Sex and Celibacy in the Church
Problems related to sexuality began long before Christendom. This is yet another example of how worldly philosophy can infiltrate into churches and have devastating effects.
Ancient Philosophies
Many ancient philosophers thought that there was something wrong with sex! Many thought that sexual activity weakened a man. In the 6th century BC Pythagoras taught that sexual acts were harmful to health. When asked when people should make love he replied,
“When you want to weaken yourself.”
This concept that men were weakened by sex was continued in the teaching of Xenophon, Plato, Aristotle and even Hippocrates, the physician, many centuries before Christ. Aristotle, who later became a great favorite of the medieval church, advocated the subordination of women to men, thinking that they were less virtuous.
There was at the same time much hedonism in Greek thinking with pleasure being a goal of the Epicurians. In contrast the Stoics rejected this pleasure-seeking, preferring duty and even celibacy.
One of the features of Stoic philosophy, a major school of thinking in the ancient world that was popular between 300BC and 250AD, was their abhorrence of sexual activity outside marriage.
Seneca, a Stoic, was the tutor of the eleven year old Nero. He wrote in an article on marriage,
“All love for someone else’s wife is shameful. But it is also shameful to love ones own wife immoderately. In loving his wife the wise man takes reason for his guide, not emotion. He resists the assault of passions, and does not allow himself to be impetuously swept away into the marital act. Nothing is more depraved than to love one’s spouse as if she were an adulteress.”
For them marriage was to be highly honoured, but sex was only for procreation. They advocated equal rights and education for women. The Stoic maxim, verbalised by Seneca was,
‘Do nothing for the sake of pleasure.”
Writers such as Plutarch, one of the most popular writers of his day, he died in 120AD, was great advocate of monogamous marriages.
Galen was a pagan Greek who became the personal physician to Emperor Marcus Aurelius in the mid second century. He was also in charge of the large medical school in Pergamum and admired altruism. He also admired the behaviour of the Christians around him although he misunderstood the rationality of the Christian faith. He said,
“Most people cannot follow coherent argument. That is why they need parables, which they make good use of. Similarly nowadays we see people called Christians who draw their faith from parables and miracles. And yet sometimes they behave just like those who live according to a philosophy. For their scorn of death and its aftermath becomes evident to us every day, as does their sexual continence. For they have not only men but women who live their entire lives sexually continent. Their numbers include individuals who have reached a stage in their self-discipline and their self-control which is not inferior to that of genuine philosophers.”1
The source of such Christian altruism is the certainty that living as God wants now will be of great benefit in eternity.
The Thinking of Jesus
The religious Pharisees thought that purity consisted in externals but Jesus emphasised that God sees the heart, people’s motives. He was accused of not being spiritual because he mixed with the wrong crowd, with ‘publicans and sinners’. External piety is not what God desires in us.
“The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and ‘sinners.’’” Matthew 11:19
Jesus explained his manner of life after going as a guest to the home of Zacchaeus who subsequently repented of the way he had lived, giving much of his ill-gotten gains away. Jesus said:
“For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” Luke 19:10
Jesus recognised that it was perfectly normal for men and women to get married. He described the ordinary everyday life before the great flood as:
“For in the days before the flood people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage.” Matthew 24:29
Jesus first miracle was at a wedding that he joyfully attended. He told parables about weddings.
The thinking of the Apostles
The apostles did not have any hangups over marriage and sex. We know Peter was married as Jesus healed his mother in law in Capernaum (Mark 1:30).
The Corinthians had written to Paul, asking about marriage, as they were being told, ‘It is good for a man not to marry” (1 Corinthians 7:1). Paul’s reply is clear,
“But since there is so much immorality, each man should have his own wife, and each woman her own husband..” 1 Corinthians 7:2
Paul does encourage active Christians to consider the advantage for ministry of remaining single, as this enables a much more single-minded devotion to the Lord’s work but this is clearly optional (1 Corinthians 7). Soon after saying this Paul adds that all the apostles were married, saying:
“This is my defence to those who sit in judgment on me. Don’t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord’s brothers and Cephas?” 1 Corinthians 9:5
It is clear that there is no hostility to sex or marriage in the Bible, though there is a deep concern that God’s people should be self-controlled and that sexual activity should be restricted to marriage. Paul rejected the early gnostic thinking that was infiltrating the young churches and he wrote to Timothy to warn him against such people,
“They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving . . .” 1 Timothy4:3-4
There is one passage in the book of Revelation that has been used to support monasticism and celibacy. John’s had a vision of the Lamb of God on Mount Zion surrounded by 144,000 men who had the name of Jesus and his Father written on their foreheads and he explains who they are:
“These were those who did not defile themselves with women, for they kept themselves pure.” Revelation 14:4
In all likelihood this is not advocating celibacy but rebuking promiscuity. Purity was a symbolic description of believers who kept themselves from defiling sexual relationships that were inherent in pagan temple worship. Such behaviour had been specifically condemned earlier in the book as it was a problem both at Pergamum (Revelation 2:14) and Thyratira (Revelation 2:20).
Sexuality, both anatomical and psychological was a gift of God and part of how we were created. As such sex is a gift of God but like every gift it needs to be kept within bounds.
Gnostic thinking
The Gnostics tried to mix Greek thinking with some Christian ideas. The early gnostics were infiltrating the churches in apostolic times, though Gnosticism only became a coherent entity later. Paul ends his first letter to Timothy:
“Timothy, guard what has been entrusted to your care. Turn away from godless chatter and the opposing ideas of what is falsely called knowledge ( Greek gnosis).” 1 Timothy 6:20-21
The Gnostics made a great distinction between the physical and the spiritual. They were a group who thought that anything physical was evil. For them the physical body was a ‘corpse with senses, the grave you carry around with you.” They taught that it is only the soul of man that is eternal and therefore it is only the soul that matters. It was sometimes taught that anything that satisfied the body was evil and consequently asceticism was encouraged. It was therefore innately pessimistic, for them worldly existence was unspiritual, a teaching that reflected the Buddhist teaching of Gautama and his followers. Yet their view on what was spiritual deeply influenced many parts of the early church so that some church leaders also became ashamed of the body.
This super-spiritual teaching even influenced some Jews, so that groups such as the Essenes who gave us the Dead Sea Scrolls, were established. Although married couples could join them, the large cemetery east of the Qumran reveals that their privileged leaders were monks. They taught that the world is darkness under Satan’s control. The Jewish historian Josephus, who died around 100AD, wrote about the Essenes,
“Jews from birth . . . turn away from the joys of life as if from an evil thing and embrace continence as a virtue. They judge marriage unfavorably . . . If they were freed from the shackles of the flesh, then they would feel as if they had been released from long imprisonment.”
Was Mary always a virgin?
This idea permeated through churches and is still vehemently taught in some. However the Bible tells us that Jesus' had named brothers and sisters:
“ ‘Where did this man get this wisdom and these miraculous powers?’ They asked. ‘Isn’t this the carpenter’s son? Isn’t his mother’s name Mary, and aren’t his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas? Aren’t all his sisters with us?’” Matthew 13:54-56
When Jesus and his mother went to Capernaum after the marriage at Cana his brothers were there (John 2:12). Mary and these brothers sought an audience with Jesus (Matthew 12:46-50; Mark 3:31-35; Luke 8:19-21). Toward the end of Jesus' ministry, his brothers urged him to prove His Messiahship, which they themselves doubted (John 7:3-5). They were later converted as they are described in Acts as uniting with the disciples and others in "prayer and supplication" prior to Pentecost (Acts 1:13-14).
Some have tried to get around these problems by suggesting that these siblings were either adopted or were the children of a previous marriage of Joseph but there is no evidence for this from the time. Neither Jesus nor his apostles thought that marital sex was in anyway wrong
Many commentators hold that the author of the epistle of Jude, who identifies himself as the "brother of James," was one of these brothers of Jesus(Jude 1). It is also generally believed that the leader of the church at Jerusalem was James the brother of Jesus, (see Acts 12:17; 15:13). This seems to be confirmed by Paul's reference to his visit to Jerusalem, in which he states that he saw only Peter, and "James, the Lord's brother" (Galatians 1:18-19).
Early Church thinking
As we have seen there is no Biblical basis for this idea that Mary remained a virgin. The earliest assertion appears in the mid-2nd century 'Protoevangelium of James' and it is this that depicts Mary as a life-long virgin and Joseph as an old man who marries her asexually, and the brothers of Jesus as Joseph's sons by an earlier marriage. This was pure speculation to support the idea that sex was somehow wrong.
By the 3rd century, the doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary had become well established, but the unequivocal scriptural references to the brothers and sisters of Jesus raised obvious problems.
Some influential people in the early church seemed to support Gnostic ideas. Such a man was Pope Siricius of Rome (334 -399 AD). He was thought to be the first bishop of Rome to call himself ‘The Pope’, although there is evidence that prior to this it was a title used by several bishops. Siricius was also one of the first to use the title ‘Pontifex Maximus’. He could not conceive how Jesus would deign to be born of a woman who would not remain a virgin throughout her life. In a letter to Bishop Anysius in 392 he wrote,
“Jesus would not have chosen to birth from a virgin, had he been forced to look upon her as so unrestrained as to let that womb, from which the body of the Lord was fashioned, that hall of the eternal king, be stained by the presence of male seed. Whoever maintains that, maintains the unbelief of the Jews.”
For Siricius, sex was somehow dirty and this view won the day in spite of the clear Bible teaching that the God who had created us made us male and female with our emotions and sex drives. Marriage and children were certainly high ideals in Jesus’ family. It is not sexuality that is wrong but the lack of self control that results in people wanting to have sexual activity outside of marriage.
Subsequently, the celibate life was considered to be the more spiritual and Siricius’ views were widely accepted. His hostility led him to advocate celibacy for priests. He wrote to a Spanish bishop saying that he thought it was a crime for priests to have sexual relations with their wives after ordination.
There were some who disagreed with the need for celibacy. A Christian named Jovinian thought that married life was not inferior to celibacy. About 390AD he came to Rome, this was during the papacy of Siricius, and persuaded several consecrated virgins and chaste men that it was permissible for them to marry. He asked:
“Are you better than Sarah, Susanna, Anna and many of the holy women in the Bible?”
Some churchmen at the time strongly criticised Jovinian, calling him a heretic and the following year Siricius excommunicated him.
A major problem within religious institutions is ‘clericalism’, a superiority, the tradition that the clergy have the right to decide about matters impacting the lives of their followers, including their sexual behaviour. It suggests that clerics are special and superior to laypersons and therefore that their authority should be accepted without question. This tendency appears in all religious groups and is a major cause of problems. In non-conformist churches it can give rise to ‘heavy shepherding’ and an unwillingness to question what the leaders say. In the Roman Catholic church celibacy and an aversion to birth control became institutionalised and leaders came to think they could insist on their ideas becoming the rule.
It was because of clericalism and the gnostic, unbiblical view of sexuality that a wrong view of sex has permeated the church. It was most unfortunate that Jerome was influenced by these notions and this influenced his translation of the Bible into Latin which became the Vulgate version. In his translation of the apocryphal book of Tobit he inserted a sentence to support these views. The book of Tobit was in any case not accepted as Scripture either by the Jews or by Protestant denominations but it became very influential in the Roman Catholic church at that time. In this book Tobit is said to have delayed consummating his marriage until the third night. Jerome inserted the words:
“And now, Lord, you know that I am not taking this sister of mine out of lust, but only out of love of offspring.” (Tobias 8:9)
This phrase has been used as an argument that marriage is essentially just for procreation. It is now known that the original version contained instead a quote from Genesis:
“It is not good for man to live alone.” (Genesis 2:18)
Jerome had deleted this and inserted his own sentence. Fortunately in recent Roman Catholic versions Jerome’s insertions and deletions have been corrected but the damage was done. There was a bishop of Amiens and there were priests of Abbeville who charged newly married couples a fee if they were not willing to observe the three ‘Tobias nights’!
When Jerome originally translated 1 Corinthians 9:5 into Latin he used the specific word for wife. This verse says,
“Don’t we have the right to take a believing wife along with us?
However after 385AD he changed this to use instead a different word that could mean either ‘wife’ or ‘woman’. Thus the text could say the apostles had the right to take a woman, such as a maid, along with them. In that same year Pope Siricius stated that it was indecent and criminal for priests to continue to have intercourse with their wives and father children after their ordination.
In spite of these pressures the majority of ordained men in the Roman Catholic church were married. It was not until in 1139 AD that priests were no longer allowed to marry.
The pressure to stop marriage among ‘the religious’ grew since the gnostic element within the church distinguished the physical from the spiritual side of man. In 1532 Emperor Charles V introduced his ‘Penal rules’ which imposed the death penalty for the use of contraceptives.
Reformation thinking
Martin Luther and other leaders of the reformation corrected this need for celibacy among Christian leaders and he himself married a nun. He wrote:
“And now the See of Rome, out of its own wickedness, has come up with the idea of forbidding priests to marry. This it has done on orders from the devil, as Paul proclaims in 1 Timothy 4: ‘Teachers will come with teachings from the devil and forbid people to marry.’ This had led to a great deal of misery, and was the reason why the Greek church broke away. I advise that everyone be left free to get married or not to get married.”
In Luther’s “On the Babylonian Captivity of the Church” (1520) he writes,
“‘A bishop should be the husband of one wife.’ And so we drop all these cursed human regulations, which have crept into the church, causing only the multiplication of great dangers, sin and evil . . . Why should my freedom be taken away from me by someone else's superstition and ignorance?”
Luther subsequently wrote,
“They were completely unjustified in forbidding marriage and in burdening the divine state of the priesthood with the demand of continual celibacy. In doing so they have acted like anti-Christian, tyrannical, unholy scoundrels, occasioning all sorts of terrible, ghastly, countless sins against chastity, in which they are caught to this day. Neither we nor they have been given any power to make a female creature out of a male, or a male out of a female, nor did they have the power to separate these, God’s creatures, or to forbid people to live together honourably in marriage. That is why we refuse to accept their confounded celibacy, but rather wish that people be free to choose marriage, as God has ordained and established it. For Saint Paul says in one Timothy 4, it is a teaching of the devil.”
Modern Church thinking
In recent years churches have been rocked by sexual scandals that have focussed particularly on those to have taken vows of celibacy. The accusations of abuse and cover-ups in the Roman Catholic church began to receive public attention during the late 1980s. Many of these cases allege decades of abuse, frequently made by adults or older youths, years after the abuse occurred. Victims were ashamed. Cases have also been brought against members of the RomanCatholic hierarchy who covered up sex abuse allegations and moved abusive priests to other parishes, where abuse continued. As a result of clericalism immense pressure has been placed on young men and women who want to be considered spiritual to remain celibate but sometimes the pressures and temptations that are associated with this profession become too great. It is only fair to say that similar problems of sexual immorality have occurred in many Christian groups and denominations but it appears to be worse where marriage is discouraged.
Typical problems that clerics encounter are related to the isolation that can be associated with clericalism. Sexualdeviations can include the secret use of pornography, compulsive masturbation, and then sexual acting out, most typically with either consenting adults or even prostitutes. Feelings of loneliness and their forbidden need for sexual intimacy combine in such a way that some choose to go down destructive strategies that further increases guilt. Clericalism often results in the desire to keep giving the impression of being an ideal Christian leader and therefore in an unwillingness to seek professional help. It is so easy to forget that clerics are people, too. This might seem obvious but clericalism tempts us to think otherwise. Clericalism suggests that ordained clerics are unique, special, and somehow closer to God, after all they have vowed not to marry or have sexual relations with others. They often maintain a self-image that they are always in a holy and spiritual place and don’t suffer from the human stresses and strains as well as the common human impulses of sexual desire and expression. This is hypocrisy, a sin that Jesus decried.
This is no new problem. In 1531, Martin Luther claimed that Pope Leo X had vetoed a measure that cardinals should restrict the number of boys they kept for their pleasure, “otherwise it would have been spread throughout the world how openly and shamelessly the Pope and the cardinals in Rome practice sodomy.”
Recent western morality
Although there has been evidence that around 4 per cent of celibate priests has misbehaved sexually this is a small percentage compared with what is happening today in western societies generally. The rejection of Christian belief has been associated with a marked increase in sexual immorality. A recent study from the Policy Institute at King’s College London has demonstrated this rapid change. In 2009, 8 per cent of those born between 1946 and 1964 thought casual sex was justifiable. However this figure had risen to 30 per cent by 2022! In younger generations this figure is even more startling. 55 per cent of millennials, those born between1981 and 1996, felt that casual sex was permissible and those born between 1997 and 2012 (Generation Z) the figure is 67 per cent. The director of the Policy Institute said in response to these figures:
“It is easy to lose sight of just how much more liberal the UK has [become], and how liberal we are relative to many other nations. What were once pressing concerns – things like homosexuality, divorce and casual sex – have become simple facts of life for much of the public, and we now rank as one of the most accepting countries internationally.”
It is the immorality of the west that some totalitarian states, such as Russia, have criticised the west for.
Is it a coincidence that as the west rejects God so sexual immorality has increased? Paul foresaw this happening:
“The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness . . . therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual immorality for the degrading of their bodies with one another. . . Because of this God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust one for another. Men committed indecent acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their perversion.” Romans 1:18-27
The Christians responsibility
Today there is an urgent need for all true Christians, those committed to living for Christ, to live holy lives that honour our Saviour, What a tragedy it is when a few Christians give way to immoral sexual pressures and so dishonour our Lord. The media always have a field day. We must do all we can to protect each other and draw people away fromanything that damages individuals and therefore his people, whatever denomination they belong to.
What is striking from this passage form Romans 1 is that sexual immorality is a resulting symptom and not the primary cause of God’s anger. God is angry primarily because we have rejected him and the rule of his only Son. SomeChristians consider that their main social responsibility is to counter the sexual immorality that is so rampant in our societies. However to major on this problem further alienates people from the message about the Lordship of the LordJesus. It is who he is and what he has done to put us right that should be our message to the world. Those who then accept his salvation and rule are promised the gift of the Holy Spirit who enables us to live in a way that honours our Lord. Without his help how can anyone hope to live as God wants, the motivation just is not there, nor the ability to keep living a godly life.
Psalm 2 summarises mankind’s problem succinctly:
“Why do the nations conspire and the people’s plot in vain? The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the LORD and against his Anointed One (or Messiah). Let us break their chains, they say, and throw off their fetters. The one enthroned in heaven laughs, the LORD scoffs at them. Then he rebukes them in his anger and terrifies them in his wrath, saying, ‘I have installed my King in Zion, my holy hill.’” Psalm 2:1-6
The only way to change a society is for God’s people to behave in a Godly way and for others to see the great advantage this is both to them and their society. This lifestyle backed by our message that Jesus is Lord can be world changing. Deep down everyone knows that sin does not pay good dividends.
BVP
I am very grateful for the early chapters of Uta Ranke-Heinemans book ‘Eunuch’s for the Kingdom of Heaven’ Penguin books (1991) which has given me many ideas and quotations.
1 Richard Walzer, ‘Galen on Jews and Christians’. London 1940 p 19-20
