We are more than our bodies

A friend drew my attention to this article which is written in reaction to Tony Abbot's recent comments. I'll quote a bit of it in case you can't be bothered reading it.

[T]he Opposition Leader's description of virginity as ''the greatest gift you can give someone, the ultimate gift of giving'' was nauseating. The comment both fetishes a woman's virginity and reduces her value to the presence of a hymen, to the unpenetrated state of her vagina. Why is that the greatest gift a woman can give someone? What about her mind? Her actions? Dare I say it, her soul?

Coslovich, the author, suggests that the way forward is for a woman to "to safely explore one's sexuality, when one is ready to do so, not when one's peers or politicians say you are ready to do so".

I wholeheartedly agree that there is more to women (and men) than our bodies, and that we have more value than as partners for sex. But I disagree with both her perception of the Christian attitude and the alternative she purports.

I agree that people should be free to chose how they behave sexually, but Coslovich follows this with the false assumption that the very fact of being free to chose must necessarily mean that it is best to milk that freedom for all it's worth - by embracing a variety and multiplicity of experience. This is not necessarily true. It may be better to freely choose helpful restriction - as when we decide to drink in moderation, not because someone is making us, but because we see that this will turn out to be the more enjoyable, healthy and dignifying option.

Going into marriage a virgin is not some ugly exercise in defining women as pieces of (prize) meat. That is emphatically not the Christian motivation. It is, in fact, quite opposite. Keeping sex to marriage is saying that there is more to sex and more to the people who sleep together than brute physicality. Christians wait until they are married before having sex because this is the only context in which the emotional, psychological and relational aspects of sex can be protected, honoured, and flourish. It is in sleeping around that women and men get treated as like disposable sexual objects.