Why Evangelical Honeymoons Go So Wrong
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- Опубліковано 27 бер 2024
- Recently Texas SBC megachurch pastor Josh Howerton told the brides in his congregation that on the wedding night, they should "stand where he wants you to stand, wear what he wants you to wear, and do what he wants you to do." Sex was presented as something that HE has been waiting for his whole life, and that she has to provide. There was no emphasis on how she actually has greater need to be cared for sexually, if you're going to begin well, than he does. Jay Stringer joins us today to talk about how the conversation around sex often leads to couples starting off badly--and also allows men to not have to grow up or do the work of being mature, emotionally healthy people.
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LINKS WE MENTIONED:
Jay's first podcast with us on his book Unwanted
baremarriage.com/2022/11/podc...
Our book The Great Sex Rescue, with the stats on vaginismus and sexual pain
baremarriage.com/great-sex-re...
Our books for engaged couples, The Good Girl's Guide to Great Sex and The Good Guy's Guide to Great Sex
baremarriage.com/good-girls-g...
Our podcast looking at Josh and Jana's Howerton's sex talk
baremarriage.com/2022/09/podc...
The podcast showing how Josh Howerton plagiarizes in his sermons
baremarriage.com/2022/09/podc...
The Orgasm Course
baremarriage.com/the-orgasm-c...
The Marriage Night at Lakepointe Church that Howerton was referring to (the section around 1:57:00-2:05:00 covers a lot of stuff about sex and includes the second clip we used)
• How Jesus Changes Your...
The study talking about the effects of orgasm the first time you have sex:
baremarriage.com/2022/10/rese...
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Thank you for addressing this! When I listened to the pastor’s “advice” to engaged women, what jumped out at me is how he painted love as transactional at its core, as though we become married vending machines, punching in codes to get what we want in return. That is just NOT the love that Jesus showed and shows us AT ALL. Plus, “I’ll trade you a wedding for a lifetime of sexual servitude” doesn’t sound like a fair trade in any light.
I noticed this too. Much like Eggerich
I agree. I think these people see God as a vending machine so of course they'd see our relationships like this as well.
It's so incredibly bad 😢
This is exactly why I am single in 49
I think I'm becoming a broken record as I leave this comment everywhere, but we need a curriculum for the Church on healthy relationships. So much of your conversation was info I've never heard in my 58 years in church, but vital to all of us and our young people would have a better path than me of this was taught from the beginning.
I so agree and have been saying this for a few years now. If we would focus on what healthy friendships and relationships are in general - from kids/youth group on up, the outcomes for marriages would be SO much better.
I think the problem is that the men at the top don’t want to change behavior to adjust 😢
That would be amazing if they made that sort of discussion a normal part of our fellowship.
Jesus will equip the right people to create relationship and sex education in our society. Use me!
Check out "Created for Connection," by Dr. Sue Johnson and Kenneth Sanderfer. This is what you're looking for!
@@saramoore1277 Thank God He's using Sheila to do this work.❤ Pass it on.
This pastor saying"Dudes, dudes, dudes" gosh he is so edgy cool with that language>eye roll<
What a dork.
What an incredible time to be alive!!! The tide is turning and picking up speed! Praise God! 🙏🏻🙏🏻
Purity culture set me (and so many other women) up to be traumatized by sex. It is not a natural transition to go from zero sexual education and fixating on purity/modesty during singleness to suddenly being married and required to be sexual. That is an overwhelming paradigm shift that causes many women (and some men) to feel dirty, violated, disillusioned, and deeply depressed.
Ugh! HIS wedding night... yikes! I am aghast!
This is so validating. I was mouth open when Sheila shared this clip of the pastor, the first time. I couldn't believe the exact same words he said about how a woman must do on her wedding night, the same I was told two years ago by a doctor. This doctor wasnt a Obgyn, was a generał doctor that I needed his services for some health issues and when I answered to the questions about if a have children, with authority and prepotense he started lecturing me the how to make babies; "you just need to lay down and let your husband do everything"... He is a christian, he had worship music in his Office, bible verses on the walls, disgusting. By the way, this was in Dominican Republic, this gross way of thinking is so worlwide.
I always wanted to know, how is the husband supposed to find out how to 'do everything,'? Was he just born knowing what a woman wants???
@@FireflowerDancer Nobody is born knowing this very important stuff. Sheila is such a welcome angel. We all need to learn from her and (hopefully) others like her. Even in 2024, some people are trying to shut her up.
This is such a powerful conversation!!! I'm a Psychotherapist with clinical sexology training and I was cheering out loud every other minute, ha! Also, sending this to my husband who is a pastor. 😊
I am so grateful you and your husband are in this new world helping to heal marriage!
Great :)
3:58 "Ladies, when you get to his wedding night... *he's been planning this night his whole life!"*
So life begins after puberty? Because I *definitely* wasn't thinking about my wedding night (or marriage in general) as a child.
So true.
@@saramoore1277 I was. I was given a bride doll at age nine and filled with all kinds of garbage about the wedding and all the trimmings. But nothing about relationships. At least nothing useful about sex.
"Just because you're married does not make you a marriage expert."
Can I use this similar argument to parenting? "Just because you're a parent does not make you a parenting expert." That seems to be the consensus of many parents -- that if you have kids, you are full of much parenting wisdom, but if you do not have kids, you know nothing!
Sorry, I went on a tangent.😅
No, don't apologize. You're right. In order to get a Driver's License, you must demonstrate a certain knowledge and proficiency in driving. But to become a husband, or a parent--not so much...
Your comment about pastors and even therapists having had *perhaps* one course in human sexuality made me realize - I’m halfway through master’s in clinical mental health and I will have NO course in human sexuality. Yikes! That’s really not acceptable, and I think I’m going to bring that up. I probably won’t get it in my *Christian* university, but I’m going to find it somewhere. It’s definitely something I need a good body of knowledge about. And I’m going to be campaigning to get the *Christian* university to add it to the curriculum. !!
Wow! Even elementary kids get a course in sexuality. I hope you are able to find the relevant info.
I just started my CMHC degree. I also looked and do not have human sexuality. Seems necessary, more than ever!
Good on you!!!❤
This was a great episode overall.
One thing I would say, though, with regard to the plea at the end for pastors to defer to mental health experts in certain areas, is that there are many bad therapists out there as well and the roots of psychotherapy in general are not all good. The field of psychology and psychiatry does tend to attract some harmful personalities.
So while there are excellent therapists out there, there are many messed up ones as well, and a lot of studies taken as foundational to the field are now coming under scrutiny.
There should be a way to evaluate therapists. There are good ones and far too many not good ones. The current licensing standards don't seem to measure the right things. In addition to skills they must be free of misogyny!
Yay!!! I always do a little dance when I get a notification of a new podcast from your channel and Natalie's!!! 💃 🪩 🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉❤❤❤❤❤
Thanks Sheila and Jay!!
13:11 And feel self righteous about it because they "waited"
This was such a refreshing podcast. And I loved that there was an actual male therapist on the pod to give the science and also medical advice on how our brains respond to sex and also how our history, wiring and conditioning affect our sex lives. Also you mention a lot about the puberty course on your website. I can’t find it. I’m using the Bare Marriage website. Can you tell me where this course is? I can’t find it under courses. Thank you.
Great discussion!
I can't wait to listen to this tonight! ❤
My fiancé and I are choosing all our wedding colors and outfits together, except I am picking my own dress, and we will both be planning the wedding night. That pastor's approach is really inviting abuse and control of one person over another to occur.
That sounds lovely. God bless your marriage-to-be! 🎉
Only dudes plan their wedding nights?! 🤨
God bless you Sheila for calling these jerk out
Woww, soooo true!!! 😢 So sad how some "christian" men teach about sex, marriages and women, no difference with non christian World view of women.
There’s still a difference, the non-Christians value consent.
non christian world treat women much better then church world, its a shame
Yikes! I think this is just one example of what’s gone wrong in the SBC. Was this a recent sermon by Josh Howerton?
Yes, about a month ago! ua-cam.com/video/-SkKXyp91jE/v-deo.htmlsi=sm9nDoD7v7P_1V3G
❤ excellent
What's feminine and masculine clapping? 😂
Women dream about a wedding night too… but their dreams end with feeling loved and cherished not feeling used. Men don’t want some spiritless breathing blow up doll. They want a real woman who loves them and wants them. If they don’t, that’s their problem not yours.
This UA-cam channel is so underrated. Thank you Sheila!
I had never heard of Josh Howerton before seeing this clip.
What he said is WRONG AND IGNORANT. I decided to find out a little more about him. I have watched some of his UA-cam. Except for the blunder he made about the wedding night he seems to be solid. He needs our prayer and needs to be corrected in one area but he can be very valuable otherwise.
16:44 some of my male friends didn’t do much to plan their wedding & I guess it’s because it was really her day and she has stronger feelings. That said it wasn’t the girl 100% planning things.
From the moment that minister talked about “ladies: on your wedding day…” I almost immediately knew where this was going to go.
@sheilaWrayGregoire Hi Sheila, I apologize if this is an inappropriate space to ask this question, and if you've answered it elsewhere. People who promote gender hierarchy theology all say they believe in gender equality, usually expressed as "equal value and dignity, equally in the image of God"...some variation on that. In all the books you've read on complementarian marriage or church life, have you ever seen the equality piece unpacked and elaborated on, or is it merely a statement made on the way to talking about "how to do hierarchy"? Is it ever presented as a stand-alone concept, with actionable things that would demonstrate equality? More to the point, when there are moderate abuses of male authority, is there ever a reference to "equal value and dignity" as an antidotal teaching, or is the council focused only on "how to do hierarchy better"? This is not a rhetorical question. I'm skeptical, but I'm genuinely curious.
I think she covered some of what you're asking about in her video from three weeks ago, "Are We Creating a Strawman out of Complementarianism?" It's a good question; I don't think I've ever seen anyone really explain how equality makes sense when you have placed half the human race in a subordinate role and define them entirely by weakness and dependency on the other half.
@@spikylittlemind8058 Thank you for the info! I did listen to that episode and remember enjoying it, but I'm going to listen again to see what I might have missed. Having grown up egalitarian, the inconsistencies in complementarianism seem stark to me. It's notable that- as Sheila and Company have pointed out- the more successful comp marriages are functionally egalitarian. Seems there is an inability to reconcile equality with hierarchy, even if it is only subconscious,
@@Wren_Farthing yes, I have always been left wondering what they really meant when they said men and women have different gifts. Seems like the only "gifts" they're willing to allow women are ability to obey and a talent for doing all the things those men don't feel like doing, such as being primarily responsible for childcare.
@@spikylittlemind8058 Hear, hear!
@@spikylittlemind8058- I’d take it a step farther. Though not expressly stated, the “gifts” the attribute to women seem to boil down to our ability to grow and feed children with our bodies. *Ergo* , we are “gifted” to childcare because “biology”. I see a lot of comments about women being inherently nurturing by our sex, this ignoring women who aren’t and men who are (most notably Jesus Himself). Or they ignore that people of God (first the Jew with the laying of the Law; then also the Gentiles by the imbuing of the Holy Spirit) are called and commanded to live outside their fleshly nature. In which case, the argument could be made, “okay, men are naturally aggressive-so the heck what? If you’re a new creature, that ceases to be an excuse.”
Sorry, that was a tangent.
I also hear the secular red pillers simultaneously argue that women are naturally obedient but also that women need to be subdued by “strong” men.
… if we’re naturally obedient; then we wouldn’t “need” to be dominated.
True complementarianism should boil down to a handful of physical traits: men are stronger pound for pound; women are the only ones who can grow humans and this makes them extra-vulnerable as long as they are pregnant or have a child under a certain age. Ergo, division of labor becomes essential to the family unit in particular living circumstances (like in Hunter-gatherer or even agricultural societies). But in those societies, you see an equal division of labor *load* amongst the commoners. It’s not really reproducible in “developed” societies.
This makes me so sad. My marriage was transformed by the Lord through your book back in the summer of 2018. As a former lesbian for a decade in my twenties, I had a lot of guilt and shame and the Lord used you in a very dynamic way to makeover my marriage. However, he has also used Pastor Josh as I continue that transformation. I was in the message that you posted, however all that was shown was a cut portion - not what he said before or after. He was joking. Pastor Josh is 100% pro-marriage and pro-marital sex and if I may be so bold as to say he is also pro- female sexual fulfillment within that sexual
Marriage. He speaks very bluntly to the men ALL THE TIME -about how they could step up and make changes that would end up blessing them as well as their wife. I’ve seen other things you’ve posted negatively about Pastor Josh and I’ve often wondered why? Everything I’ve read from you matches up 100% with what he teaches as well as what he advocates for other to teach as well. I have had to stop recommending your books to others, and instead I just talk about the benefits I received from them without mentioning their names, because I do not want to share conflicting information by recommending my home church along with an author that clearly has problems with my pastor. But as someone who has sat under his teaching - (after I read several of your books and followed your blog) as well as has learned from you - I can absolutely say - his messages match up with yours, as far as the marriage bed goes anyway.
Hi! I didn't watch the video yet, and I'm not familiar with Pastor Josh. Do you mean that when he said the husband should tell the bride where to stand and what to do on the wedding night, he was only joking?
What is the one Christian sex book that you would recommend?
I think I have it in my collection, but the title escapes me now.
We've written a few! The Great Sex Rescue, The Good Girl's Guide to Great Sex, The Good Guy's Guide to Great Sex. The Gift of Sex by the Penners is also quite good, though doesn't really include the info on obligation sex or why we have an increased chance of vaginismus in the church.
Yes that is the book I have in my collection...I plan to get and read your book too, as I seek to understand rather than condemn..I also have "Every Man's Battle.." because I feel that, and I hope you don't take this wrong, but you are taking some things out of context.
But again, I want to understand. Is there anything in that book that's good?
I don’t think that sexual message paints men in a good light either. Like I imagine there are men who would feel offended to hear themselves characterized that brutishly like the minister did.
That pastor…. 😭😭so obtuse and out of touch
I think y'all all reading too much into it. Men are men and 96+% don't care about flowers, cakes, and dresses, but some can pretend to, but in the end, she decides and he just pretends to have part in that decision to make her happy. And the best pretenders will convince you he really cared and wasn't just pretending. Now you know his secret.
I think they have a different take than the reality: the guy isn’t worried about the details. Maybe the food. But it’s really the girl’s day and he doesn’t want to get in the way of her dream is what I’ve heard my guy friends basically say.