Sidney McGillSidney McGill
THE WIDELY held world view that normal sexuality is the sexual habits of the majority in a given society, accepts as normal all such habits until they can be clearly established by scientific evidence and reasoning as abnormal. Following on this logic, the Christian view of sexual practice therefore, especially where it pertains to sex outside of marriage, could be considered abnormal. Sexual exclusivity of practising Jamaican Christians is positioned at the opposite end of the bell curve for sexual practices in Jamaica. Few Jamaicans are ever able to fully adhere to narrowing their sexual practice to the confines of a committed relationship. Fornication, various kinds of committed relationships and to a lesser extent adultery are three sexual contexts that the secular world view considers normal. Now let's take a synoptic view of fornication.
FORNICATION
The Hebrew and Christian Scriptures limits sexual intercourse to marriage because the institution, which is declared as God's will for most men and women, protects partners from outside diseases (physical and mental), poverty and the stress of attempting to negotiate a network of love affairs. Marva Dawn in Sexual Character states that "the sexual union creates a uniquely comprehensive bond. To tear it apart fractures every dimension of an individual's whole being. To stitch that bond with more than one partner causes a schizophrenic psyche."
Conservatives among Jews, Protestants and Roman Catholics condemn sex before marriage as sinful. But because empirical evidence shows widespread sexual activity among adolescents and adults, the availability of reliable contraceptives, later age at first marriage, ethicists want people to be given more helpful guidance than "thou shalt not." Their criteria for judging the morality of nonmarital sexual acts includes genuine respect for the personhood of both partners because the use of another person for merely one's pleasure is wrong. Another criterion is that genuine affection and serious commitment from both parties is necessary.
The commitment would involve responsible behaviour such as using contraceptives if the couple were not willing to have children, or take precautions against STIs. Many ethicists also consider genuine openness and honesty between the partners as a qualitative requirement. Such a view should involve the public and private institutions in helping people to make good ethical choices about sexual behaviour in a culture that tends to glorify and exploit sex. The public institution with the best resources to effectively deal with the problems of promiscuity is the Jamaican Church.
The Church can make it clear to all Jamaicans, especially her men, that "sexual relationships are relations of power" (Stanley Hauerwas), and a sexual relationship outside of a committed relationship is a misuse of power (sin). If the Church is to have the handle on things sexual it must stop underwriting the romantic ideal as the sole qualification for marriage. The notion presupposes that romantic love legitimates sexual intercourse whether lovers are married or not. What the Church must declare is that marriage is the public acknowledgement that a heterosexual couple has covenanted to live together faithfully for a lifetime. A Church-sanctioned sexual relationship is therefore a public matter which should force husbands and husbands-to-be to take responsibility for childbearing.
It is a great challenge but the goal cannot be compromised because male promiscuity is nothing more than the exercise of reckless power. A high school girl who gives sex to a taxi driver has allowed herself to be raped. Albeit that rape is the act of forcing a woman to have sex against her will, it is the abuse of power. The man still has the power to say 'no'. Men (and women) must use the greater inner Power (who is the Holy Spirit) to say 'no'.
Dr. Sidney McGill is a marriage and family therapist and executive director of the Family Counselling Centre of Jamaica, St. Ann; e-mail: yourhealth@gleanerjm.com.
