The Sex shaming needs to be stopped
Photo by Canva
The word that is to be whispered. The word that is to not be mentioned in certain spaces. The word that accounts for so much of our life but yet feels like its wrong to speak about. The “S” word. S E X. Recently on the podcast, Taylor McElwain, of the Prayer Wall Podcast, and I journey through the complex components of of our unique sexual experiences being sexual trauma survivors and also Believers.
The conversation that we had though truly lends itself to a much larger conversation and that’s the shame that we feel because of our experiences. We know that God call us to live a lfie of purity. That is an nondebatable fact. That’s not what the conversation should be tailored around though. The conversation needs to be around why we as fellow believers tend to shame our brothers and sisters in Christ for their sexual experiences when they don’t align with our own.
Raise your hand if you’ve been around a group of church girls (take note of the verbiage used. There’s a difference between women of God and church girls…conversation for a different day!) and you can feel the side eyes when you announce that you aren’t a virgin. Forget the interactions with guys in the church and the issues that can present themselves with that, for a second. Women in the church can be more likely to perpetuate a negative sex culture than men. This is problematic friends.
If the church is supposed to be a safe haven, a hospital for the sick, a place of peace, why is it that that is the place where many receive so much shame and condemnation for the issues they are facing.
It’s time for the church to restructure the dreaded purity culture as we know it and take heed to caring for the whole person presented. The whole person Damesha? Yes, time is up for just treating the symptoms of a problem and not looking at the root cause of the sickness. This is merely irresponsible behavior and I believe that God is calling us to rise up and be better.
“Don’t treat the symptoms and neglect the cause of the sickness.”
For example, one concept we discussed in the podcast is masturbation. The question of is masturbation a sin was posed. In preparation for the podcast episode, the Holy Spirit allowed for me to journey back to when I first began masturbating. It started immediately after my molestation began. As a child, experiencing sexual violations, I was terrified. For so many of us, our sexual trauma occurred at a young age and what we experienced, may have felt good physically but we knew that it was wrong mentally – usually because of how it happened. This may have been seen in the secretive nature that many abusers use, saying things like “Don’t tell anyone or you’re going to get in trouble”. Sentiments like these implemented fear, therefore causing the one being violated to turn to some sort of trauma response. What if masturbation was your trauma response?
From birth, a child learns to self soothe. Self soothe means to “comfort oneself when unhappy or distressed”, The act of self-soothing, in whatever manner we see fit, becomes our way of coping with the trauma that has occurred to us. Our innocence was robbed and we had to fight to feel okay at such a young age. That fight was on full display through pornography addictions, compulsive masturbation, and excessive lust. It could have also been seen in aggressive behavior, immense sadness, complete withdrawal from desired activities, etc. The responses are endless. The point though is that its imperative for us to identify why we indulge in the behavior we indulge in.
Once we are able to identify the reason or root cause of our behaviors, whether good or bad, we will then be able to walk in our healing. Once we walk in our healing, we will be more equipped to cast all of our cares on God and walk a journey of freedom.
God loves you friend. He doesn’t see you as damaged goods or chewed up gum. He doesn’t condemn you or shame you for your sexual sin. He loves you just the same. Because we can stamp that truth, it’s vital to our being that we don’t allow others to condemn or shame us. Our validation comes from Christ and Christ alone.