The Hypersexual Evangelical Movement

At Red Pepper, Don Monkerud gives a pretty general overview and analysis of the "culture war" on sex. It's an interesting step back and assessment of where we stand now and what the last decade has done to damage comprehensive sexual health (that includes freedom and pleasure in addition to resisting disease) in this country. It's helpful, even if not filled with entirely new information. I did think this observation was extremely poignant and sort of a key detail in making sense of the evangelical position on sex:

Far from being anti-sexual, today’s evangelicals push a hyper-sexualised message, complete with Christian pornography and bragging about having better sex than non-believers. Evangelical sex advice books emphasise the dangers of sex outside marriage, but revel in titillating sexual details. Even if they aren’t interested, Christian wives are told to be ‘available’ to their husbands at all times, especially for ‘quickies’, to make them feel like ‘real men’.

‘Although the evangelical movement is contradictory and hypocritical, it’s important to understand that it’s pro-sex, a kind of illegitimate child of the sexual revolution,’ says Herzog. ‘The evangelicals promise physiological orgasms, called ‘soulgasms’, which combine psychological orgasms, a close emotional connection with the spouse and the blessing presence of god in the bedroom. At the same time, they’re homophobic and hostile to all sex outside marriage. They take up aspects of the old sexual revolution but twist them.’