Sex and the Trinity (an exercise in practical theology)

"Let us make man in our image, after our likeness.... So God created man in His own image. In His image He created him; male and female He created them." Gen. 1:26-27

Q: How did God create man?

A: God created man male and female, after His own image, in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness, with dominion over the creatures.

(Question 10, Westminster Shorter Catechism)

There is consistency and diversity in God, and humanity bears the same double-stamp. We are one creature, a human being made in God's image. Yet we are also two separate creatures, male and female, both in God's image. When we read this in Genesis, it is so quickly stated and then left behind that it feels like an absent-minded contradiction: "In His image He created him; male and female He created them." The switch from "him" to "them" is instantaneous, almost nonchalant, as if it should be obvious that what God makes as singular cannot help but also be plural. And why not? When the Holy "Us" makes after His own image, should we expect less rather than more?

We should not glaze over how nitty-gritty the trinitarian implications of our creation are. The basic idea of the Trinity (as if this will explain it) is that God as a Being is a diversity that is so absolutely harmonious in their unity that "they" are "He". The "three" are "One". Even that shallow sketch seems to skirt heresy, but here's one ting that doesn't: the "image of God" is the image of the Trinity, and it is in that likeness we are made. Thus, we are "him" and "them," one and two, two becoming one when they "cleave" to each other and become "one flesh" (Gen. 2:24). This is a great mystery, one easily misunderstood. The point for now is that the Trinity, far from being a theological abstraction, is in fact a divine reality whose image is revealed in us, even (and especially) in our moments of the most intimate physical contact.

Again, why not? Only love creates real unity, and the name of the Trinity is "love" (I John 4:7-8). Thus, the love between friends and "like minds," the love between a man and a woman, the love of Christ for His Church---all these things are reflections and refractions of the One Great Love, the Trinitarian Dance. The Trinity is the higher reality infusing all of existence. It is the watermark of creation, the touchstone of all that is, and therefore it is practical theology, for without it we cannot even begin to understand God, or the world, or ourselves.

All other ground is sinking sand.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2013

Sex and Justification (the outrageous analogies of an orthodox rebel)

Just sayin'...

In ye olden times of the English-speaking world, "rape" was often spoken of as "dishonoring" a woman.

Now, describing "rape" as such doesn't have quite the punch most of us are looking for; calling it an "act of evil" sounds more appropriate (if a bit campy). Still, I think our ancestors were on to something, something very special and specific.

FOR HONOR!!!!!!!!

"Honor" is a word we are familiar with, though less familiar than we think. Klingons have honor, as do all their endless sci-fi imitators. (Warrior culture, yes? Expect "honor" to get a word-workout.) In some rare cases, we may hear someone be called a "man of honor". There we are referring to their character, viz., what kind of person they are, what kind of ethics they have subsumed, "who they are when no one's around," etc. That's about the extent of our understanding of "honor": having a specific character to which you should take pride in, pride enough to act according to that character.

Such an idea isn't far off the mark, but the real meaning of "honor" is much simpler. "Honor" simply referred to one's value, i.e., what you as an individual were worth. To gain honor, one had to do something(s) of note or merit (slay dragons, win wars, don't cheat on your taxes, etc.). To lose honor, one of two things had to happen: either you did something that was unbecoming of your value (in other words, it is antithetical to who you are) or you didn't do something that was in line with or would have increased your value, increased your worth. In short, you either did something you shouldn't have done, or you didn't do something you should have done. In either case, you "dishonor" yourself (and the family and/or community to which you belong). You have not treated yourself with the value that you have (or need), and thus acted (or did not act) accordingly.

Clear enough? Of course not. But let's move on.

You are without honor, sirrah.

Now, to be "dishonored" is different from dishonoring yourself. In the latter, you did not live up to the value that you have (or are called to). In the former, however, you have not been treated in accordance with the value that you have. To put it another way, anyone can dishonor themselves, but only valuable people can be dishonored. Both the man of honor and the rogue can dishonor themselves: the former by not living up to their value and the latter by not seeking to gain value; but only the already-valuable can be dishonored. Your honor, your value, is the gauge by which you measure dishonor. The less value you have, the less you can be considered dishonored. If you have no value, then you cannot be dishonored at all. A sacred place can be dishonored; a secular one, less so. You can dishonor a man more than a horse, and both more than a rock.

This is where I think them olden-folks were on to something: "rape" is to "dishonor" a woman because you are not treating her with the value that she already has. She does not lose value, mind you; she has been disvalued, not devalued. The assumption is that women have a set, intrinsic value simply by being a woman. That intrinsic value ought to guide how we act around and towards them, and rape is to act untowards a woman. It is to disvalue her, to treat her as less than she's worth, as a thing or an object rather than a unique individual with intrinsic value. It "dishonors" her, for she has honor. She is already-honorable, already-valuable, and should be treated as such. Thus, as Cameron Poe would say, "Don't! Treat! Women! Like! That!"

That. Is. The question.

A logical question to ask at this point would be exactly what is the "value" of a woman. What does it look like, or how "big" is it (so to speak)? I think the Christian answer would be this: every person, man or woman, has limitless value because (1) they are all made in the image of the God whose "value" is limitless (Ps. 8:1) and (2) they are each a unique manifestation of God's image, a one-time-only, non-repeatable subject.
 
 The first point speaks to God's objective value: whatever value He has as a being is our value as well. That is the special quality and privilege of a human being. The second point speaks to our subjective value: we are not cardboard cut-outs of the same theme, but rather each of us is a unique note in the symphony that is "the image of God". Each of us sees the world from a unique perspective; each of us sees God from a unique perspective, and thus worships and loves God from a unique perspective. There is unity of belief and creed, of course, but not necessarily unity of expression and person. We are each and all a specific "I", and our "I"-ness is a part of our value. That is the special state of a human being. Therefore, the combination of God's objective value and our subjective value means our value is limitless. We have been "crowned with glory and honor" simply be being human (Ps. 8:3-5).

Clear again? No again? Right. Moving on.

Uh...no.

If human "value" is limitless (as I think it is), then a woman's "value" is limitless (as I also think it is). Thus, any act of "disvalue" towards a human person (both male and female) is wrong. Rape, murder, theft, kidnapping, lying to or against: every sin against another (including God) is in some way related to our disvaluing that other as a being. We deem them unworthy of respect or life or property or peace or obedience. I think that makes sense (a lot of sense), but it also creates at least one interesting...let's say, "issue".

Rape, in purely biological terms, is about sex. Sex in all the wrong ways, but sex nonetheless. Now, not to sound platitudinous, but sex in all the right ways is consensual, a natural outflow of love, and within the safeguards and security of a marriage covenant (at the very least). The "issue" is this: if a woman's value is indeed limitless, then there is no way you can be worthy of her. Your value may be limitless, too, but to demand any woman (or any one) on those grounds (i.e., your own worth or awesomeness or studliness or whatever) is to treat her as an object, a mere means to your own self-aggrandizing ends. It is dishonoring to her and to you. But then, how is this supposed to work? How can you ever be worthy of her?

The answer is: only if she declares you to be worthy.

"Love bade me welcome..."

Sex, in that it is a physical representation of love, is to be an invitation, i.e., an other invites and welcomes you to come closer than any one else. They must do the inviting; anything else would make us gatecrashers. Thus, we wait on their declaration, wait in hope that they will declare us worthy. Whether we actually are worthy is not the point; the point is that the other has declared us so out of love, and on the basis of that loving declaration we approach with boldness and yet humility. Boldness, because nothing now bars our way; humility, because it is all an act of grace. Like all acts of true love, sex is to be about grace.

The image of justification is hard to avoid at this point. Union with God is possible because He declares us worthy in Christ. We are not worthy; we could never be worthy of God. But I have good news: Christ died for our unworthiness, proving God's love, and providing us a worthiness not our own (Rom. 5; Phil. 3:8-9). God gives us worth because we have none to merit His favor, and He gives out of love and now invites out of love, invites all to come to the table and feast, to the waters and drink, to taste and see the goodness of God. Christ is the gracious invitation and welcome of God, and to try and enter by any other door is to be a rogue and cheat, a robber and thief, an attempted-rapist of the divine. We will fail, of course, but we will be rightfully punished for our insolence, for our pride, for our disobedience, for our deeming God and His ways unworthy of our respect or adherence, for daring to disvalue the purest and greatest and most extravagant Lover and Love of all:

In short as well as conclusion, the sacred symbols and realities surrounding romantic (and even sexual) love continue to surprise.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2013

All About Love (thoughts on Romantic Theology)

"He that has seen Me has seen the Father...." John 14:9

"He is the image of the invisible God...." Col. 1:15

In the Divine Comedy, Dante reaches the end of his journey in the last cantos of "Purgatory". I say it's the end of his journey because he finally reaches his true love, Beatrice. However, he will soon discover that this "ending" is only another beginning. He meets her at the top of Mt. Purgatory where she comes at the end of strange pageant: a train of creatures and people, all representing the books of the Bible, theological and cardinal virtues, and even Christ Himself (represented by a Griffin). Every element of the pageant is meant to symbolize a different sacrament, i.e., a means and point of contact with God, whether it be divine revelation, "the law written on our hearts," or Christ (who is the Sacrament).

Beatrice belongs to this train. She symbolizes how romantic love (when done properly) is yet another sacrament, a doorway to the divine, a means of ascension higher and higher into the love of God. This is not only the central conceit of the entire Comedy, but also a key component in the Christian view of marriage. Christianity has always viewed marriage as a sacrament, a means of contact with God where He administers and ministers grace to us. This is what Charles Williams called "Romantic Theology," though he never claimed the idea to be novel. Christian orthodoxy has always believed and taught that romance, though it can go awry like anything else, was always meant to be an avenue of communion with God through another person, which was the entire point of marriage: two people brought together by God to be used of God to sanctify each other. The grace of God given to us through each other---that is the essence of Christian romance, and it is a sacramental essence.

The Bible reveals the sacramental essence of marriage in some surprising ways. One of those ways can be found in Paul's first letter to the Corinthians. Now, First Corinthians is all about love (and not just the 13th chapter). "Let all things be done out of love" (16:14) is the summation and theme of the whole book; furthermore, if we love each other, then we will seek each others "well-being" (10:24) and do all things "for edification" (15:26). In other words, love should lead us to be a means of grace (i.e., a sacrament) to other Christians. If you belong to God, then you have been made a sacrament to others, especially those inside the Church.

What does this have to do with marriage? Well, in chapter 7, Paul explains how men and women can "avoid fornication": "let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband" (vs. 2), i.e., get married and have sex. That's right. Paul (that cranky old curmudgeon) is telling Christian spouses to have sex, and (get this) it's not just a matter of practical morality: "Let the husband render unto his wife due benevolence, and likewise also the wife unto her husband" (vs. 3). This is not just about keeping yourself sexually pure (and faithful) in marriage; this is also about showing "benevolence" to your spouse by not withholding sex (vs. 5). Thus, in marriage, sex is tied directly to edification. It is one of the ways a husband is a sacramental means of grace to his wife (and vice versa).

Is your mind blown yet? It should be. Who views sex like this? Not our culture. Whether inside or outside of marriage, sex is merely a means of domination: two individuals mutually working their will on the other. It has nothing to do with grace at all. Furthermore, I daresay that the Church in America does little better. Marriage is important, at least politically and socially, but what about theologically and sacramentally? All of marriage (whether it be sex or something else) is meant to be sacramental, i.e., about grace, about meeting God. That is why wives "submit" themselves to their husbands and husbands "lay down" themselves for their wives: it is a mutual sacrifice on behalf of the other, and into that loving matrix the presence of God comes into our midst.

That, of course, is the whole point: of the Divine Comedy, of Christian marriage, of Christianity and Christ Himself. God is a sacramental God. He meets us in the midst of our moments, especially (as Dante showed us) in our darkest moments. Love reaches out to us in the dark wood, and it will lead us home, even through Hell itself. It is what T.S. Eliot meant by "mid-winter spring": those moments of light and life in the midst of the cold, dead lands, the intersection of our time with God's eternity. This is not about abstractions; this is about love, about Christ, who is the fullest proof of God's love (Rom. 5:8; I John 4:9-10), a love that manifested itself in our midst, that was made flesh and blood and bones and veins and fat and walked into our winter with all the glories and colors of spring. The point of the story, of all good stories (whether Dante's, Christ's, your marriage, or your walk with God), is love, love manifested in our midst with all its surprises and its unapologetic, relentless and reckless sacrifice for its beloved.

-Jon Vowell (c) 2013