We have a crisis in the evangelical church of pastors normalizing sexual sin and the objectification of women.
Late last week I started talking about a horrible Facebook live that SBC megachurch pastor Jonathan Pokluda made, where he admitted he wanted to sleep with multiple women. He has also said on a podcast that sex outside of marriage is an 11 on an erotic scale of 1-10, and that the reason you shouldn’t have sex before marriage is that you’ll be chasing that high your whole life. Sex outside of marriage is just more pleasurable because of the forbidden factor.
I could give you so many more examples of other pastors saying virtually the same thing. It’s everywhere, and I’ve got an op ed piece in Baptist News coming out later today about it. But I think we need to take a step back, and ask:
Does it matter that so many pastors are tempted by porn, etc.?
Our survey of married, evangelical men found that about 49% of men used porn in some way–the majority rarely or intermittently. That means that half don’t (which is great!), but half do.
Here’s what we know about the half that do: they have worse marriages and sex lives; they are worse lovers (doing less foreplay, and their wives are less likely to reach orgasm); they don’t feel as emotionally close during sex.
In other words, a man’s porn use changes men’s experience of sex, and porn really changes their wives’ experience of sex. You can see more in The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex, or download our evangelical sex report card!
We also know several things that porn normalizes:
1. Porn normalizes the objectification of women
Porn depicts women as existing merely for their body and their ability to be used by men. Women do not have agency in and of themselves; in fact most porn is violent and denies women’s agency. Porn trains men to see women as less than human.
2. Porn use makes men more likely to be sexist and violent
One recent study out of the Netherlands found that men who watched violent porn were more likely to perpetrate sexual violence themselves. Other studies have found correlations between porn use and sexist attitudes.
3. Porn use causes people to see sex as impersonal and about domination rather than about intimacy
Our studies found that the more porn someone used, the less likely they were to feel emotionally connected during sex, and the more likely they were to be selfish lovers. They don’t actually understand what true sexual intimacy is like because porn has tainted it for them.
Okay, with that being said, here are some things we need to keep in mind as we try to figure out what we should expect of pastors:
Some truths to remember about porn use:
1. One can quit porn and still have a pornographic style of relating
Even if you aren’t watching porn anymore, if you haven’t done the work to understand the roots of the appeal of porn in your life, and the “benefits” that porn gave you (because you wouldn’t watch it if it didn’t give you some sort of benefit), thn you’ll find putting porn behind you even harder. Simple will power doesn’t usually work for breaking the allure of porn.
And if you haven’t done this work, it’s likely the objectification of women will still continue.
2. People who do the work tend to change their view of sex entirely
And this is the really important point: If someone has done the work, got counseling, understood the role that porn was playing in their arousal patterns and their emotional regulation patterns, and healed that part of them, then they’re often able, for the first time, to become truly vulnerable with their wife. And that ability to be vulnerable opens up the TRUE pathways to healthy sexuality that have likely been hidden all these years.
3. Someone who has healed from porn does not usually still feel the pull of porn.
Therefore, when Jonathan Pokluda talks about how his porn use is in the past, but simultaneously talks about how tempted he is by porn now, we know that he hasn’t put the pornographic style of relating behind him. And thus we know that he really doesn’t understand healthy sex at all.
We need to stop normalizing pastors’ sexual sins
There is simply no excuse for it. The reasoning tends to go like this:
- All men struggle with lust (not true!)
- Men struggle with sexual shame and push it down and feel like they can’t come to God with their biggest struggles
- When pastors are honest, it encourages men to come forward
The idea is that normalizing this problem will keep men from shame!
But normalizing this does demonstrabe and measurable harm to women, and that should matter.
Seriously, I am so tired of women’s experiences not even factoring into these discussions! It’s like when I had that conversation with a best-selling author, who refused to agree with Great Sex Rescue because he felt it wasn’t fair to tell men that not all guys lust. Because that would shame men. And when I argued that giving the message that all men lust actually hurts women, his reply was just to dismiss it, saying that women just needed to adapt to the truth!
But it isn’t the truth. And women should not have to adapt to things that Jesus called sin for the sake of saving men from having to do the hard work of recovery.
Here’s what happens when women believe their husbands are tempted by porn or other women. They are:
- 2.4 times MORE likely to say “I have sex only because I feel like I must”
- 1.4 times MORE likely to say, “when it comes to sex, I could take it or leave it”
- 1.7 times LESS likely to say “I frequently orgasm during sex”
- 2.1 times LESS likely to say “I am frequently aroused during sex”
- 3.5 times LESS likely to say “my husband makes my pleasure a priority
(stats from The Good Guy’s Guide to Great Sex)
Women are hurt by these messages, and that should matter.
But also–men are hurt by these messages too.
When men hear that it’s normal to lust and have lifelong battles with porn; that being tempted by other women is completely natural; that objectifying women is basically the definition of masculinity–then how will men ever grow into wholeness? How will men ever experience true intimacy?
Men deserve better than to be stuck in this constant battle where they always feel alone and very lonely, since they can never be vulnerable and authentic and they can’t understand real intimacy.
There is no upside to normalizing this. At all. Full stop. So, given that, a few thoughts:
We should require pastors to be discipled in their sexuality.
I understand this is a big ask, given the huge numbers of evangelical men who use pornography. But pastors pastor not just men but women too, and women deserve to be safe at church. A church which normalizes lust is not a safe one for women. Our studies found that teen girls, for instance, are more likely to be harrassed and assaulted IN CHURCH in churches that teach these kinds of messages than they are in churches that don’t. And while they’re more likely to be assaulted by adults, they’re also more likely to be assaulted by their own peers, meaning that these messages are creating sexual predators.
Churches that don’t allow women in leadership are far more likely to have pastors with these problems, because their proclivities won’t be challenged in the same way. They can maintain the fiction that “this is just the way men are” because there are no women in leadership able to push back on it.
And as Andrew Bauman has written extensively, complementarianism and pornography tend to go together, because they often share the same view of women.
Given that pastors do so much pre-marital counseling, and given that they teach on marriage and sex, we should expect that pastors actually understand real intimacy. As one Facebook commenter said:
How can you be an effective loving pastor if you are coveting those you should be caring for? If they had any humility or self awareness, they would step back from a pastoring role and do some healing work.
I have a very hard time believing that the pastors who have written books and given messages about how important it is in the postpartum period for women to give sexual favours so that the men don’t feel jealous of the newborn baby are actually discipled in their sexuality. It simply is impossible to understand healthy sexuality and still give that message. And so part of the reason that we are in the mess we’re in regarding sexual teaching in evangelicalism is that we haven’t required men to actually be mature in this area.
So I firmly believe that, to be a pastor, one should not have an active porn problem, and one should go to counseling if porn is a pull to understand the roots and to heal.
If a pastor has a porn problem, that pastor should not speak on sex
Let’s bring this back to Jonathan Pokluda as an example, since he has confessed so publicly to both having a porn problem, being tempted by porn, and being tempted by other women.
I don’t believe that he will step down over it.
But if he were truly seeking after Jesus, and if he allowed the Holy Spirit to work in his heart, I believe that he would willingly stop talking about sex. I believe that he would say, “this is an area of my life that is still a struggle, and I don’t want to teach what I obviously don’t know, or normalize what is wrong.” And I think he should have licensed counselors speak on sex instead.
But that’s not what he’s doing. Instead, he spoke to 45,000 college-aged people just a few weeks ago at the Passion Conference, again, normalizing that pornography is a lifelong struggle and that the objectification of women is normal.
We should model what it looks like to heal from a porn problem
Instead of normalizing lifelong porn issues, we should model porn being in the past and actually being transformed by the renewing of your mind (Romans 12:1). Because here’s something else our stats showed us: It is totally possible, and actually quite common, to put porn behind you so that it doesn’t really affect you anymore.
Lots and lots of men have put porn behind them, and now understand and experience real intimacy, and don’t really feel tempted anymore. This isn’t a stretch. The fact that so many pastors refuse to talk about it like that means that they don’t want to normalize healing, because then they’d have to confront themselves. And so they’d rather see it as a lifelong struggle.
Church should be a safe place for everyone–and that means not normalizing sexual sin
This should not be a big ask, but apparently far too many evangelical churches do not consider an unhealthy view of sexuality and the objectification of women to be disqualifying, and that’s horrifying to me.
So, to reiterate:
- Porn use is a huge problem, that leads to worse outcomes for both men and women
- Normalizing porn use and temptation leads to danger for women in church spaces and to worse marital and sexual outcomes
- Porn use distorts sexuality
- It’s actually quite possible and common to put porn use behind us
- Instead of normalizing porn use, we should normalize healing.
This shouldn’t be a big ask. I’m so gobsmacked that it is.
And if you’re in a church where the pastor normalizes sexual sin–get out. Fast.
What do you think? Should it be normal that pastors put sexual sin behind them? How can we make sure this happens? Let’s talk in the comments!
The problems start from the foundations of his argument. Last time I checked, being drawn to something just because it’s “forbidden” is not considered healthy, even by those who aren’t Christians. Even those who support kinks at least bother to have “check your head space/emotional wellness” reminders!
I’m not surprised that emotional healing doesn’t come up very often with pastors like this either. I see very few mentions dealing with emotions in my denomination (SBC). There are some resources, but you have to hunt them down yourself and know what you’re looking for. Plus they are normally for more “respectable” emotional issues, like dealing with grief. I wonder if it’s because emotional healing was associated with secular psychology and counseling for so long? The old “secular resources automatically bad” stance still rearing its head, I guess?
Marina,
You are on target about emotional healing being associated with secular psychology. I used to attend a charismatic church and often heard that struggles with mental illness was the devil living inside of me. I didn’t need counseling or meds. All I needed to do was pray, read my Bible more, and have more faith in Jesus. I also needed some spiritual cleansing. Thankfully, I still chose to see licensed counselors who happened to be Christians which helped me. They didn’t force spiritual cleansing on me or tell me the devil was living in me.
I just think a number of Christians are afraid that any knowledge or teachings outside of the church is bad even though learning psychology and medical matters require extensive knowledge and research which I believe Jesus approved of. Staying stuck in certain patterns like porn addiction seems more comfortable than to do actual work to heal from that issue.
My ex husband was a sex addict and blamed his addiction on me. Of I gave him more sex or did what he wanted, he wouldn’t have problems. That sounds like these male pastors who admit they struggle with porn and still want to teach their congregants about sex. Ew.
Yes, I think you’re onto something here. The idea of trauma, or healing of childhood wounds, is just not talked about well at all. It tends to be framed as a sin issue–just don’t feel anxious.
I’m so saddened that this is something that even has to be explained. Just heartbreaking and truly sickening.
The New Testament seemed to expect church leaders to lead holy lives. So what’s changed that it’s ok for today’s church leaders to wallow in lust?
It also feels incredibly unsafe for any woman to be around a ‘pastor’ like that. If someone tells me that he is only ‘just’ managing to avoid temptation, that is someone I really do not want any woman I care about to be anywhere near!
I know! But I honestly don’t think it occurs to them to understand how this affects women.
I think they’ve spent so much time and energy fighting for the one qualification for elders that they seem to care about (“MAN of one wife”) while forgetting that that very qualification requires him to be faithful. And I don’t think Jesus would say “neh lust is fine as long as you don’t physically commit adultery.” You know, “pluck out your eye” and all that.
Porn use is rampant among young women as well. They’re watching with their partners and solo. One of the side effects of this is a normalization of lesbian sex among otherwise hetero women. Lawyers are seeing more and more divorces triggered by married women engaging in same sex liaisons.
Last Friday one of my colleagues was telling me of a case he had recently picked up. Wife (about 35) came to the husband and asked to open their marriage. She wanted to have sexual experiences with women because she felt that she’d missed out when she was single. Husband thought she was joking and replied that the arrangement was fine as long as he could join in. Wife was adamant the arrangement would apply to only her. Husband had to stay monogamous. When he was able to speak again he told her to pack her stuff and get out and then call my friend. She was served papers last Thursday (whenever either partner wants to open their marriage relationship it means that they’ve already cheated or that they’ve got somebody lined up).
I’ve gone around the world to say that porn is t just a men’s problem and is affecting a lot more people than we realize.
“Porn use is rampant among young women as well. They’re watching with their partners and solo. One of the side effects of this is a normalization of lesbian sex among otherwise hetero women. Lawyers are seeing more and more divorces triggered by married women engaging in same sex liaisons.”
This doesn’t surpise me. Many men are selfish lovers who have no idea what a clitoris is, where it is, simply don’t care, or bother to learn. It’s no wonder that some otherwise hetero women seek sexual satisfaction with other women. Those women know what to do with a clitoris. That doesn’t make it right, but it sure explains why this is happening in many cases. If men refuse to accept the design, so will the women.
I think I heard this being called being a “political lesbian” where otherwise straight women would seek out relationships with other women because they didn’t like the behavior of the dating pool of men around them. It was a popular feminist movement back in the day with mixed feelings from actual lesbians where some of them didn’t like the idea of someone who wasn’t otherwise sexually attracted to them wanting to be with them since many people would like a partner that is attracted them if not sexually attracted at least romantically especially since at any time if they find an actually decent man they can leave them. It is movements like this that have made a lot of lesbians wary of dating bisexual women because they could be like you described and as soon as they meet a decent man who treats them good they will leave them for the man. This is actually what the song Good Luck Babe by Chappell Roan is about since it is a common feeling for lesbians to feel betrayed when they date women who are bisexual or in this case claim to be bisexual but realize they aren’t and were just treated poorly by men in their lives.
I really hope the woman in your story wasn’t a pastor!!
Nope, healthcare professional. No kids. No real equity in the house. Both make about the same. Split the assets and liabilities. No muss. No fuss. She can chase all the women she wants.
Your books and The Easy Peasy Method to quit porn did more for me than any of the books you rightfully dismantled.
I’m so glad!
Great article! This is such a harmful rhetoric, and it needs to be called out and snuffed out in the church.
I used to be terrified of men as a child because I grew up hearing this sort of rhetoric. How awful a picture of men it painted!
Quick question though! Regarding this quote:
“…to give sexual favours so that the men don’t feel jealous of the newborn baby are actually discipled in their sexuality.”
Is it supposed to say “disciplined”, or “discipled”? If it’s “discipled”, can someone tell me what it means? I’ve never heard that word used in that context, and would love to have a full understanding of the article.
Thank you!
I really like your point that someone who finds it a *struggle* to be faithful to their wife, avoid porn and lust, etc. doesn’t have a healthy sexuality, even if they aren’t currently “losing” in that struggle. It grieves me so much to think of all the good men who have resigned themselves to a desperate lifelong battle because they don’t know healing is possible and don’t know that men’s sexuality can become something naturally good and innocent.
Sam Jolman’s book “The Sex Talk You Never Got”, which you’ve mentioned here before, was a life-changer for me in that regard.
Also, something I think is worth clarifying: A healthy man doesn’t feel a *desire* to seek out porn, but a healthy man will still have a “wowza” response to accidental porn exposure. This happened to me a few years ago when the hover text on a link on the Wikipedia main page had a pornographic picture in it, and I was appalled to find that I reacted to it. But as Emily Nagoski points out, that reaction is pure reflex: “Just because a male body responds to a particular idea or sight or story doesn’t mean that he necessarily likes it or wants it. It just means that it activated the relevant pathways – expecting.” (Come As You Are, p. 204)
I disagree, I think in every marriage, for both husband and wife, there will be at least a few times they will struggle to remain faithful and choose their spouse, even if it stays at thought-level sin. I think sending people into marriages assuming they will always be faithful and will never struggle with it is really immature teaching, and it’s the kind of teaching my church sent me into marriage with.
Much better to focus on the fact we are all sinful, and will all be tempted to sin throughout our lives, and that learning how to resist temptation, as well as be open and honest in immediate confession when we do sin, wil be key to a healthy marriage, not the notion we will never be tempted.
Thank you for this, it’s so very needed. It was healing to read your words. Calling harm harm is love in action.
I especially appreciate what you are asking for from pastors; the way you call out how men are protected from ‘shame’ while women are left hurt, wronged, and silenced; how the normalization of porn/pornified sexuality doesn’t facilitate true healing and growth.
Again, thank you.
Keep speaking up, and I will try to do more of the same.
Thank you, Rebecca!
There is so many times a pastor who is openly anti-gay ends up getting caught looking at gay porn or soliciting sex from a male prostitute, etc. They are the ones that think it is normal for people to struggle with same sex attraction when in reality they are just telling on themselves since most completely straight people don’t fixate that much on the same sex as they do. It reminds me how John Rekers the guy who was behind a lot of the conversion therapy techniques a lot of biblical counselors use for their LGBTQ clients that have been discredited by pretty much every licensed counselor and even outlawed in some places getting caught and charged for soliciting sex from a male escort. A perfectly straight man secure in his sexuality wouldn’t think about other men, infact even a gay or bi man comfortable about being gay or bi wouldn’t objectify men as much as these guys do.
Absolutely!
“There is so many times a pastor who is openly anti-gay ends up getting caught looking at gay porn or soliciting sex from a male prostitute, etc.”
Ted Haggard being the most famous type example.
It’s a specific example of “I have Problem X, so everybody else must have the same Problem X” and “You can tell when a preacher’s in trouble when he stops preaching what he’s for and only preaches what he’s Against”.
Now, regarding Conversion Therapy (“Pray the Gay Away”):
I have on the hoarder’s mess that is my bookshelves a 1980-vintage Christian book on the general subject (title “Sexual Sanity”?) by a trained psychologist. Said author relates how his first sexual experience was being molested by a youth pastor (NOT Catholic) on a sleepover around the time he hit puberty. He said before the molestation his attraction (and arousal) was developing male-to-female; after the cherry-popping his arousal triggers changed from female to male. This SSA arousal faded away over the next few years until he was attracted to and aroused by female as before.
This sounds like the SSA was an “overlay” over a natural straight orientation that faded away without reinforcement. This hypothesis has two corollaries:
1) What if that SSA was reinforced by experience? Such as would have happened a few years ago in California where he could have been “diagnosed as gay” and immersed in gay culture (there was even a “gay high school” out here for a couple years)? The cultural surroundings would have reinforced the overlay until he may as well have been born that way. (Note this is not the sensationalized “They’re After Our Christian Children!” you hear from a lot of pulpits, just that a predator COULD cause this overlay effect in a specific victim).
And this whole dynamic is probably resurging now that Trans has become the new Trendy among Kyle’s Moms and on social media, so there’s that dynamic also in play.
2) Since this was an overlay that faded away due to lack of reinforcement, Conversion Therapy (reinforcement in the other direction) would probably have “worked” in his case. Which would have been ballyhooed as a “successful conversion” when it was actually restoring the pre-molestation “base” orientation. And probably would “work” ONLY in such a dynamic as his.
And Conversion Therapy types do NOT publicize or even mention their failures.
“Both the Transcendental Scientists [male-supremacist political religion] and Femocrats [female-supremacist political religion] claim all planets introduced to their ideology have converted to it; much higher probability they do not publicize their failures.”
— Norman Spinrad, “A World Between”, 1979 SF novel about an egalitarian world caught in the middle of an interstellar propaganda war
Sheila, you wrote: “If someone has done the work, got counseling, understood the role that porn was playing in their arousal patterns and their emotional regulation patterns, and healed that part of them…”
What resources would you recommend to someone who wants to do this work and find a counselor who can help them? How would you approach someone you love who you would like to see do this?
I’ve got a list of books that I really like here. A lot of them talk about what proper counselling would entail.
Jesus didn’t die so men could stay in porn addiction. It’s pretty simple. The life long porn adict model comes from secular treatment models that honestly are designed to keep you in lifelong treatment programs. Can We say…Show me the money! Jesus died so we can be healed and live sanctified holy and righteous lives. Jesus is mightier than porn. Complete Victory IS possible. If a pastor can’t understand this nor teach the truth than they have no business being in leadership anywhere for they aren’t teaching biblical truth. They are a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
Yes, there’s a lot coming out in the literature now too that shows that porn doesn’t actually follow traditional addiction models, and that you can’t actually say porn is an addiction.
What (addiction?) models does it follow?
This quote: “Instead, he spoke to 45,000 college-aged people just a few weeks ago at the Passion Conference, again, normalizing that pornography is a lifelong struggle and that the objectification of women is normal.”
Do you see what I see?
If someone presents his relationship to pornography as a “lifelong struggle”, he actually tells us he is going to be involved with porn somehow for the rest of his life, at least on some level. You can not struggle with something without having something to do with it. And if you are not involved in something any more, you are not struggling with it any longer.
By presenting porn as something to struggle with for the rest of your life, one allows it a permanent little corner for the rest of life. Sounds almost like saying: “I will repent of all the rest, but let me keep this little piece of sin so I can at least struggle with it a little bit every day”.
I’m not quite sure how to articulate this, but maybe part of the problem is distinguishing between sexual tendencies/sins/addictions that you actually can grow out of and leave behind, and those that you should probably always treat as “crouching at the door.”
For example, it’s naive to think that someone can be “rehabilitated” if he is a pedophile. A person who recognizes and repents of his pedophilia should probably put certain limitations on himself, no matter how much therapy he does- he should never have children of his own, and he should never be with children. Like an opioid addict in recovery, he is probably safest when he is humble and cautious about his capacity to relapse, rather than assuring himself that he is “cured.”
I feel like a lot of the bad teaching swings between the two extremes- ie, pornography and lust are constant temptations that represent a lifelong battle that never gives freedom, but at the same time, things like pedophilia and homosexuality and abusive behavior can be “cured” and offenders can be “restored” with few safeguards (hiding behind marriage without concern for the wife’s safety seems to be the primary safeguard, a la Doug Wilson).
Can we confidently tell men, “Pornography and lust are different than abuse or pedophilia, etc. and should be addressed differently and have different expectations for recovery” ?
Yes, great point! I think anything that abuses or hurts another is in a different category, because once you’ve hurt another, you should be treated with suspicion from now on, since safety of others always takes precedence.
Sure! The weird thing also, some of these porn addicts or ex porn addicts, I’m not sure how to call them, claim that struggle with temptation will be a lifelong companion…oops…I mean struggle…while some pastors claim a pedophile can be fully restored and are willing to cover for them and protect them and give them space. So., some of them sling to one extreme for themselves, so they can have a lifelong comp…I mean struggle with porn, and some go to other extreme on behalf of someone else and claim tbey are fully recovered and there is no struggle at all. That’s a weird sling between extremes and hard to explain. Very complicated. Does not seem very logical either, but perhaps it isn’t.
I love your comment, and yes lust is in a different category in some ways from pedophilia, due to the abuse. But pornography arguably also enables abuse, as it keeps women as sexual slaves in a system.
The church also is continually useless at safeguarding as they don’t understand addiction etc. So yes I agree they have let dangerous people be in positions they should never ever be in.
For me, though I think it is more helpful to view lust and porn as part of the sinful world that will tempt us to some extent as long as we live. I just think that’s God’s honest truth. Now, if we are loving our spouse well, and being loved and respected in return, yes that may go a long way in reducing the ‘felt’ temptation towards lust for other people and porn. But I don’t think it will ever go away entirely for someone who is tempted in that arena, and I think it would be the height of foolishness for someone to assume, at any point, that they are ‘healed’ and will never be tempted to lust after anyone again.
The Bible is clear that we can grow in godlness, but that sin will always be crouching at our door, even in our older years, for those of us whoa re tempted by them, these things will still be a temptation for us.
I do wish in this article and others that it was clearer what Sheila and others are saying.
‘It is normal to lust’ can have two meanings, it can mean both:
‘It is normal to feel tempted to lust’ and
‘It is normal to give in to lust’.
I strongly agree with the former, and I strongly disagree with the latter. But I’m not sure which one Sheila means when she talks about other people saying ‘it is normal to lust’.
If Sheila was saying that it’s not normal to feel temptation to lust, then I do think that attitude is going to shame good people who are simply tempted, but don’t give in to the temptation. I have felt a strong temptation to lust my whole life but very very rarely have given in to it. I have made so many sacrifices for the sake of any future husband I might have, not to give in to the lustful temptations. But I do not think experiencing the temptations themselves is ungodly, or shows I have a pornographic style of relating (I’ve no background in porn). It just means I’m a normal regular human being for whom immoral sexual activity is tempting.
Absolutely that’s what he’s saying.
I’d disagree. I’m a woman, married, been a Christian for 40 + years.
I would say that yes the objectification of women is not and never should be normal. But on the pornography is a lifelong struggle, I can honestly say I could see where he is coming from, and what he is saying there might not be problematic.
I have no porn background but I would say that for me the temptation to lust, to objectify sexually men, to look at or engage with pornography will be a lifelong struggle for me. You can admit something is a temptation for you, a struggle for you, without admitting that you are giving in to it. I have never given in to the temptation to watch porn, but it’s still a regular temptation for me. I have sadly given in to the temptation to lust over some people, but I have almost always confessed and repented quickly.
You can definitely struggle with something without having something to do with it, you are just having the honesty to admit that this area is a weakness for you. A compulsive eater would say they struggle with overeating or binge eating, but that doesn’t mean they will spend their life binge eating, just that they know this area is an addiction for them, and they need to make the right decisions in this area and get help when they need it, be accountable to themselves and other people etc as needed.
I’m not involved at all in pornography but lust and porn will always be something I will struggle with, and need to take care to avoid. So I don’t think we can crucify him and assume by him admitting it is a struggle for him, that he is currently sinning. Absolutely not.
Just to give a clearer example of what I mean. Imagine a guy boots up his computer, he has an evening in, and not much to do. Almost immediately he is tempted to go to a porn site. He sits with the struggle, battling with himself and his two desires – one to live honourably and save sex for his future partner, one to indulge in sexual activities now and use the women online. He struggles and tries to fight against himself. Maybe he hibernates the computer and tries to look at a book or distract himself with something else. But he is still in the struggle as the thought that he could watch porn is still there (the desire), he is fighting it, and he hasn’t sinned yet, but it’s a struggle. Maybe he eventually calls a friend and arranges to go for a walk or meet at a pub for a drink, and at that point the desire to use women sexually leaves him and he gets on with his evening. He has done well, he hasn’t sinned, but it was most definitely a struggle. A struggle that was ongoing for a good while.
Telling men that even having that struggle is sinful, is so shaming. This guy did everything in all his actions to honour women, including any future partner, but according to this article he should feel bad for even experiencing the temptation. I have an issue with that. I would say there’s no shame in experiencing the temptation, it’s what we do with it that matters.
Does that make sense?
I really believe that if a guy or girl has struggled with the temptation to lust, but hasn’t given in to the lusting, that they shouldn’t be shamed.
The whole point of temptation is that it is a struggle, a temptation! Judging other people for being tempted by something that we ourselves aren’t tempted by isn’t helpful behaviour. For yourself and myself, we will struggle with anything we are tempted by; we either struggle and give in or struggle and don’t give in. But the struggle bit itself, where we battle inside our mind what to do, is not sinful.
This is so important as it really shames men and women who are trying hard to seek God and live godly lives, and also trying to be honest and open, and confessional, about the sin they are tempted by.
By the way, I just got an idea. Evangelical Complementarians love Bible verses, at least some of them. We love Bible verses too! Perhaps we should start a Bible Verse Storming Campaingn against this whole idea that all men struggle with lust, it’s just unavoidable and a lifelong struggle, and men simply do not have “this christianized view on sex” an all this nonsense that sounds so very pious and humble at the first sight but just denies God’s power to change our lives and set us free from sin and old destructive patterns of behaviour.
I found this one to start with:
How can a young man keep his way pure?
By keeping it according to Your word. (Psalms 119:9 /nasb1995)
I know many more, both from the OT and NT, and you’ll probably know them too. Let’s keep them coming!
Yes! Absolutely. There’s also this one: “Put to death, therefore, the components of your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust…” 1 Corinthians 3:5
I’m bothered by the idea from a Christian that unmarried sex is hotter than married sex. So you want women to stay virgins until marriage, but then they don’t even get to be the best that their husband has had, no matter who skilled and generous they are in the bedroom? Gross.
That was a very unwise and foolish thing to say, indeed. And very dangerous. Not something the young people of his church need to hear.
I think where the guy is coming from is just the admission that sinful things, naughty things, do sometimes have that added thrill, that doing the ‘right’ thing doesn’t. Esther Perel, who is a divorce coach, talks about this a lot. She says one reason for a lot of unfaithfulness, is people struggle with the fact you simply cannot have both ‘stability, safety, familiarity, history together’ on one hand, and also ‘wildness, newness, one off-ness, the new, the unfamiliar, the exciting because it isn’t allowed’ on the other hand. She says people often want both and don’t really realise they cannot go together. So you have to choose one. (She has some practical advice as in you cna make sure once you marry that you still do ‘new’ things together, go to a coffee shop you’ve never been to, travel to new countries etc, do things you’ve never done as a couple, new hobbies etc. )
So on one level I do agree with him that obviously doing the wrong, sinful thing would have a weird thrill about it, but at the same time, I would say married sex would reach a deeper level of knowing, that has its own deep pleasure that the naught event couldn’t have.
I love some of the descriptions of porn here, I’m passing them on to my son, as they are really helpful, so thankyou! And I agree with a lot of what you are saying; very obviously pastors should not be engaged currently in any level of ongoing sexual unfaithfulness to their spouse.
But with one important caveat, I do not believe pastors have to be magically perfect. And for many of us, that will mean, the occasional slip into momentarily objectifying someone and lusting and then repenting, and later on sometimes confessing to one’s spouse, where necessary. For a lot of us, this can happen as quickly as just passing a billboard we didn’t expect and which tempts us to lust and we then give in to lust temporarily. It’s still sin. But it’s sin we immediately ask forgiveness for, confess to God and later if we believe it important or at a certain level, we confess to our spouse.
When I read this:
‘SOMEONE WHO HAS HEALED FROM PORN DOES NOT USUALLY STILL FEEL THE PULL OF PORN.
Therefore, when Jonathan Pokluda talks about how his porn use is in the past, but simultaneously talks about how tempted he is by porn now, we know that he hasn’t put the pornographic style of relating behind him.’
It sets off all sorts of alarm bells in my head. I will be honest with you, I do not agree with this. I know several people personally who engaged in sin with porn in the past and who are healed of it, have repented, have married again and are now in loving, faithful relationships of honesty and trust. All these guys have told me personally they of course would still be tempted by certain things, by certain situations like beaches or some swimming pool situations, by being in a sauna, or of course by porn etc. I think you do need to consider this more carefully. Of course, someone who has confessed and healed will not want to go back to a life in porn, but that is not the same as saying they are no longer temped by it, or saying that means they are still in a pornographic style of relating. This has nothing to do with it. Every man I know well personally, bar one who is sort of asexual, would be honest that they will always be tempted by porn. Of course they will. That doesn’t mean they will engage with it, but that they are acknowledging it is a temptation for them. And that isn’t wrong. Experiencing something as a temptation isn’t wrong, it’s only giving into it is wrong.
Some of us are just more physical than others. I’m female but have always felt that I am tempted more physically in a way that a lot of men are, and so this is true for me too. I will always be tempted to sexualise people, that is simply always going to be a temptation for me, but I’m going to spend my life fighting that and most of the time, overcoming that temptation, but the temptation itself is not wrong and not sinful. I think quite obviously that many, many people are going to be tempted by young, attractive people of the opposite sex unclothed. Unless someone is a medical professional and spends their life seeing nudity, I assume most people would struggle, regardless of any porn background or not, to not move into lustful, sinful, sexual thoughts at the very least, on seeing those a group of young people naked.
When I get tempted to lust, it doesn’t mean I’m automatically devaluing, or demeaning men. I get tempted to lust even by men who I know to be great people, godly people, people I look up to, sometimes people I am friends with. But at the point where I notice their body or start to think of them sexually, I need to stop, repent and put my mind and my eyes on something else.
It just feels to me that this is someone writing who hasn’t experienced a lot of temptation purely for physical, sexual sin, and so in a way, it doesn’t meet where I’m at naturally, the way God made me. Please listen, as I agree with you on a lot of things and you are doing a great work. Where you say that men who use porn have worse sex lives, that is so helpful and so hugely practical to pass on to my son and his friends as a way to help them understand there are consequences for pursuing women sexually outside of marriage.
But please listen on the fact many men, and some women, will always be tempted by porn, whether they have a porn background or not (I don’t and I definitely will always be tempted by porn), and the temptation itself is not sinful. It’s normal. Of course we want beautiful young people sexually, but we can choose to refuse that, and we do. But please don’t shame us for experiencing the temptation in the first place.
and just to clarify, what I’m saying is that is IS normal to lust, in the sense it IS normal to feel the temptation to lust.
What is NOT normal, is to give in to that temptation.
I really worry that you are giving women a false idea, that if their man is a good man he will be completely untempted by the world of pornography. I think that’s mostly fiction. Most men, and many women, will be TEMPTED by what is available in the world of pornography (after all it is offering quick, tho shallow, sexual satisfaction for free) but will RESIST that temptation, because they know they want something deeper, more beautiful, and they don’t want to treat men or women as sexual objects or have them kept as sexual slaves.
Could you possibly clarify on some of that? It is totally normal and a common experience to feel tempted to lust, as Jesus acknowledged. But giving in to that common temptation is sin, just as the even worse level of sin of adultery is. So as Christians, we need to be aware of our temptation to be lustful, and be careful not to get ourselves into situations where we may give in to that (so maybe not overnighting or sleeping in same bed as someone we are dating but don’t want to have sex with until marriage, maybe not visiting nudist beaches, or for some people, being really careful on any beaches not to let our thoughts go sexual, etc etc)
What we can’t do is just turn a magical switch where we are no longer tempted sexually at all, no longer tempted to lust. That temptation is going to be there for most people who experience it, lifelong. We don’t help ourselves by not acknowledging that temptation is real. And it doesn’t help women to believe something that isn’t true – for example, that their husband simply ‘shouldn’t” experience the temptation to lust. Why would we tell our husbands they shouldn’t be experiencing something that Jesus said we all would most of us experience?
Thank you so much for this article. I can say that I have personally experienced the damage these types of teachings do to men and women in conservative christian circles. The environment created by messages like, “a wife’s role is to submit”, “having sex before marriage means you are used goods” and “all men struggle with lust” coupled with stats like “80% of men admit to watching porn” (early 2000s stat) have destroyed so much. No, porn is not normal, nor is consuming it harmless. Enabling porn actors to objectify themselves and enabling human trafficking is truely disgusting. Still the church looks away… sex trafficking is at an all time high. After you hear testimonies of enough people who have been forced into making porn and equally the people whose lives have been destroyed by consuming it; it will no longer hold the same attraction.
I had a porn addiction for a few years. I am not tempted by it AT ALL anymore. It is not a problem that warrants using words like “always, never, or normal.” You can see the truth and move past it.
I think many from Evangelicalism don’t have a great view of what is normal noticing attractiveness and when it crosses into lust. We were told to “flee immorality” so vehemently that we weren’t taught what it is to feel in our own bodies, appreciate others around us – even find them attractive, and know that is a human experience, not lusting.
“Many from Evangelicalism don’t have a great view” of ANYTHING.
They’ve become so Spiritual they have ceased to be Human, ceased to be Real.
And not only that, they have isolated themselves in a Spiritual bubble with the accompanying terror and avoidance of everything outside of that bubble. Because everything Outside is the Devil’s domain of Sin and only within the Bubble is Safety.
“And because they ‘won’t be taken in’, they can never be taken out.”
— Aslan, Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle
“One can quit porn and still have a pornographic style of relating”
Similar to a “Dry Drunk”, i.e. an alcoholic who has quit drinking but retains the other alcoholic behaviors. Sometimes transferred to something or someone else than My Next Drink.