What’s coming up on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
The talk. It’s something parents often dread to have. Who’s going to be the one to give the talk to the children? Many parents live in dread of this moment and it’s not like there’s an instruction manual that tells you the proper way to talk to your kids about sex, especially in a day and age where sexual issues are being put front and center and there are whole new questions that have to be asked regularly and discussed.
Or maybe there is an instruction manual.
And maybe the person to share it is my guest this Saturday, Dr. Freda Bush. Who is she?
Freda McKissic Bush, M.D.,FACOG has been involved in women’s health for more than forty years. Her health career began graduating from the University of Arkansas School of Nursing in 1967. She graduated from Columbia University, New York, with a Masters in Maternity Nursing and Certificate in Nurse Midwifery (CNM) in 1970 and worked as a CNM for 12 years including serving as the Chief Nurse Midwife at Harlem Hospital, New York, NY. In 1974, she became Director of the University of Mississippi Nurse Midwifery Program in Jackson, MS. In 1983, Freda graduated from the University of Mississippi Medical School and in 1987 completed her residency training at the University of Tennessee in Memphis. Since 1987 she has been practicing OB-GYN in Jackson, Mississippi and is a Clinical Instructor in the Department of OB-GYN and Department of Family Medicine at the University of Mississippi Medical Center. She is a partner in private practice with East Lakeland OB-GYN Associates in Jackson, Mississippi, is a Fellow in the American College OB-GYN and a Board Member of the American Association of Prolife OB-GYN.
Dr Bush is Past Chair of the Board of Directors of the Federation of State Medical Boards of the United States (FSMB), having been elected to the Board in 2003. She also served on the Mississippi State Board of Medical Licensure for 12 years. Currently, she is a member of the National Board of Medical Examiners. She is past President of the Central Mississippi Medical Society. In 2006, she received the Community Service Award from the Mississippi State Medical Association (MSMA).
In February, 2012, she became President/CEO of the Medical Institute for Sexual Health. Freda co-authored with Joe S. McIlhaney, MD two books, HOOKED, New Science on How Casual Sex is Affecting OurChildren and the latest book released January, 2012, Girls Uncovered, New Research on What America’s Sexual Culture Does to Young Women. She is a Member of the Mississippi Governor’s Blue Ribbon Task Force on Teen Pregnancy Prevention and serves as Chair of the Medical Advisory Subcommittee. Dr Bush served as a Presidential appointee to the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS (PACHA). She was a contributing writer to Faith Matters: How African American Faith Communities Can Help Prevent Teen Pregnancy published by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.
Dr. Bush is a member of the Physician’s Resource council for Focus on the Family. She also currently serves as a medical advisor for Heartbeat International and CareNet and serves as Medical Director to the Center for Pregnancy Choices, Metro Jackson.
Much of her time is spent speaking on sexual health, sexually transmitted diseases and social behavior education. She has presented seminars for health professionals, educators, parents and youth in several cities and states; co-sponsoring a conference in Jackson, MS for seven years.
Dr Bush has been interviewed on several TV programs as well as numerous radio programs including Focus on the Family and Family Talk with Dr. James Dobson, Focus on the Family with Dr. Jim Daly and Family Life Today with Dennis Rainey. She has published articles in the Journal of Medical Regulation, The MS State Medical Association Journal, Christianity Today, Charisma Magazine and Christian Living Metro Jackson.
Married for 45 years to her husband, Lee, an engineer, they have four children, nine grandchildren and one great grandchild.
This Saturday, we’ll be talking about her new program Had The Talk aimed to help parents understand how to guide their children through this. This is becoming more and more of a central issue in this day and age. I hope you’ll tune in to hear this interview and also consider leaving a positive review on ITunes of the Deeper Waters Podcast.
Is rape really a big deal? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
A lot of people are talking about a news story of a Stanford swimmer convicted of sexual assault. What has made it even more noteworthy is that the father of the boy has come forward and written a letter that people are just outraged by. For the sake of discussion, I’m going to assume that the boy is indeed guilty and the girl really was raped by him. Sometimes, new evidence comes out later that shows otherwise but from what I gather, the evidence we have is convicting enough. Of course, even if I am wrong, what I say on rape will still stand regardless of this particular.
So according to what I’ve read, the girl goes to a party and has a little too much to drink. To be fair, that part is on her. This is why you need to be careful with your alcohol at a party, especially a college party. In fact, the victim has said that this was something she owns up to, but that does not mean that someone was justified in taking advantage of her in a state where she was entirely vulnerable. Much of this she says in a letter that she has written.
What has amazed people is that the offender has been given a light sentence of six months and then three years of probation because of the judge’s worry about what a stiffer sentence would to him. Yes. We must worry about the psychological well-being of someone who takes advantage of an innocent woman instead of remembering that the law is in place not to cater to our feelings, but to dispense justice.
What has been more astounding has been that the father has sent a letter. In it, he spoke about what his son and dreamed about and worked to achieve and asked for probation. He reportedly said “That is a steep price to pay for 20 minutes of action out of his 20 plus years of life.”
That statement just sticks out to me. 20 minutes of action. What are we talking about?
A lot can happen in 20 minutes. A man could pick up a gun and go and murder his neighbor in a 20 minute time-frame. A shooting spree can take place at a public place in 20 minutes. A photo taken wrongfully of a young woman in a position she would not want to be seen in can be shared all over the internet in 20 minutes. A good thief can break into your house and steal your valuables and be out in 20 minutes.
Can some greater evils take more time? Yes. They can. Some greater evils can take less time. The time has nothing to do with it. If it did, then I would want to ask this Dad how much time should have been spent in this action before it would be worthy of more jail time?
Now let’s look at the other part. Action. Twenty minutes of action. Really? Is that what you call it? Taking a girl out back behind a dumpster and raping her on the ground so much so that bystanders rightfully consider it an attack is referred to as just actions? Now to be sure, of course it’s an action. Yet it is not just an action. It’s an attempt to downplay it.
To give a different standard, suppose my wife and I engaged in some love-making that took twenty minutes and for us was entirely mutual and self-giving. Is that twenty minutes of action? Sure, but it is not just action. It is something incredible and wonderful.
I find it amazing that as a Christian, I’m often thought to have a negative attitude towards sex. I am seen as a prude who thinks that sex is this big dirty thing. I just want to control everyone’s sex lives.
Okay. Let’s start off. What is my view of sex? Sex is one word that I really use the word “magical” to describe and I hesitate to use that term. It’s just I can’t think of anything else. When I talk to young men about to get married and ask them if they think they know about what they’re getting into and they say yes, I tell them they don’t have a clue. They don’t know what a sexual relationship does to someone. Once Pandora’s Box has opened, it can never be shut again. Nothing is ever the same.
Like many Christian couples, my wife and I waited until we got married to have sex. I don’t regret that decision. In fact, I encourage every couple to go that route. I encourage it because of the awesome action that sex is. Sex is something that intimately bonds you to another person.
The thing about sex is that when it comes to the marriage act as it is called, you are really giving yourself to another person in the most vulnerable action possible. This is done willingly. You tell the person that you trust them entirely. You desire them entirely. You want nothing to come between the two of you.
One of the designs of the activity is to bond the husband and wife to each other. Sex is a bonding activity and you cannot choose for it to not be. That’s what happens. That’s why a husband’s love for his wife can shoot up even more after they have sex together and vice-versa.
Sex outside of marriage can no doubt be intended to be a message of love, but it can also be a message of testing. We often hear this with “Would you buy a car without taking it for a test drive?” Someone who says this misses the point and is thinking in a way sadly similar to this father. It is to dehumanize the person.
You see, you can’t have sex with another person and have it have no affect on them for better or for worse. If you take a car for a test drive and you don’t like it, the car will not be thinking about what you did. The car will not stay in the lot wondering why it wasn’t chosen. The car will not go into therapy hoping to learn how to improve itself so it will be wanted next time. The car doesn’t know or care. A person is not a car. When someone tells me they wouldn’t buy a car without taking it for a test drive, I just ask which one of them is the driver and which one is the car.
Do you really want to have your relationship work like that? What would it mean if you were not pleased sexually with the person you were dating? That they would be out? How can a person be truly giving themselves to you then in selfless love if they know somewhere that they are being tested? If they do not perform adequately, then they are out. If that is not your stance, then why do you need a “test drive”? A test drive implies someone could pass or fail the test.
If you wait until marriage, there is no pressure. Of course, both partners still want to please the other, but your relationship is not on the line. You are not going to end it because of how things go. In fact, this is really important because contrary to what you see in the movies, sex is something that improves over time as you get to know the person and your bodies get used to each other more and you learn what you like and don’t like.
Theologian R.C. Sproul in a book I saw several years ago talked about going to see his family a few weeks after his marriage or so. I do not remember how long exactly except that it was early and I don’t remember if it was his family or hers. Anyway, he talked to an older uncle there who asked how he “liked it.” Sproul said it was terrific. This uncle then said that he didn’t know the half of it. Sproul said he didn’t know what this old codger knew that he didn’t already know. Years later, he said he started realizing it.
The good thing about the covenant is you have the rest of your lives to improve, and you will improve. The more the self-giving and desire keeps going on, the better the relationship improves. This is not a test. It is something beautiful.
Unfortunately, some people can steal this away before its time. It tells me in the case of a man raping a woman (And to be fair, women can rape men too.) that the man is really not a man. If you want to have a woman, you need to do the work for that privilege. Be a real man for her.
This is the part the women can really change in the culture. For the most part, men are usually the most aggressive ones with sex. We are the go-getters. If we consider who is in charge of an economy, who is it? Is it the buyers or the sellers. Does the buyer determine the price of an item, or the one who gives the item? It is the latter.
So ladies, when it comes to sex, you are deciding how much a guy has to give you before you will give him yourself entirely. Is it dinner and a movie? Is it three dates? Is it a month? 6 months? Engagement? Or is it marriage? I recommend you go with the final one. Go with marriage. You tell a man he has to make a covenant with you that he loves you and you alone and is not going to ever leave or abandon you before you give him all of you.
Our culture has that backwards. It’s been said that the great temptation when a couple is dating is to look for any excuse to have sex. When they are married, the great temptation is to look for any excuse not to have sex. It is a shame that unmarried people look to have more sex than married people. It’s one reason people view sex as dry and stale. If the church wants to see the world honor marriage, we have to lead by example, and one of that is not just having a marriage, but doing marriage well, including sex.
As wrong as I think having sex outside of marriage is, having rape is worse. This is where we get to the analogous part to buying a car. Rape is the ultimate way of treating someone (And I’m going to presume a woman for the most part) like an object. It is not looking at the person as a human being, but looking at them as a tool of sexuality. You don’t really care about them so much as getting your kicks.
Can that happen in twenty minutes? Yep. Men will do the most incredible mind-blowing things in order to get sex. Consider for instance this favorite clip of mine from the Family Feud.
If you want to see more of this, just consider looking up vines on YouTube, which I generally hate as a rule, about the topic of “But I’m home alone.” In each case, the girl calls her boyfriend wanting him to do something and he says no only to be told “But I’m home alone” and then no task is too much. That doesn’t just change for boyfriends. It happens in marriage as well.
What I want to establish with that is that yes, sometimes the passions can easily take over. That’s why men need to develop self-control as much as they can. This boy might have wanted to be a great swimmer, and he could still do that, but at this moment, he wanted something else more. He was willing to do whatever it took to get it, and he made the choice.
We are often told with abortion that consenting to sex does not mean consenting to pregnancy. In fact, it does. You remain open to that even with the best contraception because nothing is foolproof save vasectomies and hysterectomies. In life, you can choose your actions, but you can’t choose your consequences.
Some consequences you will have little control over. If you look both ways before crossing the street and someone comes flying around a corner and hits you, you have no control over that. If a child of yours gets cancer through no fault of medical lack on your own, you have no control over that. The sad part is we spend a lot of time crying about things we do have control over if we will do something different and that is to change our behavior. This isn’t a light switch that turns off and on, but if we want to do it, we will have to do the work for it.
So let’s get back to the action that we’re talking about. Rape is in fact stealing. It is a form of theft and dishonoring and the shaming and dehumanizing of a person. While the father is talking about the consequences for his son, let’s think about the consequences for the woman. In fact, she hasn’t gone far enough. She’s not the only one affected.
When we start with her, she is saying now she sleeps with a light on and she wants to have protection with her always. Now, she will be tempted to look at every man with suspicion. One guy at a party seemed innocent enough, but maybe he isn’t. Maybe he’s just like every other man. (Because now built in is an idea that all men are like this.) Maybe all men are just predators. (We have an idea even in Christian circles that because men think about sex so much that all men are perverts. Not true.)
I don’t know about this woman’s boyfriend. I don’t know if they were sexually active together or not, but so far it looks like he’s been a very honorable man. He’s going to pay for the sins of this other man. She’s going to have to learn to trust him. He will be held responsible for their sins and he will not be able to repent for he cannot repent of a sin he has not committed.
If she breaks up with him, any future man will be seen with suspicion. The root reason is that this woman has been violated. She has been treated as an object. She is not some inflatable blow-up doll. She is a person. She is someone who lives and breathes and has thoughts and feelings like most everyone else. To treat her as less than a person is to dehumanize her. (Which always men in marriage as well, make sure you don’t treat your wife as an object or someone just there to satisfy your desires. You are to care for her as well.)
In the end of this woman’s letter, she does say the story isn’t over for this man. She’s right. He will be a registered sex offender, but he can change. He can learn from this action and overcome it. (I have no desire to call it a mistake. A mistake is locking yourself out of your car. Raping a woman is not a mistake. It’s a deliberate wrongful action.)
The story is not over for this woman either. As a Christian, I would first listen to her. I would hear her cry. (Note I would honestly prefer to have my wife do this. As someone in ministry I try to avoid counseling women apart from her.) I would let her express any painful emotions she’s feeling.
Then, after all that was done, i would tell her about Christ and how she can be made a new creation. No. Her past is not undone, but she doesn’t have to be a victim to it any longer. No. It’s not guaranteed to be immediate, but she does not have to be alone and she never will be truly alone. I would be able to assure her that as awful as this event was, the God of creation can take it and use what was intended for evil for good. In fact, this is already starting to happen as she’s apparently speaking to try to raise awareness of this danger so other women don’t have to undergo it.
All in all, this whole story shows how our culture really does not understand sex. Someone once said the problem with our culture is we think too much about sex. It isn’t. The problem is that we think too little. We dream about sex, fantasize about it, make TV shows and movies of it, talk about it, just plain do it, but we don’t think about it. We don’t sit down and ask about what sex really is and what it means when we do it and why that is so important and why it shouldn’t be taken so lightly.
If we don’t think about it, then we are just as guilty of treating sex as just an action. It’s just something you do for fun together with no long range consequences. It is just a way of expressing love. No. Sex is in its own unique category. It stands apart from everything else.
That’s in fact why we Christians have such boundaries about sex. We put boundaries around it for the same reason we put our valuables in a safety-deposit box and not our garbage. Sex is valuable and we don’t want to mistreat it or misuse it. I compare it to nuclear energy. It’s wonderful and very efficient when used in the right time and place and circumstances. If you do it wrong, you get Chernobyl.
I hope that all this will lead to us doing and thinking about sex right. Part of the problem is our philosophy of sex has led to a culture where sex is treated cheaply. When sex it treated cheaply, real women are treated cheaply. They are not cheap. They are wonderful creations in the image of God. I love my wife, but my wife is not to be seen as a means to have sex. Sex is meant to be seen as the way that I have her. I express my love intensely in that action and want to show her every time how serious I am about my relationship with her and how much I desire intimacy with her.
I look forward to a day when we realize again how sacred sex and marriage are.
Is marriage private or public? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Recently, I was doing some more thinking about marriage, which isn’t a shock to most readers of the blog. There are some things I don’t think you really learn well about the institution until you’re in it. In this case, I was thinking about honor and marriage and the public and private aspects of marriage.
You see, a marriage starts off with a very public ceremony. In fact, it’s seen as kind of a necessity. No doubt, others have known about the love of the bride and groom for a long time, but now they publicly announce it and make a pact. At this point, they declare there will be no one else. It is the two of them together. This is done in the sight of God and man.
From there, shortly after you have a very private aspect of marriage. This takes place sometimes on the wedding night, but some couples do wait until the next day. Sexual intimacy is again a central part of marriage. In this case, the last thing the lovers want is for their relationship to be private. It’s not because of a shame of the act or themselves, although that can happen for some people. It’s because of a unique trust.
There is a unique trust in a woman trusting her body to a man and a man trusting his body to a woman. Both couples share something secret of themselves that they share with no one else on an intimate level. It’s also something that the details are not discussed. All that needs to be known about couples is that this is going on. There are two great demonstrations of this.
One demonstration is the love that is shown in private. It’s not just love, but it’s honor. A wife honors and respects her husband by saying “You alone I trust with this most vulnerable part of myself and you alone do I feel comfortable with.” Men respond to honor and respect for the most part. Nothing builds them up.
You see, my wife is working with me on a fear of water that I have right now. I absolutely panic when I get into a swimming pool. It’s going to take time. You know what one of my biggest motivations is for improving? It’s realizing that my wife trusts me so much that she gives me herself. How much am I willing to do for my wife back?
This is also part of the beauty of the mutual giving of love. My act then can motivate her to say “I’m so proud of my husband. How can I best show him how proud I am of him?” The beauty of marital intimacy is that it becomes a cycle that regularly increases the love and the trust. The more you have intimacy with your partner, the more you will grow in love and trust. The less you have intimacy, the harder it will be.
Oh. Please note that guys. The best part of this relationship is the intimacy. Sex is more than the physical sensations. It’s the connection you realize you’re building with your wife. It’s not just about getting something in the body, but getting something in the relationship.
I said that one way this love is shown is through the love the couple has for one another in public. What happens in the bedroom should stay in the bedroom but the results should be seen in public. One clear result often seen in public is children. One way the topic of sex is public happens whenever you see a human being. When that happens, you know that two people have had sex at one point.
Of course, not all children are the results of loving unions, which is a shame, but for the most part we’d think they are. The reason you are with your spouse right now if you’re married is because in part, your parents had sex one time and their parents had sex one time. The result was you on one end and your spouse on another.
The ideal of marriage then is to have that honor shone in both places. Husbands and wives should strive to honor and build one another up in public. In turn, they should do so in private where the most honor can be shown. As I said, it’s a great build up. I have regularly told my wife that I think my ministry shot off after I got married because I had her in my life and got to receive that private honor.
Marriage is not just a part of our lives that we compartmentalize. It affects everything that we do. I have often said that if we want to be good apologists, then we need to be honoring marriage. If you’re single, maintain sexual purity until you marry and honor marriage and respect the relationships of your married friends. If you are married, love your spouse as you’re supposed to. If couples should compete in anything, it’s to outdo one another in showing love and affection.
What do I think of Tom Gilson’s book published by Kregel? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Parents have always tended to dread “the talk” and asked one another which one of them will be the ones to tell their children about the birds and the bees. As awkward as it has been in the past, today for Christian parents, it can be even more awkward. What was thought unthinkable in the past is now seen as the new normal. Christians for the most part know what the Bible says about homosexual practice and today, that leads to them being called bigots, haters, intolerant, etc.
What are Christian parents to do? It’s no longer enough in our day and age to just say “Well this is what the Bible says.” Something more is needed. That’s why I’m proud to support Tom Gilson’s book on the topic. Gilson writes a book that is intellectually rich but also with a pastoral heart. As you read it, it’s like Gilson is taking your hand and guiding you through the minefield and helping you see step by step how best to handle these conversations with your children.
Note I said conversations. The birds and the bees talk might be a one-time deal, but this is a prevalent issue that will likely involve more than one talk, especially as your teenager receives more challenges from classmates. Gilson is set to walk you through with a history of how we got here, what marriage means and why it matters, and how to handle challenges everywhere, even from a professor in a college classroom.
All that is well and good and you can find that information in many books, but if all you had was the final section, it would be worth the price of the book. In the final section Gilson takes a lot of the soundbite slogans that your child will encounter and works through how to answer them. He has an idea of a kind of conversation you can have all the while wanting you to make sure that it is not a script.
Most every slogan you can think of is addressed here. It’s as if Gilson sat at his computer writing every sound bite that came along and then decided to respond to all of them. It is a shame that we live in a soundbite culture where these kinds of statements have to be addressed, but unfortunately they do. Gilson does the job though. Your children will encounter taunts. They will be able to reply with substantial arguments.
If there’s something I would like to see in a future edition, I would like to see more of the positives of what we are defending. We as Christians have largely been seen as taking a negative side in the marriage debate. We need to make sure we present equally a very positive case. I would like to see more writing encouraging teenagers on the goodness of the male-female relationship and how it works in marriage, which would certainly include the grandeur and wonder of a sexual relationship, but also the way male and female can build themselves up to holiness in a life of joy. There is some of this when Gilson says every kiss with his wife is something big, but I would like to see more.
Still, this is a book I wish every Christian parent of teenagers would buy. Actually, change that. Every Christian who wants to know how to address homosexuality period whether you have teenagers or not should read this. You are coming across the soundbites just as much as they are. You too need this. Don’t avoid buying this book just because you don’t have teenagers. Buy it because you are a Christian in a world that needs the answers.
I heard the news as I was out doing some errands on Friday about your sending advice to schools on how to handle the transgender issue. Seeing as this is an interest of mine, I headed home and looked for your letter. It didn’t take too long to find it.
There is no doubt that there is a desire to help people who identify as transgender, but I am of the opinion that what you have done is not just unhelpful to them, but in the long run harmful. It is also not only harmful to them. It is harmful to the well-being of the American people that you are supposed to defend.
I know what it’s like for people to have a need to fit in. My wife and I are both on the autism spectrum with Aspergers. Now while I appreciate the benefits I have from it, I know that it can be difficult. I know that social situations can be a total mystery to us at times and there are times you want to speak in polite conversation but can’t seem to find the words to do so.
Still, while it is hard for us, we have to learn to overcome. We do not want society to pull down to our level. We want to be able to function as is. Now this is of course on an issue that is not heavily involved with morality, but what about something that is involved? What about especially if it involves something many of us take as a sacred aspect of ourselves, our sexuality?
There are several several people out there in this world who are hurting and they are hurting because of sexual trauma. They are hurting because someone touched them or acted otherwise sexually to them in an inappropriate way. We live in a culture of divorce being rampant and children consistently being born out of wedlock because sex has been put on the level of a game you just play with someone, no commitment required. Let’s face it. Sex is a big issue in our culture today, as it is in every culture.
When I look at your proposal, I see it opening the doors wide to much more trouble. It looks like you have what is believed to be a problem and have given a solution that is worse than the problem itself. Now as I speak on this, I want to be certain of some points.
I do not think that the large majority if not the entirety of transgender people are perverts. I do not think they want to get into the bathroom with someone of the opposite sex and do whatever they want with them. I also think they honestly believe that they were born the wrong sex and I honestly think that that is a problem that we must deal with. I think the mistake you’re making is that you’re wanting to change reality around them instead of changing the thinking within them. It’s forcing every single one of us to go along with it as well.
At start, I wonder what makes you think you can make a statement like this to schools without working with Congress? Shouldn’t this be put forward also for the American people to decide on? Do we not have that right also? You see, these are public schools. They’re not just your schools. They’re our schools. They are the schools of we the people. They are the ones that our children go to and we have a right to speak on what is going on in them.
When our children go to school, we want them to learn subjects like the three r’s. We do not want them to learn that which is a highly debatable position. We want the schools to be able to reinforce the moral guidance that is found in the home and to uphold the right of parents to educate their children on moral issues and not have it be state vs. parents.
Unfortunately, your statement is already a line drawn in the sand and I wonder what will happen when the American people really see what is in it. Now to be sure, I have read it. I believe in being a thorough researcher in that regards and I was greatly troubled by what I read in it.
You start with terminology and this is a good idea. I appreciate that you defined your terms right at the outset, but even here I see a problem. For instance, in gender identity, you refer to a student’s internal sense of gender. You say it may be different from the sex assigned at birth.
I’d like you to think about that saying. “Sex assigned at birth.” Do you really think that’s what happens? Do you think that a child is born and the doctor has to really think hard on the decision of if to call the child a male or a female? Do you think they just flip a coin and decide? No. It’s really easy to tell if a child is a male or a female 99.99999% of the time. You just take a look at what’s between the legs. Most of the time we don’t even need that. Due to our advanced science, we can see the genetic makeup of a child so we can tell what disabilities a child can have beforehand as well and know the sex without ever seeing, but if someone didn’t see, there would still be no difficulty. You do not assign a sex when a child is born. You discover what sex they are.
That should be what tells you what sex a child is, but instead, you want to look at what’s going on inside of them internally. Here’s the problem with that. A lot of us can feel things about ourselves that are dead wrong. Have you ever talked to someone who is suicidal? They have a strong internal feeling that life is not worth living and that they are a burden on society and there is no hope for them at all. Of course, there are a 1001 ways you can change that statement for suicidal people to describe their moods, but they really believe it. They believe it so much they seek death to escape it. Are you going to tell me that that feeling should be given authority?
There are a host of other beliefs out there that we do not need to do tests to see that they are false. Consider Cotard’s Delusion as my favorite example. In this case, the person believes that they are dead or that they don’t exist. Now can you imagine a situation where a person goes into a psychiatrist’s office and tells them “I really believe that I am dead” and the psychiatrist saying “Well let’s do some evaluations and look at the data and see if you really are or not?” He might say it in the sense of playing along, but he won’t say it in the sense of “That’s a really good question. Let’s see if the objective truth is that you’re dead.” No. As soon as the person walks into his office, the psychiatrist knows that the person is not dead.
The feeling is in this case, pardon the pun, dead wrong. Many of us know that feelings can be awfully flighty in school. Look. We don’t trust students to bring cough drops onto school grounds without a doctor’s position. Many students have a major decision trying to figure out what they’re going to wear in the morning. Despite that, we’re supposed to trust their internal feelings that tell them they’re really one sex when all the empirical evidence shows that they are another?
Why is it that feelings should be given that kind of level of infallibility? Furthermore, are you going to tell me that everyone who is born a male but feels like they’re a female is right? How can this be? What tests would you take to determine if the person is truly male or female and not just having a delusion? How could you at the end of the day say “Well, I realize you have a male body and male DNA but yeah, it looks like you’re really a female.” What are we teaching our children? Do you really want to teach them that their feelings have that much authority?
Now you speak also about Title IX. The problem is I’ve looked at Title IX. You can search all through there and you will search in vain for something that speaks about gender or gender identity. It’s just not there. This means that something has been added to the law afterwards and now is being the basis of a new statement. It’s being made up as we go along.
It gets worse. You say that “under Title IX, there is no medical diagnosis or treatment requirement that students must meet as a prerequisite for being treated consistent with their gender identity. In fact, you say requiring them to obtain such could be a violation of Title IX. In other words, students can get to say they have this and they do not need to provide any evidence whatsoever for it. A teacher won’t believe a dog ate the student’s homework without some evidence and won’t give a student basic medication without evidence from a doctor, but something as complicated as sexuality is to be handled without any evidence save the student’s say so?
Are you serious?
You also speak of a safe and nondiscriminatory environment. Unfortunately, this is one where students, staff, and parents do not go along with someone’s claim to have a different gender identity. Is that not discrimination in itself? I am someone who says that that is a false belief. Are you telling me that I must go along with a belief that I consider entirely to be false? How is that not discriminating against me?
Furthermore, if we talk about safety, a lot of women live in fear of something happening to them. Again, this does not necessarily mean they live in fear of transgenders. They live in fear of any man. If there’s a place a woman should feel safe, it is in the bathroom or a place like a locker room.
Look President Obama. You have daughters. You have a wife. You should know this. A woman’s body is a sacred and beautiful thing. Would you like to have your wife or daughters have to shower next to another man in a locker room because that man identifies as a woman? As soon as they object, they can be accused of discrimination. I understand your daughters are in a private school. Would you be willing to put them in a public school where they could have the potential of having to shower next to a man in the locker room? If you’re convinced this is a good policy, I’d like to see if you’d be willing to do that.
I do have a wife as well and her body is sacred and I don’t want anyone else of the opposite sex seeing her body like that. I don’t care if they identify as a female or not. My wife’s body is something sacred to me and I should be the only man who gets to look at her body. (Barring some medical emergency which I hope never happens.) You talk about the feeling of safety of transgender people. What about the feelings of safety of the far more numerous people who are not and who feel particularly vulnerable? Do they not matter?
If parents think this is an exaggeration, it is not. When you talk about sex-segregated activities and facilities, you say these must be altered for transgender students. Keep them open, but allow transgenders to participate. How many people know how far this goes?
You start with restrooms and locker rooms. Now let’s be sure of something. There are many people, particularly boys, who would like to take advantage of this kind of law. Knowing they don’t have to provide any evidence makes it far easier since they could sue at any time if they don’t get their way. I’m sure you know as well as I do that men really like to see naked women and if you’re a young man, that’s a whole new world that you’re eager to explore.
So picture this scenario and it’s not too hard to do. A group of guys get together and challenge one of them with a dare to identify as a female and go into the women’s locker room and shower with them. In fact, many times bullies will get a naive young man to do something like this at the threat of him not being including in the group. This is how bullies get good boys to do something illegal even. So what’s this boy going to do to get included? He’s going to do just that. Many young boys will do this without any prodding from the group. They’re in a strong mood to see naked women that day and it’s worth it.
Do I need to remind you also that this is the age of the internet? A picture can be taken quite easily and before too long, it goes all over. After all, this young man wants to prove that he made it. How will he do it? Easy. He’ll send pictures. These pictures can go all over the internet and the victim can be entirely innocent. That can affect them later in their life with their college education and their marriage. Sometimes, this can even lead to suicide.
Are you aware you are opening the doors up for this?
I realize that some aspects can be set up for the privacy of students, but it won’t last. That can easily be seen as discrimination. Why not? You’ve opened the door wide for it. You do have stipulations in here about fraternities and sororities and overnight housing, but how long can it last? You’ve already opened up Pandora’s Box.
I want to be clear on something else. I say all of this as a follower of Christ in the Christian faith, but I don’t need to be a Christian to back this. This doesn’t require the Bible. This just requires common sense. At the same time, you have claimed to be a Christian many times. I would like you to really ask if you would stand before God someday and be able to say that you did this and you think this is a decision that He would honor.
You see, you have been given a great responsibility. Few people in history get to essentially be the leader of the free world. What have you done with that? Will the world be a better place because of what you did or will it be a worse place? Are our people growing in virtue and character or not? I contend that when we see the results of your actions here and see the fruit that sprouts from these seeds, we will realize what a drastic mistake it was.
Now you can say that this letter is just advice, but that’s like saying all the IRS is doing is giving us advice on how to spend our money. All the police do is give us advice on how we should behave in society. When stipulations are tied to the advice not being followed, it is not just advice. It is something else. The question is is it a right something else or not. In this case, it is not. This is something individual states should get to decide and something that parents should definitely get to have a say-so in first. This isn’t about your children since they don’t attend these schools. This is about our children since it is them who attend these schools.
At this point, my honest “advice” to parents would be to clear out. If this is what you want public schools to be, then parents should have no part of it. If they cannot afford private school, let them homeschool. In fact, if you want a social experiment, let’s have a real one. Let’s have students raised under your system and let’s have students raised by parents. Let’s see who does better in life overall. Who has more students completing college and succeeding in the workforce and having successful and happy marriages and lives overall? I’m quite confident it will be the side of the homeschoolers.
I love this country, but I do not love what it has become and what it is becoming. It looks more and more like we are becoming a “Look at me” and “anything goes” society and calling it progress. The ultimate form of progress is not how much knowledge we really have, even though it isn’t, but about the character of our nation. People come to this city on a hill looking for freedom and to pursue the American dream. The more control that is had over them, the less likely they are to be able to have those. Already, this is taking away some of our freedom. How much more will be taken away?
If you really want to help people who identify as transgender, and I think you should, the best way is not to go along with the belief but actually question the belief. Why do you feel this way? When did it start? How is life for you with this? Enabling is never a helpful path to go and not only are you doing that, you are forcing all of the rest of us to do it.
I want a society where all of us can be free to excel and do our best and the more we hold beliefs that are false, the less likely we are to be able to do that. There are some beliefs no doubt we can debate on as these are serious issues that have been debated, but there are some that we really do not debate. The identity of someone as male or female is one of those and has been obvious from the moment of birth. You are instead placing the full authority in the ideas instead of in the reality.
When you go against reality, reality will push back hard. There will come a breaking point and the consequences with that pushback are severe. I only hope that we wake up before we get to that point and stop the downward slide we are on as a society. I fear there is a painful crash waiting at the end.
For now, it’s in the hands of the American people. Again, my advice is they not take part in this dangerous game. You want to say how our children will be raised? We have more say so there and it’s time we acted on it. If every American who views this as I do, no matter their religious persuasion or lack thereof, would pull their students from the public school system, I wonder how different that would be.
I hope you’d really consider and think about what this could mean for our nation. These are the lives of our children that we’re dealing with. Unfortunately, I have no hope that you will. The one who said “I won” is not likely to listen to a contrary opinion.
What’s coming up on the Deeper Waters Podcast? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Target. Say the word and immediately the thoughts of boycotts comes into your mind. Why? Because of a bathroom policy. Women who identify as men are allowed to use the men’s room and vice-versa. This has led to many protests by others. There is a fear about predators taking advantage of the law, but something that is not discussed often is the people themselves who are claiming to be transgender.
This is a concept that strikes most of us as something that doesn’t make sense. We are living in an age where you cannot tell a woman that she must be a woman. If she identifies as a man, well that’s okay. Many of us are stunned that this is even being seen as a debate today, but lo and behold it is. What are we to do about this?
Why not have someone on who knows about the transgender viewpoint? In fact, we could say he knows about it so much because he was a transgender and then with the surgical reassignment became a transsexual. That’s why this Saturday I am going to be interviewing Walt Heyer.
So we are going to be talking about what so many of us really have a hard time wrapping our heads around. Are we really going against the scientific establishment? What is the cause of suicide in the cases of transgender people? Is the condition really a mental illness or is it something bona fide and the only way to help these people is to have them alter their bodies to become a person of the opposite sex?
What was it about Walt’s experience that brought him to this realization? What was it like to “become a woman” and then go back to being a man? What does he think should be the best approach to helping people who are struggling with thinking that they are the wrong sex. If his case is a negative one, is that just an isolated incident while most cases seem to work out for the good of those involved?
This is a big issue that is going on and I do believe that there is more at stake than just using a bathroom. We are calling the very identity of male and female into question. Perhaps I am mistaken in my approach and Walt can show that or perhaps there is in fact more than just the surface level debate that is going on.
I hope you’ll be listening next Saturday either way as Walt Heyer joins me!
What do I think of Robert Reilly’s book published by Ignatius Press? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Reilly has written a book on how America is taking part in rationalizing on homosexual behavior and the affect it’s having on our society. He takes a unique approach as he is not arguing from Scripture but more from just the natural law tradition, despite his having a deep Catholic faith of his own. The book is very well-researched and goes into the history of what happened and what is going on in the world today as a result.
For Reilly, the problem started with the contraception movement. I can’t say I agree for sure because there had to be something else in the background. People can still use birth control and think that sex has an end and just know that it would not be good to have children at the time or perhaps in some cases, physically harmful to a mother. Do some people wrongly use this in order to justify whatever it is that they want to do sexually? Yes. They do. That is not the fault of the tool but of the people so we have to ask “What changed in the people?” I wish I had a clear answer to that, but I don’t.
Reilly’s book is certainly hard hitting as he goes through homosexual behavior and the affects it has on people and why arguments for it and for redefining marriage fail. If there is a common argument you hear in favor, you will likely see it responded to in this book. Those interested in a history of how we got to where we got will also be pleased to see it.
The version I read did include a statement about the 2015 Supreme Court decision. If that is rationalizing, one wonders what he would say about the transgender movement today. Reilly does say the viewpoint cannot really last and I agree, but what will be the cost of it for going against reality?
Reilly gives a history of what happened in the world of psychology as well that led to homosexuality not being included as a mental disorder. He then shows the effect this is having elsewhere such as what has happened with the Boy Scouts and what has happened with the military as people seek to remove all barriers whatsoever and treat male-male and female-female relationships as equal in every way to male-female relationships. We have now reached the point where homosexual applause is something that we are exporting to the rest of the world.
Reilly’s book is hard hitting. I do wish he had said more about no-fault divorce as I think that was the largest hit to the nature of marriage and sadly, it was one Christians allowed to happen easily enough. There are times I do realize divorce could be a necessity, but it should always be seen as a sad one. If you want an argument besides “The Bible says” this book is right up your alley and worth reading.
How have we twisted the notion of self-sacrifice? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
I’d like to say I came up with this concept originally, but I heard someone, perhaps Peter Kreeft, speak on the words “This is my body” recently and made a contrast between two opposing positions. I actually thought of another position and I have just been mulling this over for some time. Therefore, I’d like to take my thoughts at this point and share them.
We’re familiar with the words from the Last Supper of “This is my body.” In this, Christ was preparing for His greatest act of self-sacrifice ever. He was preparing to face the tortures of the cross for the sins of the world. This was not something He had to do. This was the plan of God that He willingly submitted to. We find this displayed well in Philippians 2.
Some of you might be wondering about how I interpret the phrase. I really don’t. I have no strong case either way and prefer to see it as words of self-sacrifice. This is something I think could be seen by every viewpoint from a Christian perspective.
Now let’s take this over to marriage. Believe it or not, marriage is supposed to be about self-sacrifice and the epitome of that is to be found in the sexual relationship. This is where the ultimate trust is given by both partners, though I would say certainly the woman puts herself in a more vulnerable position. Each one can say “This is my body” and then say “And I give it to you. In a Biblical sense, your soul belongs to God, but when it comes to the physical relationship, you give your body to only one person. This person gets more of you than anyone else does.
In each of these, we have a beautiful picture of self-sacrifice. It is something powerful in each one and something divine in each one. Of course, since the second one is something we do, we can sadly twist it into something that it isn’t and we can use each person’s body as an apparatus of pleasure rather than that of a person to be loved. Still, something beautiful should not be judged by its misuse and we Christians are called to despite the misuse because we love the real deal so much.
Let’s look instead at another contrast. Do we ever hear the phrase “This is my body” elsewhere? Yes, we do, and in this contrast it is not self-sacrifice. It is in the case of abortion. We hear women speak about how it’s their body and they will then instead give up their children. The children who the body is designed to bring into the world will die for whatever reason the mother deems worthy.
I just find it so amazing that in this act, the concept of self-sacrifice is gone. Is nine months a long time sometimes? Yep. Is the period of childbearing painful? No doubt. Is giving birth painful? I am highly convinced every woman will want extensive pain killers in that time. It’s a shame that some women are not willing to face this time and instead choose to end another human life.
I also think this is worse than what the pagans did in the times of the Old Testament. Sure they sacrificed their children, but they didn’t do it for themselves individually but rather for the good of the harvest or something of that sort. Wicked and evil still? Absolutely, but our modern abortion is even more self-centered then that is.
I look forward to the day when the slaughter of the innocent is done. I look forward to when “This is my body” is always a reminder of self-sacrifice. I look forward to when virtue is restored to our people once again.
What do I think of Preston Sprinkle’s book published by Zondervan? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
Preston Sprinkle has written a unique book on homosexuality where he says it’s not just an issue and frankly raises up a point that we often lose sight of. People are people. Whatever person you’re arguing against, they are a person. This is something both sides need to learn. Traditionalists like myself can often see just the issue and be tempted to think the worst about homosexuals that we meet, when in reality many homosexuals, like many heterosexuals, are wonderful people. Of course, just like heterosexuals, some are jerks. How you view your sexuality is not a determiner of your demeanor.
Meanwhile, those on the left need to realize that the homosexuals are persons as well. In what way do they often act otherwise? It’s too easy to assume that if someone is a homosexual, that that entails their identity so that if you say homosexual practice is wrong, you are treating the person as if they are not a person, and this is simply false.
Sprinkle wrote this book wanting us to see not just the issue but the person. He starts by talking about being on a plane and sharing with some people who ask what project he’s working on and he says it’s a book on homosexuality. The husband shakes his head saying there is no debate and the Bible is very clear. Sprinkle does want to say there is a huge debate in academia, but instead he asks where the Bible is clear. Unfortunately, the man has no idea where the Bible verses are that speak about homosexual practice.
Too many Christians could be like that today.
Sprinkle also does introduce with too many stories of homosexuals who have committed suicide and have been bullied for their being homosexual. Naturally, we should all condemn this sort of behavior. He also writes about those who leave the church. Interestingly, they don’t leave because they’re told same-sex behavior is wrong. They leave because of how they’re treated. The main walk away he wants you to get is that homosexuality is not about an abstract issue. It is about an issue that concerns people to be loved.
In this, many of Sprinkle’s stories hit hard. He does open this by a look at the Scriptures themselves. He comes down on the side of the traditionalists, who he describes as non-affirming. He also addresses many of the issues such as if someone is born with a sexual orientation and if change is possible of an orientation. He points out that too many of us have this idea that if you have to live your life without sex that it is absolutely unlivable.
Sprinkle also wants us to know that homosexuality does not define someone’s life. Still, while I agree that most homosexuals are fine people and there are other sins to focus on, I do think there are some people that while they are still people to be loved, there needs to be more on how to respond to them. Do some people get turned away from the church because there are many Christians who are aggressive and unloving to them? Yes. Of course. There are also homosexuals who are also aggressive and speak about their lifestyles.
What about situations such as the book After The Ball written as a coercive propaganda material to change the hearts and minds of Americans, which was a brilliant success by all standards. There are in fact people who want to be aggressive in their homosexuality and label us as intolerant bigoted homophobes if we disagree. Then there are issues many people have with the transgender talk today about men sharing bathrooms with women.
Do we love those people who are hurting and open to discussions? Of course. We are also to love the aggressive ones, but shouldn’t our approach be different? I did not really find Sprinkle’s book addressing how to deal with this. We could say Christians seem to always be talking about homosexuality, but that’s also because our culture is always talking about homosexuality. We are talking about what everyone is talking about and giving our viewpoints.
While few Christians will ever meet a leader in this movement, they are online and they will meet them and they will meet heterosexual supporters of the homosexual movement who are like them in their responses. There is a problem with Christians of course treating homosexuals horribly, but how are Christians to respond when homosexuals do likewise? While I know Sprinkle is for non-violence, as am I and I do not think this needs to be physical, I don’t think this means we just lie down and let homosexuals walk all over us.
Still, I have to say that Sprinkle’s book is a breath of fresh air. If I could recommend one book on the popular level, it would be this one. Sprinkle gives you good academic research and then he gives an excellent application. Sprinkle reminds us that every time we discuss homosexuality, we are also discussing homosexual persons. These are people to be loved. No. These are people who are loved by Jesus. The question is, are we going to love like Jesus did also? We do not affirm the sin, but we do love the person.
What do I think of William Loader’s book published by Westminster John Knox Press? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.
William Loader is the scholar in the world who has probably written more on sexuality and the Bible than anyone else. Naturally, the Bible talks a lot about sex. Is it because the Bible is a perverse and dirty book as some would say? No. It’s because people talk about sex a lot and it’s a dominant feature in our society just like it was in the ancient world. Loader aptly gives us a warning on page 5.
“Sometimes wanting to know becomes impatient to the point of jumping too quickly to conclusions or filling in gaps with fantasy instead of coming to terms with the limits of our knowledge. Particularly in dealing with matters of sexuality it is not uncommon for people to become deeply involved emotionally in wanting, indeed, needing texts to say certain things which would reinforce or confirm their own beliefs and attitudes. This can happen from many different angles, both from those wanting to affirm what some might see as conservative positions and those wanting the opposite.”
This is a major point worth stressing. Many of us today want the Bible to side with us. Now we could take a totally foreign approach and say the text has no real meaning, but this is problematic as we should not approach any text this way. Could it be difficult to know what the author meant to say sometimes? Sure. There are matters open to dispute. Sometimes it isn’t and with many of these texts, I think the meaning is clear.
The first place Loader starts with is the texts on homosexuality. Loader looks at the various interpretations of all the texts in the debate and frankly, comes down on a conservative side, and this after looking at what most scholars are saying. This does not mean necessarily he agrees with that. I find it hard to tell frankly, but that’s a strength of Loader’s work. It’s hard to know what bias he himself might bring to the debate and frankly, I can understand much better if I encounter someone who says “Yes. This is what the text means. I just disagree.”
Loader also deals with some of the revisionist ideas such as the idea that the Centurion’s servant is a homosexual lover or that the Beloved Disciple was involved in a homosexual relationship with Jesus. These are times where I really think the homosexual reading is grasping at straws. As Loader indicated above, you can read anything into a text if you want to. We must all be looking to ask “But what does the text mean?”
Loader goes on from there to talk about marriage itself and what the Bible has to say about it. He interacts with ideas of polygyny as well and notes that it was limited, although the Damascus Document was pretty hard on it. Loader thinks this could be a minority position. Of course, polygyny would also be costly so few people would do it. Loader goes on from here to talk about issues of divorce and remarriage and pregnancy and child birth. Naturally, Loader will also touch on the household codes found in Ephesians and Colossians. He rightly states that the way the husband is to act to his wife still is the way Christ does for the church, which is loving and not violent or exploitative.
From there, we move on to adultery in the Bible. Many of the texts are quite clear on this and the idea is that sex is to be between a man and a woman in the covenant of marriage. I was pleased also to see a talk about what lust is in the discussion. I do think the command to lust is speaking about another person’s wife, which makes it a form of covenant, but I think it can also mean an excessive desire, a desire that dehumanizes the person and makes them only an object of sex. After all, today if a man and a woman are dating, it is not a problem I think if the man has sexual desire for the woman. He ought to. If he does not desire her, he has problems.
Now some will wonder about spiritual adultery. What does that mean? Looking at another woman with lust. Frankly, I like what Robert Gagnon said at a talk he once gave on a podcast about this where he said “If spiritual adultery is grounds for divorce, every woman could divorce a man on her wedding day.” Lust is something to be avoided to be sure, but let’s not be extreme in saying everything is adultery. Actual physical adultery is worse.
There’s a lot in the book that is covered and yet it is a short read. If you want a good lowdown on what the New Testament says about sexuality and scholars on both sides, you owe yourself to check out Loader’s work.
