Thoughts on Sex, Marriage and Celibacy

Remaining unmarried for the sake of God’s kingdom is a good and noble thing, but for anyone to require it of someone else is evil and demonic.  The Apostle Paul warned:

“Now the Spirit expressly says that in later times some will depart from the faith by devoting themselves to deceitful spirits and teachings of demons, through the insincerity of liars whose consciences are seared, who forbid marriage and require abstinence from foods that God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth” (1 Timothy 4:1-3, emphases mine).

The Virgin Mary ceased to be a virgin in the biological sense at the moment she gave birth to Christ; the miracle was the virgin conception, not perpetual virginity.  It is very plain that after Mary and Joseph observed the forty days of sexual abstinence commanded in Leviticus 12, and offered the mandatory sacrifice (Leviticus 12:8; Luke 2:24), they went home and consummated their marriage.  Matthew 1:25 informs us that Joseph honored Mary’s virginity only until she had given birth to the Lord Jesus—he did not “know her,” meaning he did not consummate their marriage, “until she had given birth to a son.”

Mary went on to bear other children after the Lord Jesus.  The Bible mentions these folk in a number of places.  For example, Matthew 13:55: “Is not this the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother called Mary? And are not his brothers James and Joseph and Simon and Judas?”

In Galatians 1:19, Saint Paul refers to James the Just (not the brother of John who was martyred earlier) as “James the Lord’s brother.”

While biased scholars offer other explanations, such as these people being Joseph’s children by another marriage or their being Jesus’ cousins, there is no historical evidence for such conjectures whatsoever, and they fly in the face of the biblical evidence.

If Mary had remained perpetually a virgin, she would have been living in sin because the Bible requires regular sexual activity between married people.  This is explicit in the Word of God.  Even a cursory look at 1 Corinthians 7:1-5 makes this unmistakably clear.

1 Corinthians 7:1 ‘Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is good for a man not to have sexual relations with a woman.”’

Here Paul is telling us that abstinence from sex is a good thing, but he quickly adds in verse 2:  “But because of the temptation to sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.”

We notice, then, that marriage and sex are not simply for the purpose of procreation but for the purpose of avoiding sexual immorality: “because of the temptation to sexual immorality.”

He writes further, 1 Corinthians 7:3, “The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.”

Had Mary refused to open her body to Joseph for sexual intercourse, she would have been a wicked woman, because regular sexual intercourse is a basic element in marriage.  The moment that a person says, “I do,” he or she forever forfeits the right to say, “No:”  “For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does” (1 Corinthians 7:4).

Notice how this is true both of the husband and of the wife.  Saint Paul was not a misogynist; on the contrary, he taught that the husband forfeited the rights to his own body, too: “Likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does” (1 Corinthians 7:4).

While no one can say for others what constitutes regularity in terms of sexual intercourse, surely it should not be measured by the year or month, but by the week.  1 Corinthians 7:5 is quite clear: “Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.”

If a person feels called to go off for a period of prayer and fasting in order to seek the Lord, he or she is not permitted to do so without the blessing of the spouse.  Furthermore, even with spousal blessing, this should not be for an extended period of time, “so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.”

Some people have received a special spiritual gift of a single life (1 Corinthians 7:7), but this is not everyone’s gift, and it has no connection with Church office whatsoever.  While men have studied clever arguments to enhance the idea of avoidance of marriage, the failure to marry for a person who does not have the gift of a single life is a deadly snare.  Asceticism appears to be a holy thing, but it is of “no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh:”

‘If with Christ you died to the elemental spirits of the world, why, as if you were still alive in the world, do you submit to regulations—“Do not handle, Do not taste, Do not touch” (referring to things that all perish as they are used)—according to human precepts and teachings? These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self-made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh’ (Colossians 2:20-23).

While sex outside the bounds of marriage is sinful and destructive, sex inside marriage is very holy and good.  

The root of sin is not in the body, but in fallen human nature.  The physical body was created by God to be sexually attractive; he intended for a woman’s body to stimulate her husband.  It is good, holy and pious for him to enjoy looking at his wife’s naked body.  Her breasts should be delightful to him and touching them should give him pleasure.  Husbands are commanded by God to “rejoice in the wife of your youth,” and to “let her breasts fill you at all times with delight; be intoxicated always in her love” (Proverbs 5:18, 19).