Post purity culture reflections

If you grew up in the church like I did, you might be familiar with the term “purity culture”. This was a movement within many Christian circles in the early 1990’s-2000’s that sought to promote sexual purity and abstinence for young adults in the church. In this, many stereotypical gender expectations were prescribed: men were to be strong, “masculine” leaders, and women were to support them, modeling both beauty and modesty, submission, and meekness. One blog post writes, “Men are taught that their minds are evil, whereas women are taught that their bodies are evil.”

Growing up in a purity culture led me to feel as if I couldn’t trust either myself or men in a romantic relationship. I began to see my body as dangerous, something that could cause my brothers in Christ to “stumble.” Purity culture emphasized my physical body and appearance as the most important part about me, and at the same time told me that beauty was no longer something to enjoy and celebrate, but now was something dangerous and untrustworthy. Beauty had the potential to lead others into sin if revealed, so it was best to hide it completely. Purity culture also taught me as a young girl to distrust men. It painted boys as animals who couldn’t control their thoughts and actions. It minimized their ability to feel emotions, demoting them to purely physical creatures who could hardly contain themselves.

So here I was, as a young girl, believing that my own beauty and boys in general were dangerous, so as my curiosity about the opposite gender grew, so did my fears and distrust. This led to many inner vows at a young age: I will never stumble into sexual sin before marriage, I will never trust a man, I will choose to hide and hate my own beauty because of the danger it can bring. These vows were meant to keep me safe, and in a twisted way, hoped to honor God, but ended up causing shame and leaving emotional and relational scars as I grew older.

Today, there has been a huge push back on what implications this purity culture has for those that are now in their 20’s and 30’s, navigating life, relationships, and marriage post purity culture. I myself have often been a part of that push back after my own painful experiences, and I have sought to find a better, Biblical response.

This morning, I read a key passage often cited in purity culture circles: Proverbs 5, which is titled, “Warning Against Adultery.” Many people are quick to judge Christians for their rules, but in reality, the law is meant to provide boundaries, or warnings, that keep us safe and show us how to live a life abundant, enjoying God’s gifts in the right context (John 10:10). Proverbs 5 is an excellent example of that, as the first 14 verses warn the reader about the “forbidden woman” but spend the next 9 verses affirming sex and romance within the proper context (marriage).

As a culture, we often struggle with moderation. It can be easy to have an all or nothing mentality, and I want to take a moment to empathize with those who initiated purity culture. The Bible is very clear that sex and romance outside of the proper boundaries is dangerous, and does carry painful natural consequences. There are valid reasons why people pushed for protecting purity years ago!

As an individual then, I also struggle with moderation. There have been many times where I either “binge” on sin, or cut off even good things to avoid temptation. Because I grew up in a purity culture, I am quick to cut off romance entirely because of its risks, and I see this in many of my Christian peers as well. There seems to be this fear around entering relationships, because what if we mess up? A line from a song “Quiet Places” by Jamie Pratt calls it “fear disguised as cautious wisdom.”

Sometimes it feels easier to label all romance as forbidden, maybe reading a few books about healthy relationships to feel informed, and then still walking away because it just feels too risky and difficult. It’s important to note that in the context, Proverbs 5 is written to married couples, not single young adults. Many of us are still in the stages of trying to find out who is “forbidden” and who is the one to “be intoxicated always in (their) love” (5:19). For years, I read this chapter and assumed that because I am still single, the last 9 verses that affirm and encourage romance and sex within marriage do not, can not, and will not apply to me.

Because of this, I have a tendency to want to flee potential relationships because that’s what Christians are supposed to do, right? Flee temptation and sin? I am also quick to deny or condemn the part of my imago dei that enjoys romance, pursuit, respect, love, attention, and mutual commitment, because I feel excluded from the context in which it can be celebrated and rightly enjoyed. I remember one time I told a friend, “I just don’t think I’m a romantic type of girl!” and he responded with, “Yes you are, because your Creator is a romantic and He put that in you too.”

Regardless of our relationship status, God made us with the capacity and desire for romance and relationships because HE is that way. He loves romance and relationships! Just think of how He intentionally created Adam and Eve in the beginning, the stories of Hosea and Song of Solomon, and how He uses a metaphor of marriage to describe the relationship between Christ and the Church. God is not afraid of romance, and He certainly does not condemn or forbid it! While He does provide boundaries, He does this to keep us safe, allowing and encouraging us to enjoy the gifts He has given us in the right context; and He has grace for us as we navigate the pathway into that context. In the meantime, we can learn to wrestle with the tension: blessing our desire for human romance in the context of marriage, and also choosing to believe that His love is enough as we wait.