Sermon for April 1, 2012 - Sexuality

The Scripture reading for this sermon: Mark 11:1-11 and John 12:12-16

A few years ago I was a leader at a summer youth program.  We brought in guests to talk about all sorts of things, views, opinions, and areas of study.  And I remember we brought in one retired theology professor.  A man who was held in very high esteem, but who, as a retired theology professor, had been stereotyped a certain way in our minds.  He came in wearing a three piece suit, I think it was probably tweed.  With those classic professor leather patches on the elbows.  This professor emeritus also wore a bow tie, and any time I have ever encountered him, he has been wearing a bow tie.  It takes a certain type to wear a bow tie with regularity.  Glasses, hair combed pristinely to the side.  He looked the role of the retired theology professor through and through.

Sitting there, I was trying to get a sense of the feeling within the room.  A bunch of adolescent young men and women, being lead by a bunch of twenty something young men and women.  We were not participating in this program in order to hear some dusty old man talk about whatever he had on his mind, using language that would fly over our heads.  “Ok,” I thought to myself, “an hour and a half of this.  I can get through it.  I just hope the participants can as well.”

Many of the previous speakers had brought in power point slides and interactive opportunities to engage all of us.  Not this man.  He just went straight to the lectern, pulled out a few pieces of paper, straightened them and looked out at the audience whose eyes were already beginning to glaze over.  I even seem to recall him pulling a pocket watch out and placing it down in front of him, so as to be aware when his hour and a half were up.

“I remember when…” was how he started.  I could feel my own brain synapses starting to shut down.  “…I first met my wife.”  Oh God.  “I couldn’t help thinking about how she was very, very sexy.”  And he paused.  Eyes began to perk up, backs began to straighten.  “Oh sure,” he continued, “I fell in love with her eventually, but oh man, she was hot.”  He closed his eyes, his mind pulling up that image he held onto for however many years, a knowing smile crept across his face.  And he had each and every one of us.  A retired theology professor, with glasses, pristeen hair, and a pocket watch, in a three piece tweed suit, had easily gotten the attention of every single person in that room.

Sex.  All the teenage boys, all the teenage girls caught in that awkward phase of trying to both hide their feelings and explore them at the same time, were able to just release any tension they were holding back.  Any shame they felt around their curiosity, around their questions was momentarily lifted by that impish smile on his face.  It was wonderful.  And the youth weren’t the only ones who sat up and listened intently.  I was just as captivated as them.

It is odd that we don’t talk about sexuality.  Without it, none of us would even be here.  It can create marvelous dreamscapes of joy, of excitement; it can also be the source of nightmares, ruining lives.  It can create that wonderful sense of giddiness, of wanting to dance and sing with joy when we are besotted, while at the same time wanting to throw up with anxiety.  It is woven into our very bodies causing our hearts to race, our breath to gasp.  It can seem an unquenchable fire, it can be a source of tremendous energy.  But we don’t talk about it in an honest and down to earth way.  Why do we shy away from it, speaking only in jokes and giggles?

When we don’t talk about sexuality, the conversation gets hijacked.  It gets transformed into a discussion of a few dos, and a lot of don’ts.  Or it becomes meaningless, plastered across billboards, magazines, movies, and commercials without a thought beyond marketing simplistic pleasure.  Dom Bede Griffiths once said, “Sex is far too important to eliminate entirely, and it is far to important to do lightly.  The only alternative is to somehow ‘consecrate’ it.”

Imagine yourself as one of the people in Jerusalem.  You have heard about this Jesus figure.  His healings, his words, his message have all reached your ears, it has reached everyone’s ears.  One day, word arrives that he, this figure of story, will be coming into to town.  People are filled with anticipation at the prospect.  They all want to be healed, they all want to see him, to touch him, they all want him to transform the world, to change the way things are.  And sure enough, when he arrives, there is a flurry of excitement.  People flock to the streets.  The excitement builds, and soon people are shouting, they are waving palm branches, and they are crying out.  They cry out, “Hosanna!  Hosanna!”  Which means, “Save!  Save, please!”

These people of Jerusalem, they are longing for wholeness, they want that relationship with God, they want a new relationship with the world around them.  They desire it, they seek it, and they are expressing it in their shouts, they are expressing it in their waving of palm leaves frantically in the streets.  They can feel this longing in their very bodies.  The crowd is swept up in that ecstasy of it all, amid cries and heat and sweat.

That desire which dwells within, is more than just a desire for a physical act.  It is a desire for relationship, it is a desire for wholeness. We need to abandon the idea that sex and sexuality are just about certain acts.  Sure, those can be a part of it, but they don’t need to be.  Sexuality is about longing for something, longing for wholeness, it is about desire, it is about seeking relationship: relationship with one another, relationship with ourselves, and relationship with God.  And it is expressed and experienced in our very bodies.

What better way to describe humanity’s relationship with God, than through language of seeking, through language of longing, through language of desire.  And what better way to experience this than through our bodies.  Relationship with God is not just about our heads, not just about some far away transcendent mystical experience.  Experiencing God is about racing hearts.  Experiencing God is about gasping breaths.

It is bizarre to me that Christianity, has so often taken the stance of hating the body and embracing the spirit, when the focus of our faith is where the spirit and the body meet.  These two are inseparable.  We cannot move our relationship with God away from our bodies.  We cannot separate the love of God from creation.  This is the essence of incarnation.  God loves our bodies so much, that God chooses to have one.  God loves creation so much that God chooses to dwell within it.  This is the sign that is Christ.  God is here.  God is in this world.  God dwells within the body.

A healthy sexuality embraces that idea.  A healthy sexuality sees the wonder of bodies, of our own, and of other people’s and cherishes them as God’s creation.  A healthy sexuality invites us to explore a deeper relationship with ourselves, with others, and with God.  A healthy sexuality sees that longing as a wonderful gift, a gift that invites us to wholeness.