel ashamed of ours.
What is really unfortunate though, is that if a woman does enjoy sex, she is perceived to be a slut or a nympho. It’s a lose-lose situation.
Great post!
True. And sad. As they say: A man wants a slut in the bed, and an angel in the home - as long as it’s your bed and your home.
Reminds me of a great Milan Kundera short story (The Hitchhiking Game) where a girl and a boy in a car at the beginning of their summer holiday start playing a manipulative game. They pretend that they do not know each another and that they have just met for the first time. The boy pretends he is a womaniser, and the girl plays being a hitchhiker who looks for a sexual encounter. The game destroys their relationship, because the boy believes that her acting is just to real - she must really be slut to be so convincing.
Why can one not be a slut and an angel at the same time? To enjoy the bliss of a treacherous body - sin? So many questions, so many different answers…
Hello Itisi,
The worst is the best, and the best is the best of the worst.
There Is No End To A Good Thing And The Best Is Yet To Come…
You are talking about a person you neither know nor fully understand. You are assuming that because the woman is religious, she regards sex as sinful. The assumption may or may not be correct. And you have a very narrow understanding of what it means to love God more than anything else, or of the pain and loneliness that women like that so often experience, while they desire a deep relationship and both a spiritual and physical closeness to their husbands.
You’re right - there are two sides to this story.
Loving God, or my limited understanding of what it means to love God (and aren’t we all a bit limited in this?), is not the issue for me here. And I’m not implying that it’s impossible to love your husband / wife if you love God with all your heart, soul, and mind. On the contrary.
It’s just so sad when you are unloved because of someone else’s love for God.
I might be that dear friend’s wife.
On the contrary; making love is a wondrous gift of expression, it is not only our legs that willingly and continuously part, but our whole being, and it encompasses, envelops and emerges our very being with completeness. It is wonderful to give and receive pleasure; it is heavenly to experience the tides of ecstasy and to explore the body of the one you love, always seeking, listening, feeling for avenues to increase the height of oneness…. And yes, all of this is sacred; it creates a powerful bond between two people within the framework of marriage. Once either partner starts handing these treasures out to strangers, the bond breaks the presence of the ‘other lovers’ destroy their joy and union, then lust reigns. The faithful spouse is aware of the intrusion and sadly the relationship is destroyed.
Christian woman, thank you - what a beautiful expression of “making love”.
Oubaas, the pleasure is mine (LOL)