Something June invited us to do while we were with her was to bless our bodies. She told us how we neglect our bodies and take them for granted instead of blessing them. Each of us lay on our backs with enough space between each person so that no one touched the other. Then we closed out eyes and silently moved our hands over each part of our bodies, pausing to ponder how wonderfully we are created and then to give a blessing and say, “Thanks.” It was powerful to move from our toes, to feet, to ankles, to calves, to thighs, and then think about how each part functioned and was God-given. We blessed our genitals and pelvises, hips and waists and stomachs. We thought about the organs we take for granted like the skin, heart, lungs, liver, and kidneys, pancreas and colon. We touched our lower and upper backs, our breasts and chests, collar bones, shoulders, biceps, triceps, forearms, wrists, hands, thumbs, and fingers. Finally, we came to our necks and heads. We touched our lips and mouths and teeth, our eyes and ears, and noses, our foreheads and the crowns of our heads. We each had thought about our total selves and blessed them. It was an amazing experience to name and picture each part and say, “This is of God. Behold, this is good. This is to be cherished.”
One of my colleagues was giving a lecture when he said, “Our sexuality includes all that we are, not just our ‘gender and genitals’.” In other words, our sexuality includes not only our anatomy and physique, but also our scent. The way we sit, walk, and cross our legs. The colors and clothes we choose and how they fit, our hairstyles and cuts, whether we shave our heads or pluck our eyebrows or grow a beard are all part of our sexuality. The jewelry we wear, a tattoo, even our laugh is part of our sexuality.
According to the New Testament, all who are baptized into Christ are members of the body of Christ and a temple of the Holy Spirit. We are joined to God through Jesus Christ. We live in God, and God lives in us. Food and drink, work and rest, prayer and play all contribute to our appearance, attitude, and sense of well-being. The way we treat our bodies colors how we feel about ourselves and our sexuality. Years ago, someone gave me a tiny wood plaque that reads, “If I would have known I was going to live this long, I would have taken better care of myself.” “God created us male and female.” “We are sexual beings and we are good.”
Questions for Reflection
• Do you celebrate the goodness of your sexuality?
• What might it mean to you personally when in the New Testament we are told, “Your bodies are not your own to do with as you please for you were redeemed for a price. Therefore glorify God with your bodies”?
Prayer
• Creator God, thank you for the goodness of flesh and creating us sexual beings. Help us to respect and cherish our bodies which are your creation. Amen.
Touching Appropriately
Neva was a widow in the first parish I served. In her seventies, she lived on a railroader’s tiny pension plus Social Security in a small house on a hill outside the city limits. She heated her house with wood, had no indoor plumbing, and got water from a catch fed by a spring that ran eleven months of the year. She gardened, grew flowers, and made all sorts of craft art out of stuff others discarded.
Neva had one daughter who lived in the middle of the state, but there wasn’t a lot of contact. I was unofficially adopted as her son. She would drop by the office to bring me flowers, baked goods, or to gift me with a piece of pottery or small craft item she had fashioned. It quickly became apparent that she was lonely.
One evening during a week my wife was out of town, Neva treated me to a homemade chicken dinner with all the trimmings. It was obvious she had pulled out all the stops. I felt as though I had been treated like royalty. As I got up to leave, I gave her a hug. A tear came to her eyes so I asked, “Neva, what’s wrong?” “You are the first man who’s hugged me since my husband died.” I asked her how long ago that had been and she told me slightly more than twenty years had passed since his death. Can you imagine not receiving a hug for twenty years? I wonder how any people who knew her even suspected her loneliness.
Ten years later I attended a Leadership Skills Institute sponsored by the Episcopal Church. A lot of it dealt with small group process. After one week together, the normal social barriers were down and all the participants were quite open about expressing their feelings. One facilitator warned us about what she referred to as the “TLF” syndrome. She went on to explain the way some people functioned behaviorally was as follows: “I touch you. I love you. I f—k you.” Not only in that group but in any relationship, we need to be aware of all the messages our touch can communicate or miscommunicate.
I had a very talented creative colleague who couldn’t keep his hands off female parishioners. This was many years before the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings. He denied this was a problem even after women began to call the bishop’s office. He and his wife were asked to seek out a counselor. It was rumored he and his wife were having problems in their marriage. He continued to make light of his inappropriate remarks and behavior. When other women complained that his behavior continued, ultimately he had to resign since he couldn’t abide by the church’s guidelines. He became a fireman. A pastor had become a predator.
All clergy and religious church workers have been required by our bishop to attend a sexual harassment workshop because of all the litigation which the church is involved with. This was a professional consciousness–raiser and a corporate measure to protect the church’s backside. Many of my colleagues will no longer pick up children or hug or kiss children, teens, or adults out of fear of a lawsuit.
Some would say the pendulum has swung too far in the other direction. But last year a female colleague who is a single woman serving a parish as the sole pastor wrote an excellent newsletter article, “Touch in the Congregation.” She indicated many men seem to think they can hug or touch her every time they see her. Her viewpoint is, “It’s not always welcome or appropriate.” She was asking for a new sensitivity and respect on the part of all congregational members. “I don’t want to violate your space but I also need appropriate boundaries to protect myself,” she wrote to her congregation.
Can there be a happy medium? Perhaps we need to ask permission to discover whether someone is open to a hug or kiss. That may seem unnatural if you’re a hugger, but it’s also a safeguard. We dare not assume everyone needs or welcomes our touch when we want to demonstrate our affection. I believe it’s better to check it out than be burned. But in the spontaneity of the moment sometimes I still forget, catch myself, and apologize.
Questions for Reflection
• When you feel you want to touch a particular person, ask yourself what you think your motivation is. Is the feeling mutual? Are there potential dangers?
• What kind of touch do you welcome? When? From whom?
• If you are uncomfortable with someone’s touch, are you able to say so clearly?
Prayer
• Loving God, help us not to misuse the gift of touch. Let all touch be a sign of human and holy affection and your care. Amen.
Celibacy Is Not the Same as Being Single
In some parts of the church, celibacy still is lifted up as a calling. Celibacy is choosing for the sake of Jesus and the reign of God to neither marry nor have sexual relations. According to the teaching of Jesus and the New Testament, celibacy is a gift. I believe it should not be legislated by a church hierarchy. Within Roman Catholicism over ten thousand priests have left the priesthood because they met someone, fell in love, and decided to marry. Within my tradition, the calling to be a pastor and the calling to marriage are not mutually exclusive. I believe celibacy can be personally claimed by some people as part of our response to the Risen One’s invitation to become a follower. To be celibate is to choose Jesus as “one’s partner” and to offer one’s whole life in service of God within the church and for the world.
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