50 Shades of Grace: Jesus' Sexuality

I wasn’t surprised to read that the Vatican has published a response to the September 18th announcement of a tiny piece of papyrus that includes a dialog where Jesus refers to “my wife.” It is, in their words, a “clumsy forgery.” I only wonder what took them so long.

As you have no doubt read, Dr. Karen King, a professor of early Christianity at Harvard Divinity School, released findings last week regarding a newly found original document that offers evidence suggesting Jesus was married. It was front page news and lit up social media, with some claiming that it provides support for women priests and a married Roman Catholic clergy. 

Veracity of the fragment aside, this wasn’t news to those of us who think about sexuality and the church.  More than forty years ago, William E. Phipps wrote a book entitled “The Sexuality of Jesus,” in which he postulated that Jesus would have been betrothed by his parents during his teen years as was the custom for Jewish men based on the mores of the time. With an average age of marriage of 14, Phipps argued, Jesus was in all probability married. By the time we meet Jesus again at age thirty, when the Gospel story introduces him as an adult, he was likely a widower. (Women on average died in the first century at the age of 25, most often in childbirth.)

As a Jewish Unitarian Universalist, it’s hard for me to fully understand why a married Jesus causes such dismay. Regardless of one’s beliefs about the humanity and divinity of Jesus, the embodied Jesus would surely have been sexual from birth to death as all humans are. There is nothing in the Gospels that suggests that Jesus was asexual or celibate his entire life—something that would have been so extra-ordinary that surely it would have been mentioned by their authors. Indeed, the ideal of a celibate clergy was not decided until the late seventh century: the Quinisextine Council in 691 was the first to decree that clergy couldn’t marry after ordination, although previously married men could become clergy.

Rather than decrying the idea that Jesus was married (and therefore most likely sexually active with at least one woman), perhaps the discovery of the papyrus fragment will reopen the too-often missing dialog about sexuality in those denominations that would rather wish it away. If sexuality is one of God’s gifts to us, if sexual diversity is part of God’s blessing, if people of all genders are created in God’s image—then surely there is the possibility that Jesus too enjoyed this good gift.

Non Virgins Need Not Apply

I've just published a Huffington Post blog on the decision by a Christian school in Florida to fire a 39 year old teacher for having sex before her marriage.

You can read the full post at www.huffingtonpost.com/.../non-virgins-need-not-appl_b_61...

It's inconceivable to me that in today's world having premarital sex can be used as a reason to terminate employment -- or is seen as some how debased. Remember that more than 90% of Americans have premarital sex, and that's been true for at least the past forty years.

What do you think?

Part 2 - The Marriage Message: “Marriage could be . . .”

Rev. Haffner is on the road this week. This guest blog is by Kate Ott, who directs the Religious Institute's Seminary Project and provides sexuality education training to teens, parents, and clergy.

Marriage is and should be defined by many characteristics. Unfortunately, in legal and cultural debates about marriage between two men or two women, we have lost a significant opportunity as people of faith to think creatively about what makes for a just, loving marriage. Yesterday, my colleague, Tim Palmer wrote about marriage equality as a right of any two people to “join” marriage. We can also consider marriage equality as "re-defining" marriage as equal partnership!

I truly believe marriage equality is terrifying to some people because it by definition gets rid of the necessity for gender/sex based categories in marriage. Many of us still define marriage based on things that women should do and things that men should do (gender roles). And there are some who still believe gender roles are grounded in our biology. In society and our faith communities, we continue to give gender roles unequal value. Much of Christian theology about marriage is founded on these ideas.

Marriage equality doesn't mean we will erase differences based on gender (or anything else) in our relationships. As I say to my children on a regular basis, “Equality doesn’t mean sameness.” Equality means our differences are valued “equally.” Equality in our marriages would allow us to celebrate the diversity of blessings two people bring to each other -- blessings that are free of falsely imposed gender stereotypes that harm both men and women. Some people are good at fixing leaky faucets, others are great cooks, some like doing the bills, others are good at childrearing -- finding the balance is evidence of true partnership.

Ted Olson, who is a life-long conservative Republican and now defending marriage equality in the courts, wrote in Newsweek, “Marriage is one of the basic building blocks of our neighborhoods and our nation. At its best, it is a stable bond between two individuals who work to create a loving household and a social and economic partnership. We encourage couples to marry because the commitments they make to one another provide benefits not only to themselves but also to their families and communities. Marriage requires thinking beyond one's own needs. It transforms two individuals into a union based on shared aspirations, and in doing so establishes a formal investment in the well-being of society.”

I fully concur. I hope we have not missed the moment as a nation and as communities of faith to talk about what marriage could be. Given the woeful success of heterosexual marriages, our faith communities might consider the importance of requiring more in-depth pre-marital counseling, providing on-going marriage enrichment opportunities, and promoting equality in our relationships.

Marriage equality won’t happen for any two people without hard work, honesty, dedication, and communication. Successful, happy, and fulfilled marriages have more to do with those qualities than genitalia or gender roles ever will!

What do you think makes a marriage “a marriage”?

Helping Couples Enjoy Monogamy -- In Churches!

We hear a lot these days from evangelical leaders about their concerns about AIDS in Africa. I've just learned about a fascinating project in Mozambique, courtesy of a British group called The Pleasure Project.

Here's the description:


Among these was the highly successful Vida Positiva (Positive Living) programme in Mozambique. One of the many elements of Vida Positiva was to promote safer sex among couples by tackling the primary reasons that married men were having sex outside of their marriages: because they were bored with their sex lives at home. To do this, educators worked with community ‘gatekeepers’, including priests and nuns from Christian churches, to promote pleasure-focused couples counselling....


Kubatsirana is an ecumenical HIV/AIDS Association of 56 churches in and around
Chimoio, Mozambique, and in seven areas of Sofala and Manica Provinces. Kubatsirana
provides HIV/AIDS prevention and mitigation within four programmes:
• Church training and technical support programme
• Home-Based Care for PLWHA and OVC
• A support group for people living with HIV/AIDS
• Sustainable Agriculture and Income-Generating Project as a support to PLWHA,
OVC and volunteers working for the programmes


The Church Training programme includes training church leaders as well as husband
and wife couples to become Marriage Counsellors in their communities. The training
includes communication skills, gender-roles, conflict resolution, sex and sexuality and pre-marriage counselling and relies on two publications: "Enjoy your Marriage"
(Cunningham, Family Impact, Bulawayo) and "Answers for your Marriage” (Bruce and
Carol Britten, SA), which is very detailed in everything from positions to cultural issues.


According to Kubatsirana’s Technical Advisor, Carina Winberg: "We have started to do
something about the problems of couples not enjoying their sexual realtionships. Three or four years ago we identified this problem among the pastors, couples and families we work with, and then decided to bring it up as a subject in the prevention courses for pastors and church leaders. Last year we started separate courses for church leaders and their wives on what we call "Couples Counselling and Retreats". We have one very good couple (husband and wife team) teaching both men and women. Just a few weeks ago we trained 20 pastors on topics such as:
• how to improve your sexual relationship
• how to counsel couples in your church on sexual matters
• how to give pre-marriage counselling
• how to follow-up with young couples in order to support them in building a good
relationship.


It strikes me that we could use this type of project here in the United States as well. Surely in the search for common ground with evangelical leaders, we could also agree to MARRIAGE ENRICHMENT, including sexual enrichment, for married couples.


Perhaps we could start with offering such a workshop for married Members of Congress.