A Sound of Sheer Silence

I have news for you--gay marriage is totally passe.  In saying that, I don't mean that LGBT people will stop getting married; surely that will continue apace.  No, gay marriage is passe as a vehicle for generating moral panic.  One might suggest that those who have been pushing the "the gay agenda is coming for your kids" have realized that this line is losing its effectiveness, and thus are abandoning ship.  I think that's basically true, but be that as it may, it is becoming clear that folks are moving on. "But surely, Mike, folks are not going to give up on decrying the culture and reducing all problems to some readily identifiable cause, are they?"  Surely not!  Instead, it is clear that there is a new moral panic on the horizon, one that both our evangelical and Catholic brothers and sisters of a conservative stripe are already beginning to rally the troops.  That new moral panic is pornography. To prime the pump for this new talking point, th...

This may be the dumbest controversy of all time, and because of that I wanted to avoid this topic altogether.  But, I just can't help it--I have to talk about foot washing. For those not familiar with this issue, in the service for Maundy Thursday (the Thursday before Easter) in Catholic and other liturgical Christian churches (I know, for example, its in the Episcopalian Book of Common Prayer), there is a part where the priest washes the feet of certain members of the congregation.  This practice is derived from John's Gospel, where Jesus washes the feet of those gathered for the Last Supper.  The symbolism here is that washing feet was something done by a servant, and thus Jesus washing the feet of the Disciples is a sign that leadership in the Christian context involves serving others instead of lording over them. I go to the Maundy Thursday service every year.  We didn't always go as a kid, so I would estimate I have been to that service around 20 times in my...

I saw two reviews this morning for 50 Shades of Grey .   Grantland 's Wesley Morris, who has become my go-to movie reviewer with the passing of Roger Ebert, says that it is conventionally terrible .  In other words, it is bad, but probably not entertainingly  bad in the way I hoped .   So, no reason to see it. Amanda Hess's review in Slate  has a different, and potentially more interesting, take.  She claims that the film is actually very self-aware, in the sense that it knows that many people "hate read" the 50 Shades  books, to use Hess's phrasing.  The film approaches the material in the book, Hess claims, from the point of view of someone who is attempting to read the material from the perspective of ironic distance.  [Ed:  Will Leitch says something similar ]  The story is crap, the characters are crap, the situations are crap, and the movie knows this as it is portraying the same story, characters, and situati...

I was introduced to The Body's Grace by Frank from Letters to the Catholic Right in this post , where he quotes Williams saying: It puts the question which is also raised for some kinds of moralist by the existence of the clitoris in women; something whose function is joy. If the creator were quite so instrumentalist in ‘his’ attitude to sexuality, these hints of prodigality and redundancy in the way the whole thing works might cause us to worry about whether he was, after all, in full rational control of it. But if God made us for joy…? I want to talk about the first part of that quote here, regarding the clitoris.  I am not aware of any theology that has been done on the clitoris, but there should be.  As Williams alludes to, the existence and nature of the clitoris is a theological "problem," especially if you want to hold on to traditional Christian sexual morality.  It is especially problematic if you want to hold that sexuality needs to be understood through the...

We come now to the last section of Holy Sex! , which consists of a series of short chapters that attempt to address problems that might crop up along the path to Infallible Loving.  By definition, this section is a mixed bag, and I have already addressed the most substantive chapter that deals with objections to NFP .  So, I'm just going to hit the chapters that stand out. Chapter 16 is about female sexual dysfunction.  I am pleased to see that he identifies "poor technique" as potential cause #1 of why a woman can't orgasm, and he advocates manual stimulation of the clitoris as a potential (at least partial) solution.  He also suggests that excessive negativity one's upbringing around sex can be a cause, which is also constructive.  But then he drifts into "guilt about past promiscuity" as a possible cause, which is problematic.  While Popcak is sticking to the story that "eroticism" leads to massive psychological wounds around sex, my exper...

Chapter 12 is about foreplay.  Most everyone acknowledges that foreplay is good, and this chapter is no exception.  Popcak makes the interesting but seemingly effective choice to break foreplay down into the various senses.  So, for example, under seeing he discusses things like wearing lingerie, under smell he suggests to use scented candles, etc.  There is nothing revolutionary or earthshaking here, but the suggestions are solid and reasonable. He also provides an unambiguous defense of oral sex.  Some might be puzzled as to why oral sex needs defending, but the traditional position of the Church opposed oral sex--hence the reason it was traditionally grouped with anal sex under the heading of "sodomy."  So, Popcak is stepping out a bit on a limb here, and he deserves his kudos for that.  He also makes clear that oral sex goes both ways, subject only to the One Rule.  Good on him for recognizing the needs of the ladies in this realm. I could...

Chapters 11 through 13 is where we get to the nitty-gritty of Infallible Loving.  Chapter 11 is yet another framing chapter, albeit more focused than the previous ones, Chapter 12 deals with foreplay, and Chapter 13 deals with intercourse.  Needless to say, this post (and the next one) is going to be the real "Sheer Silence After Dark" portion of the review, so fair warning. Before diving into the three chapters and dwelling on the weird parts, I want to talk about the good parts of these chapters.  First, it is clear Dr. Popcak's heart is in the right place.  He comes across in these chapters as utterly sincere in his desire to lead couples to have a good relationship and good sex.  Whether or not his proposals actually accomplish this is a separate question, but the intention is there.  You have to give him credit for trying very hard, particularly as he is fighting the headwinds of Catholic doctrine and practice. Second, it is clear that these chapte...

Chapter 10 is about Natural Family Planning or NFP.  To keep the topic together, I am also going to skip ahead and also cover Chapter 15 in Part 4, entitled "When NFP is Too Hard," which deals with problems and objections involving NFP. For those that might not be familiar with NFP, the idea is that the woman monitors certain physical signs in her body to determine when she is or is not fertile, and then the couple avoids sex at those times in which she is fertile.  The mechanics of how this is done varies depending on which of several methods are employed.  As NFP supporters are eager to point out at every opportunity, it is not the "rhythm method," in the sense that it does not exclusively rely on counting out the days on the 28 day ovulation cycle.  It does involve attempting to map out that cycle in detail, using those physical symptoms to plot where the woman is in the cycle at a particular point in time.  I think it is fair to think of it as "Rhythm M...

We'll handle the rest of Part One--Chapters 3 and 4--in the post.  Be forewarned:  there are a bunch of lists in these chapters. We start off in Chapter 3 with the promise that Popcak will explain what he calls the "eight ingredients" of Holy Sex.  But before we get to that, he has a brief section where he reiterates that Holy Sex is awesome and eroticism is terrible.  Then he says: [Being an Infallible Lover] means that if you are struggling sexually, the root of the problem most likely has more to do with your character or relationship than it does with mechanics and proper lighting.  Your sexual relationship is a microcosm of everything good and bad in your entire relationship. See, this is precisely what I was worried about in my previous post .  Can relationship problems lead to sexual problems?  Absolutely.  Are relationship problems more often the source of the problem than technical problems?  Maybe.  Are relationship probl...