MrShorty

Did we just concede here that nudists are living some kind of "higher law"??? :)

Thought 1: Sometimes I think this modesty discussion gets too focused on "what my clothing might make men ( and women, if we want to be gender neutral) think." With due appreciation to the Savior's teachings in Matt 5 (thoughts about something are the same as actually doing it), I think, socially, there is a dramatic difference between a man who sees a woman and spends the next week fantasizing about her and a man who sees a woman and seduces/rapes her. This kind of hit home to me in a brief internet exchange. One man said, "if you knew what a man thought, you'd be scared out of your mind." and the woman replied, "I am not afraid of what men think." It has made me wonder if the modesty discussion is too much about what others might be thinking. In some ways, as long as they keep their thoughts/hands/lips/etc. to themselves, it does not matter much what they are thinking. Thought 2: Another observation that I have found interesting comes from the nudist community. Nudists are fond of claiming that they learn how to properly separate nudity from sexuality. We have all heard of "native" cultures where women go topless, and they do not sexualize the nudity that they are exposed to -- it is the cultural norm for them. It emphasizes to me that some of this modesty discussion is "cultural" and not "theological." I'm not promoting nudism or other less modest cultural dress standards, but it helps me see that no one is forced to think anything (let alone do anything) because they see a certain amount of skin. Everyone can properly respond in thought and (especially) action to what others wear or don't wear.

To bring this back from the dead, I solicited the opinion of an "LDS marital intimacy coach" on this article, if anyone is interested in Coach Sam's opinion on the article: http://ldsmarriagebed.blogspot.com/2014/07/reader-question-do-we-need-sex.html

It is an interesting question. I'm not sure I fully understand the answer. Joseph Smith taught that the, "same sociality which exists among us here will exist among use there..." (D&C 130:2), so I get the impression that there will be echoes of this life in the next life. The exact form of our social structure in the next life seems inexact, but I expect my wife and I will live together. Our adult children and their spouses will live together, and we will recognize them as our children, as well as all their children and children's children. I will also know my parents and grandparents and other ancestors and understand my relationships to them. If I am granted the privilege of raising my stillborn child, he will live with us until he is grown. I don't think we really know the details of what our lives will look like in the next life. As Spirit Dragon said, we will be sealed together into one big "family of Adam".

My thoughts, in no particular order: 1) on fabricating desire: I assume you are referring to the challenges in growing and maintaining a healthy sex life in heterosexual marriages. After years in a sexless marriage, the idea of "fabricating desire" is one that I have studied to some degree. In many ways, I think your assertion that desire "has to be" fabricated at times is at the heart of the "sexless marriage vs adultery vs fidelity" thread that I started a few months, which ended up being about whether sex is a need and/or an obligation. How important/necessary is sex to a marriage relationship -- and, therefore, what are the obligations to "fabricate [sexual] desire" in marriages. (the overall tone of this discussion seemed to be that sex is neither need nor obligation, so what does that mean for this discussion about "fabricating desire"?) One issue I would point out as it applies to mixed orientation marriages (MOMs). In the heterosexual case, there is usually a hetersexual "core" to work with. A couple can think back to the "infatuation"/"honeymoon" stage of their relationship and recall how much desire they felt for each other. Or there are those where a spouse says something like "I like sex (with the opposite sex), just not with my current wife/husband." Or one can think on their relationship with erotic literature/visuals and recognize a heterosexual attraction towards the opposite sex. In these cases, "fabricating desire" is about learning how to fan those flames and direct them at one's spouse. In MOMs, there is no heterosexual core to fan -- fabricating desire in these cases is about creating a desire that does not exist and has never existed. IMO, truly fabricating desire is a different challenge than merely "rekindling" a latent desire. A few (like Josh Weed) manage to build workable heterosexual MOMs, but I think the success rate for MOMs is never going to be very high. If the secular climate would allow it, it would be interesting to study what successful "sex therapy" might look like for MOMs. 2) I would add the following statements from the article to this discussion: This statement strongly reminds me of Laura Brotherson's "Involuntary Celibacy" article on her blog. In many ways I think this discussion -- even when it is about SSA -- really hits at the heart of what our sexuality means to us as individuals and as couples. How are sex and love related to each other? Is love needed for sex? Is sex needed for love? (naturally this kind of discussion is about romantic relationships and not about love between family members, parent/child, or friends or other "platonic relationships"). In many ways it maybe comes down to understanding why God made us sexual beings and what is the eternal nature of our sexuality and what part is a result of being fallen mortals. 3) How to address children: I don't really know. In some ways, I wonder if Tom Christofferson's Bishop had the best advice -- "well, I don't think it is a good idea to lie at church, do you?". Maybe we just need to figure out how to be honest with our children. "Brother Smith and Brother Jones love each other and live together (are married??). The Church teaches that men should not marry men and women should not marry women, but they want to come to church and we should accept them and love them." In many ways, how different is this discussion from "why is my friend's unmarried sister pregnant" or "why does that man smoke and drink" or "why does so-and-so go shopping on Sunday". How should we teach our children to deal with sinful people and a fallen, sinful world? How should we do this so they can have the fortitude to overcome their own sins/weaknesses without becoming depressed over their own imperfections?

Thank you for pitching in James1. Since the discussion started with a statement from an Evangelical pastor, I was hoping someone from your side of the aisle would pitch in a few thoughts. If I may ask, if you were responding directly to Dr. Lutzer rather than on an LDS message board, would your response be any different? I think I can agree with you on this. In many ways, I think it is the same thing that TFP was arguing for (though obviously from a decidedly LDS POV). In some ways, you both seem to me to be making the same argument -- the only difference being what you each consider to be part of the scripture canon. It almost becomes circular, since the question originally started with "how to discern whether the Bible is supposed to be scripture/part of scripture." I find questions around discernment quite fascinating. In your understanding, James1, what is the Holy Spirit's role in discerning truth and error?

Question, and you may not know the answer, yet: Would you consider this a "bisexual" sort of thing (you found your husband sexually attractive in the past and maybe the present, as well as finding other men "attractive" as well as finding women attractive), or would you say this is homosexual (you find yourself repulsed or disinterested in men sexually, and exclusively prefer women)? It seems to me that a bisexual situation is similar to what most of us experience, even as heterosexuals -- we need to work on "guarding our hearts" against developing "feelings" for others so that we stay faithful to our current spouse. We need to work on, nurture, etc. the sexual relationship with our current spouse so that it doesn't become routine or boring. In these respects, it doesn't seem much different to me than the regular heterosexual situation. If you are more homosexual than bisexual, then there will be certain challenges ahead. Mixed orientation marriages do not have a stellar track record. It will take significant work on your and your husband's part to make this work. With the help of a good counselor, figure out how to make the marriage work.

Correct. On the other hand, there are many "sinful" activities that are legal according to the law of the land. It seems to me that the heart of the debate over SSM is whether or not this particular sinful activity warrants legislative prohibition or not.

There is one challenge that I see in accepting Adam only as a figurative character. The heart of Christian theology -- in spite of all the differences in details -- is that Christ came to redeem a fallen mankind. I'm not enough of a theologian or philosopher to understand the full logic behind these things, but it often seems to me that, if Adam and his fall are merely story, then are Christ's ministry and atonement likewise merely story or allegory? As I must reject the latter, I also want to find some way to make Adam and his fall real events, too. I don't fully know how to reconcile this with what science teaches, though I believe they can be reconciled. If nothing else, it is a good question.

A few thoughts: 1) If "normal" means "common", or "natural", or that many couples get into fights/arguments, I would say that fighting/arguing is normal. If "fighting/arguing" is the same as having "conflict/disagreements" I would say that it is almost inevitable as TFP noted. I must note that this does not mean that fighting/arguing is "good", or "healthy" or otherwise conducive to building strong relationships. 2) In his books, Dr. Gottman spends a lot of time talking about dealing with conflict. He says that he can predict divorces quite reliably based on how a couple deals with conflict. One key to building strong relationships is to learn how to resolve conflicts in positive ways and avoiding his "four horsemen" (http://www.gottmanblog.com/2012/12/manage-conflict-six-skills.html).

mdfxdb: In essence I would agree with you -- the key is to learn to be unselfish. In some ways, though, this also seems circular -- "the key to learning to be generous is learning to be unselfish". I also agree that, sometimes, this kind of selfishness can be symptomatic of selfishness elsewhere in the marriage. I also sometimes think that there are special considerations in the sexual relationship. I recall lessons (and I have seen discussions here on lds.net) where the message presented is "SEX and sexual desire (outside of marriage, if marital status is even mentioned) are inherently, unavoidably, and universally selfish acts/desires." When that message gets carried into marriage, it creates a challenge to the simple "be less selfish" message. Paul Byerly on his blog recently explained it this way: "Our culture has taught her men are obsessed with and totally selfish about sex...You will do anything to get more sex than you need, and it is her job to limit you to something reasonable...Your gender makes it impossible for you to tell the truth about sex!" (http://www.the-generous-husband.com/2014/06/07/is-she-good-willed-in-bed/). In short, while I agree that the key is selflessness, I think our discussion of selflessness as it applies to the marriage bed sometimes needs more detail to overcome some of these misperceptions of how sexuality and selfishness are related.

Anatess, I think you are touching on a problem I have seen in other men (not sure if WhatdoIdo is in this category or not). Some men do get rather stubborn about insisting that their wife should experience sexual desire the same way he does -- "strong and constant" desire (to borrow a phrase from Elder Packer), spontaneous desire, that "I've got to have you now" feeling. Reality seems to be that each gender (and, arguably each individual) experiences sex, desire, libido, etc. differently. And it is not very helpful to expect or insist that your spouse will experience sex the same way you do. What you seem to be describing I expect is a common and a good way to approach it -- approaching sex out of generosity for your spouse is a good thing. From the point of view of someone like WhatdoIdo, how do we get our wives to be more generous in this regard? How do we get our wives to realize, like Anatess has already learned, that generosity in the marriage bed is allowed, is proper, is often necessary (without, at the same time, coming across as selfish, oversexed pigs)?

I wish I had a better answer than this, but this is the only answer I have come across, too. Keep loving her, keep telling her that you want a stronger sexual relationship, take note of the things Dr. Gottman talks about to make sure this perpetual problem does not descend into gridlock. Somewhere along the line, it has to come from her. She has to make a choice to "awaken" her sexuality and engage with you. One of the toughest things about marriage (part of why I think Dr. Schnarch emphasizes the idea of "differentiation" so much) is that you cannot make your spouse want or do anything. A couple of years ago, I had what to me seemed a significant observation. A good many (most? all?) of those things we say to do to "fill her love tank" (help with housework, be positive to her, take her out, get her little gifts, etc.) are also the same suggestions you can find if you google "how to be a good roommate". I can't speak for others, but in that realization, I felt like God was calling me to be a good roommate, and let Him take care of the rest. I don't know if it really right or not, but it has not hurt my marriage to be a good roommate. I still have hope that something fundamental will change in the marriage bed, but who knows if or when.

Where's the laugh button when you need it? I guess I inadvertently set that one up pretty well.

I think that a forgotten aspect of this is the part where you kick your heels, slap its rump, or whatever your favorite method is of communicating "get moving" to the horse. So much of our dialog around sex is about trying not to do (or not to do too much of) something, that we neglect to talk about the importance in some cases of "awakening" sexuality even though some of us don't feel as much natural urge.

WhatdoIdo: You won't get any argument from me that we don't use the term "bridle" correctly in this context. My observation has been that our usual use looks like "bridle" = "control" = "abstain" in these contexts. As you note, this does not translate at all into marriage. I personally have chosen to simply break the connection in my own mind between "bridle" and "abstain" so that I can see bridling more in terms of growing and developing sexuality rather than repressing and abstaining. I am certainly not opposed to finding a different term or concept for what is supposed to be happening in marriage.

One thing Dr. Schnarch says a lot is that "marriage is a people growing machine." Yes, you are asking her to "change" and "grow" sexually. That is difficult, but it just might be an important part of what marriage is. On the flip side, she is also asking you to "change" and "grow" sexually. It often seems to me that the real skill is how to take two sexually different individuals and blend them together into "one flesh". Sister Brotherson (in a podcast on her strengtheningmarriage.com website) talks about "awakening" versus "bridling" sexuality. The basic premise is that some of us (maybe you) need to work on "bridling" our sexuality, and others (like your wife) of us need to learn to "awaken" and develop our sexuality. Try not to give up. It's a long and sometimes painful road, but this can be overcome.

Maintaining an appropriate level of disgust towards sin is important. The pattern of "despise -> tolerate -> embrace" is unfortunate. But isn't part of this learning to discern sin? The "cliche" example I think of is the way the ancient Israelites approached the Sabbath. They were so "disgusted" by the sin of profaning the Sabbath that they had created multiple rules (sins) around what it meant to honor the Sabbath. Jesus showed them (Matt 12, for example) that some of their sins were man-made sins and not really sin. It seems to me that some of these difficult issues really come down to how do we discern what is sin and is not sin. A lot of the difficulty is that we know it is possible for man to misinterpret and call something sin (evil) that is not really sin. We also know that it is possible for man to call something good when it is really evil (Isaiah 5:20).

What do you think Paul is really trying to do in these kind of verses? Is he trying to say that this born again experience absolves us of all past and future sin,so we can resume our hedonistic lifestyle, free of guilt and responsibility for our actions? I tend not to think that is what he is trying to say here. I think of it more like something I would here from a motivational speaker. When you are feeling despondent because you are not good enough, because you continue to make mistakes, don't let your past sin define who you are. Don't let recurring sin define who you are. When sin happens, pick yourself up and turn back to God. I am reminded of Nephi's psalm in 2 Ne 4 (https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/2-ne/4?lang=eng). The pivotal verse seems to be 19: "my heart groaneth because of my sins. Nevertheless, I know in whom I have trusted." I think the take home message is to avoid simply "groaning because of our sins", but remembering that we have put our faith and trust in Christ, and to remember that he can and will save us from our sins.

I will agree with estradling, the advice is still the same. If it helps, I am reminded of this article written by LDS therapist Mark Chamberlain: http://markchamberlainphd.blogspot.com/2010/10/want-porn-out-let-wife-in.html Obviously it is specifically addressing married men, one of the key ideas he brings up is this: It sometimes seems that part of what drives this habit/compulsion is the need to keep it secret. In cases like this, part of breaking the habit is finding a good "accountability partner" who can receive your confessions. The theory is that, as you break away from the need to keep it secret, you can break away from the need to do it (or at least better manage the need). Obviously, since you are not married, this is not going to be your wife, but your bishop could fill a similar role, or a parent, or a reliable friend.

It is an interesting question, though I'm still not sure I understand the question fully, nor do I think I will fully understand the answer when (and if) we come up with an answer. In an attempt to clarify the question, it seems to me that it is headed in one (or both) of two possible directions: 1) My first reaction to these questions is to wonder if you are thinking about questions of "free will" or, what LDS call "agency." While I can in no way call myself an expert in the discussion, I know Christian philosophers have been discussing it for a very long time. Do we have free will, or are we puppets on a string? When we develop faith in Christ, is it because we chose to develop faith, or did God pull the "believe" string and we suddenly believed? When we go to church, is it because we wanted to go to church of our own will, or did God pull the "go to church" string and we went? Is this the kind of thing you want to discuss? 2) In another way, it looks like a question along the lines of "Do LDS believe in a variation of 'once saved always saved'?" Another question that Christianity has attempted to understand for a long time. Some do indeed believe that, once we have believed and/or done anything else necessary for salvation, that nothing we say or do or choose after that point can "unsave" us. Is that where you are headed with this?

In some ways, I will agree with applepansy, though I can certainly empathize with Windseeker. I am reminded of this post just a few days ago by Brad at One Flesh Marriage (http://www.onefleshmarriage.com/2014/06/look-great-no-i-dont.html). For whatever reason, it seems that this is a common problem in our society. How to learn to give and receive honest compliments is difficult enough. Combine with the familiarity of marriage relationships and the outside world's fluctuating, irrational definitions of "beauty", "attractive", etc. and it is probably a wonder that anyone manages to get this right. One observation on Charity Pierce: Even in her case (grossly overweight due to physical illness), we frame the discussion of "is she beautiful" in terms of finding a man who says that she is beautiful and worthy of love and affection. Maybe it is difficult to describe "hotness" without it, but it sometimes seems to me that some of this issue needs to be about our relationship with ourselves. Can we each learn to describe ourselves as attractive, beautiful, valuable, "hot", acceptable, loveable, or whatever on our own terms without needing someone outside of ourselves to prop us up? Can we learn how to do it without deluding ourselves?

Quinn: I find myself rather interested in understanding what makes good relationships/marriages and how sex fits into it. It is an interesting blend of religion, anecdotal evidence, and science. As you note, sex is not all there is to building a good marriage, but it consistently seems to be part of a good marriage. While strongly correlated, what does this mean in terms of causation? And, ultimately, what does this mean as far as "actions" a couple should take to try to have a good marriage? In what ways do we overemphasize the importance of sex in marriage? In what ways do we underestimate it? I'm reminded of a concept Dr. Gottman uses: the concept of a "perpetual problem" and "gridlock." (http://www.gottmanblog.com/2012/07/managing-conflict-solvable-vs-perpetual.html). What you describe begins to sound to me like sex could be a "perpetual problem". The idea would be to learn how to deal with it so we don't become "gridlocked" over it. I sometimes wish I could find some good case studies where Dr. Gottman shows how to use these principles to deal with sexual issues specifically.

If these are the two options, I would say it is more likely to be a lack of awareness. Most estimates for the US say that about 20% of marriages are "sexless" (usually defined as 10 or fewer sexual encounters per year http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexless_marriage). At that rate, an LDS bishop with stewardship over ~100 couples has probably got 15-20 sexless marriages within his ward. Acknowledging, as we have above, that a few of those are due to age, illness, and he probably has at least 10 couples who are actually fighting, wishing, hoping, and otherwise struggling -- and most of them probably don't talk to the Bishop about it. Mark Regnerus (http://www.religionnews.com/2014/04/22/new-study-mark-regnerus-suggests-religion-can-predict-sexual-behavior/) claims that he will present some data later this year that may break this down by religious affiliation, which will be interesting.

I'm reminded of something Elder Oaks said (https://www.lds.org/ensign/2006/06/dating-versus-hanging-out?lang=eng): "As a General Authority, I have the responsibility to preach general principles. When I do, I don’t try to define all the exceptions. There are exceptions to some rules." I would venture to say that, in the case of sex within marriage, we tiptoe around the general rule for fear of offending the exceptions. Or perhaps it come back to one of PC's original questions: Do we, as LDS, believe that sex within marriage is a commandment (with exceptions) or do we believe it is something else. Do we believe that we should teach that sex is an important or even necessary part of marriae or not?