Photo by A. Do you know unmarried couples who attend church, have consensual sex, and may even live together? According to a study by the Barna Group,. The majority of American adults believe cohabitation is generally a good idea. Of the 65 percent of American adults who are okay with cohabitation, a good number of them identify themselves as Christians. While this figure is far below the 88 percent approval by people who do not profess any kind of faith, the fact that over 40 percent of self-professing Christians tolerate cohabitation attests to the far-reaching effects of secular culture upon believers.

In a recent summit on human trafficking at Johns Hopkins University, kidnapping survivor Elizabeth Smart made some surprising remarks about why victims of rape may not try to escape their captors. Her conclusion? They, like she, may have been raised in a culture that says a woman's worth in rooted in her sexual purity. Recounting an anecdote from a childhood teacher who compared having sex to being chewed like a piece of gum, Smart, a Mormon, tells her audience that she "felt crushed" after being raped: "Who could want me now? I felt so dirty and so filthy.

The starting point for a Christian understanding of human sexuality is the belief that all humans are made 'in the image of God'. The creation story in Genesis shows how male and females are intimately connected to each other:. This story suggests that man and woman unite to become complete.

But it's not that simple. And then, you could have at it all you wanted. But what I wasn't taught in Sunday School is that the Bible's teachings on sex have been interpreted in many different ways. I didn't know that the early Christians actually started practicing celibacy because they were convinced the end of the world was near. No one told me that marriage wasn't always defined and controlled by the church.