Duality Of Religion Essay

What was confusing for me, was starting to go to church with my family at the age of fourteen, but still witnessing my father’s sexual expression not change. From what I was being taught about the Bible, sex or sexual issues were only appropriate in marriage between a man and woman. The male was the leader of

Growing up as a Catholic I was educated in the spirit of living a pure life, learning many aspects about what I should not do. My parents and the entire Catholic community in which I grew up praised a restrictive life, wherein most of the pleasures in life were forbidden. Sex has been always a taboo subject for Catholics. My parents taught me that sexual relationships are only allowed after marriage. People who were known to be engaged in sexual relationships without being married were regarded as sinners and they were not respected within our community. Being raised in this spirit of considering sexuality a sin, I had become to despise the idea of sex, considering it impure and vulgar. As a child I could not imagine myself ever being married and desiring to be involved in sexual relationships, because I was inculcated with the idea that sexuality is

The most important recurring issues in the study of the history of Christianity during our time period is sexual abuse amongst the Catholic Clergy and abortion, the killing of a living entity, as it is a sin against God according to biblical doctrine. Many believe that sexual abuse happening in the Catholic Church, is directly related to celibacy. The Churches restriction on priests that directs them to abstain from sexual relations. This issue has been debated since the reformation in which Martin Luther and other reformers opposed celibacy. They based their argument against celibacy on the bible scripture, namely Genesis 1:28, where God wanted people to “be fruitful and multiply”. There is nothing in the bible that directly mentions celibacy. There are many versions that mention fornication and uncleanliness and the interpretation of the Catholic Church seems to have made this deduction based on those scriptures. The other major issue that is common in most of the world’s religions is abortion; the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church, and the Protestant Church still adopt the early church’s belief to oppose the practice of abortion. Abortion is considered murder and a mortal sin in accordance which many versus in the bible as it relates to each of these faiths. Even between the Old Testament, where the law or Tora refers to the 10 commandments, where Exodus 20:13 states “Thou shall not Murder” and

Helminiak provides an interesting discussion based on a reoccurring topic of interest, integration of sexuality and spirituality. Helminiak begins the paper establishing that the greatest undertaking was trying to define spirituality. He then proposed that sexuality would either foster or hinder one’s spiritual growth to the extent that if would affect the person’s sexual behaviors. Helminiak suggested that someone’s sexual behavior would essentially fall in accord with their chosen religious belief and ethical requirement as a means to enhance their relationship with God. The paper begins with the author providing

This group is designed for those who wish to discover the truth to which God sees things (privately) behind closed doors. All sexual questions are welcome to be asked, discussed and debated without any reservations or shame.

Sexual relations are a powerful and essential part of God’s intentions for defining humanity. God intended sexual relationships to be ideal for His creation. Therefore, Paul emphasizes the destruction sin distorts from the illegitimate use of the gifts from God. “Even their women exchanged natural sexual relation for unnatural ones…men also abandoned natural relations with women with lust for one another…men committed shameful acts with other men…” (Romans 1:26-27). They are of such importance that the Bible gives them special attention and counsels more restraint and self-control than with any other desire. Paul indicates one of clearest ways of society or a person in rebellion against God is the rejection of God’s guidelines for the use of sex. In Paul’s day, many pagan practices encouraged homosexuality, “men committed shameful acts with other men,” (Romans 3:27). Homosexuality is strictly forbidden in God’s Word (Leviticus 18:22). God does not obligate or encourage the degradation of this act in humanities relationships. Paul even states that the people were aware of their wrongdoings. “Although they know God’s righteous decree…they not only continue to do these very things but

“When God created Eve…he took her straight from Adam’s side. None of us have fully recovered from the surgery. There is aloneness, an incompleteness that we experience everyday of our lives” (pg. 126). Chapter eight goes to mention the grand affair found between us and God. There are times in life where everyone around me seems to be in some type of relationship. This leaves me feeling lonely and questioning what I have done wrong to deserve this single season. However, it’s a natural feeling to crave union with the opposite sex. We were made to be long for intimacy. In the society we live in, I feel as if this unity between man and woman have been misunderstood. We don’t believe that intimacy is possible anymore because several people are turning to sex to ease the pain (pg. 135). Fortunately, God provides beauty and strength. When we are in a relationship, and both people seeks to put God first, God will enable us to see the desires we seek in the opposite sex. When it comes to relationships, we shouldn’t focus on the physical intimacy and attraction, but rather on worshipping

The book of Romans appears to be stating that God’s “glory” in essence, exists as His/her sexual presence within people; by which the beauty of God’s glory, one’s true sexual birthright, became an ‘image’ of self-importance. Whereupon, resulting in the presence of lust arrogantly inflating human egos to idolize their bodies, by creating the pride of self, the Truth of God became unimportant, darkening and fading into a forgotten, ancient memory. In the course of time, this evil presence convinced the masses that the LORD exists “too holy, too sacred, and above it all” to become involved with people’s sexuality. Essentially, began the long history of suppressing the memory of the exquisite time of the ‘romance of Eden’ with humanity.

Along with the harsh day to day cruelty of people’s lives in general, the lack of sacredness within sexual love and the spiritual value of it, set the stage for God Divine’s light to endeavor to communicate something long forgotten; enigmatically, the reality of their Maker 's sexual existence within His people and the sacred joy it held. Manipulatively, though Satan’s distortion ‘the body’ of people (the worship of the penis and vulva) intensifies as their gods; relentlessly, controlling this planet forever with this untruth. Superlatively, along with numerous reasons, God in His infinite wisdom sent Jesus, an ‘alien,’ to confront this evil force known as Satan/the Devil and awaken people’s spiritual beings to His mysterious Truths. For the Bible says, “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8).

s pointed out the subject of “Our Godly Sexual Beings,” endures as a mystical subject that can either evoke immense anxiety, disbelief or other anomalies; as the initial thought of sex and God makes countless folks uneasy, including myself, once upon a time. For my beliefs regarding this enigmatic subject matter accrued over various years of study, personal experiences, and life’s progression; still, my viewpoints have been challenging. In effect, this Truth of God’s sexual essence lived serenely within my being for a number of years; however, a jolting “moment of truth” materialized. Abruptly, this event took place with a Christian literary agent named Kent, concerning another book I had written. Essentially, He telephoned to converse about

The instructed elect or Christian followers, within and without the church were initiated into the acclaimed mysteries, becoming the ‘Guardians of this Truth,’ down through the centuries. This is why I believe there was such a continuation about celibacy surfacing within the church, due to the fact that celibacy was true, but hard for most to grasp its true meaning. The Truth being, we have a sexual relationship with one’s Divine God first and foremost - above any and all, within the oneness of celibacy. In effect, celibacy offers the opportunity to obtain wholeheartedly the pearl of great price Jesus promises (Matt 13:46). This knowledge gives a person oneness with the LORD, giving a person understanding of the Truth, whether they are married or not is a personal choice (I Cor 7:7-9). For nothing can separate our consciousness with God as Paul states, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal

The word fornication comes from the Greek word porneia. In the Bible, porneia is roughly translated to sexual immortality which was later interpreted to include adultery, anal sex, oral sex, homosexual sex, sexual possessions, etcetera, by the Christians. Today in the Catholic church, sex is strictly seen as a necessary act needed to procreate the catholic church. They equate the rising interest in sex as a rise of devil’s activity in the world. This is the result of an archaic interpretation of the bible and especially Paul’s work in the new testament. The church condemns sex because it demotes us to animals, and as chosen people of Christ, they adhere to archaic laws to be pure, instead of following a natural way of life.

Bullough presents the writings and ideas of St. Augustine as the foundation of the Catholic Churches stance on sex. St. Augustine believed that the fall of man from paradise was the point tipping point when sex went from an act of purity to one of base desire. Adam

Biblical writing tends to have strict laws about sex and sexuality and how it was expressed and universally accepted. The Pauline Epistles, or Paul’s views, had unique views on sex because he completely distrusted gender as a whole and because he believed that there would be an apocalypse. Many of Paul’s ideas were widely accepted back than because they explained may things that people could not, for instance it explains homosexuality. Today, the laws are seen differently and in some cases interpreted much more literally than they were back then. It is likely that ideas have changed either because people have become more understanding and accepting of others or because we no longer view sex and sexuality as a thing to be ashamed of. This new age of interpretation is seen in the way homosexuality is accepted today, submission of the wife to the husband in some religious dominations, and the ideal of marriage and its sexual implications.

Many priests, after taking the vow of celibacy, discover that they can’t suppress their sexual feelings towards others. Many priests have secret relationships that they hide from their parish. Good Tidings is an organization set up by a woman and her husband, a former Catholic priest, to help priests who have fallen in love to decide whether to leave the priesthood. The organization has been contacted by almost 2000 women who were sexually involved