Lust and the Church

There is something completely sinister about lust. What do I mean by lust? Wikipedia calls it “any intense desire or craving for self gratification and excitement.” I guess that’s about as “point blank” as I could get. Usually it’s a reference to sexual gratification. I think it’s fair to call it a religious word because faith has everything in the world to do with its origin. To “wish” or “desire” describes an active imagination, does it not? But not just an active imagination, but an imagination informed by a given context: Christianity. We trace the Western sexual norms that inform what we call “lust,” (ie. unacceptable dress, fornication, pornography, sodomy, and yes–even still homosexuality) within the context of Christendom. So, in reference to a time we now call PostChristendom, a time when Christendom as we knew it has waned but leaves its fractured definition of lust everywhere, what sort of Church has what it takes to speak to lust in this era?

Maybe I should begin by acknowledging that when Christendom was quite strong it had no real control over the sexual imaginations of men and women. Ever read Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales? It’s a collection of tales about people on a pilgrimage from Southwark to Canterbury to visit the shrine of Saint Thomas Becket at Canterbury Cathedral. These people are certainly not free of lust, even on a pilgrimage! Then of course we know of the roles that prostitutes and mistresses played to priests, bishops and kings at that time in such a large way that, though not “accepted,” was socially condoned and yes, economically subsidized. Did the Church ever consider lust a virtue? Of course not. It topped the list of deadly sins and became representative of the devil’s work in art.

What did the demonization of lust accomplish? For some, it chastened their minds. For others it only fueled their imaginations. They got creative with it, learned new ways to hide and practice it within the social norms, and then of course it only made lust that much more powerful for some.

It should be noted that like gluttony and sloth, lust rules the lives of some people and seems to have barely a place in others. It should also be noted that what lust represents within Christian faith, namely the deification of desire, is more important than what it represents to society, namely an obsessive mind that has the possibility of getting the body into naughty places. What is it that’s so sinister about lust?

It thrives on all that is good about being human, all that is God given, all that is pure. Faith depends on the faithful use of our imaginations. Lust depends on our imaginations, but drags them into a corner to be alone. Love depends on the habitual use of our bodies to serve others. Lust depends on the habitual use of the body to take from others. Our minds were created for relationships. Whatever we do functions best when brought into a shared context. Lust too needs relation, it desires it, craves it, but is all the while fearful that somehow its needs won’t be met. Like a child with a starvation complex lust hoards the other because it sees what it wants with the constant fear that it will soon disappear.

What can the Church do for its members whose wills and imaginations have been overtaken by lust? First, it should acknowledge that, yes indeed, they are members of the Body of Christ! The teaching of the Church should be informed by the Scriptures and its wealth of experience and history. There is a wealth of great teaching out there on the subject. But, we should acknowledge that because lust, like faith, depends on the imagination, the effects of lust themselves on a body so warp that imagination that one can be absorbing faithful teaching one minute and giving full leash to lust the next! In this way the very heart that prays to be faithful knows that it has a mind so informed by past lust that it cannot desire and wish correctly. It knows that at its very core it is broken.

The Church that acknowledges its members and their sin must be faithful not to want to hide them or their sin when society wants a prettier picture. Too often the Church has wanted to reveal itself in power. In America this means mimicking the business community. The problem is that Jesus Christ is Lord of our hearts and minds and he makes claims that even the business community won’t dare. He claims Lordship over work and leisure, asking all of our imaginative strength.

The Church in a PostChristendom society must demonstrate its power in Repentance. It must show that repentance does not mean “I’m sorry.” It means shedding the old and putting on the new. It means “taking the actions of love to improve our relations with others.” (The AA Big Book) In order to care for those overtaken in the sin of lust, Christians must be the kind of people willing to confess sins and receive the discipline of the Church. Of course this is all voluntary, which means we will usually take the path of least resistance—and not do it! Instead of asking “Do I want to confess my sins and be restored to the Church?” maybe the inverse will help for a time. “Do I want to hide my sins and play Church even though it’s destroying me and real Church is what I desperately need!”

Now for the most sinister side of Lust. Lust creates its own telos or end. This writer knows first hand that lust is its own religion. It is a doppelgänger for love, using the same physical senses most creative and sacred for humans, but with an economy of instant gratification. In this way lust is perfect for Americans. It creates need in keeping with our social impulse to buy, consume and protect. Yes, this is an end in itself. But it’s clear that it is no true fulfillment. Lust has devastating effects. It creates humans with little caves in their hearts and big serpents in their minds.

But here, into this very point of broken obsession walks Jesus. Look at all the sexually broken people he included in his ministry. The unfaithful woman set to be stoned in John 8:3-11 is set free and becomes perhaps the first public example of Jesus’ antipathy toward Church authorities whose hearts are just as sullied as the accused. The sinful woman who anointed his feet hears the good news that “her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.” [Luke 7:48] And finally, Mary of Magdala, a woman of the night with demons, becomes the first to meet Jesus after his resurrection and the first Evangelist. [John 20:16-18]

In so far as the Church has the power to call men and women to repentance it remains a Church with power to help its own members get free of lust. The “wink, wink, nudge, nudge, now turn a blind eye and put on our best face” approach has the same effect as the clothesline sermon or the “scare the devil out of them” approach, namely to cause the person with lust to hide and practice the addiction. We’ve used both too often and neither works. Our only hope is to return to Jesus, the One who with the Father and the Spirit provide all the love we’ll ever need.