Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy

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Sexual morality of christianity

Gunter Runkel

To cite this article: Gunter Runkel (1998) Sexual morality of christianity, Journal of Sex & Marital
Therapy, 24:2, 103-122, DOI: 10.1080/00926239808404924

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 Sexual Morality of Christianity

G W E R RUNKEL
University of Lueneberg, Lueneberg, Germany

After discussing the origin of religion, functions of religion, and

the construction of meaning by religion, the author focuses on the
connection between religion and anxiety. The permanent anxiety in
religion is determined by guilt feelings that arise for example from
the violation of norms in the area of sexuality. I n a religion at enmity
with sexuality, such as Christianity, the satisfaction of sexual desires
is considered bad and sinful; the permanent production of anxiety
and a guilty conscience are the result of it. Christian sexual suppes-
sion leads to the propagation of asceticism as the taming of corrupt
sensuality that only religious virtuosi can maintain. One result
of asceticism is celibacy, although passages f%om the Bible demand
monogamy for bishops without prohibiting celibacy. I n Catholicism,
celibacy institutionalizes the enmity with sexuality and causes a
permanent depreciation of real sexuality infavor of one projected onto
the mother church and the Virgin Mary. A further consequence of
asceticism is the reduction of sexuality to reproduction. In the section
about the factual consequences of Christian sexual morality, the
author connects sexual instinctual grati$cation with religious a@-
iation on the basis of a n analysis of the sexual behavior of Germans.
The weekly Pequency rate of sexual intercourse amounts to 3.1 with
male and female nondenominationals, 2.6 with Protestants, and 2.3
with Catholics; 39% of nondenominational men, 20% ofProtestant
men, and 12 % of Catholic men in Germany use condoms. The connec-
tion of religion and aggression is empirically signi$cant as well. The
religiously most active men feel more inclined to use aggression to
reach sexual goals than religiously indifferent ones.

Christianity gave Eros poison to drink-

it certainly did not die of it, but it degenerated-
to vice
Nietzsche (p. 73).@
This article has been translated by Sabine Turner. Citations originally in German were translated
into English for the convenience of the reader.
Address correspondence to Gunter Runkel, Ph.D., University of Lueneburg, Institut fuer Sozial-
wissenschaften, 21332 Lueneburg, Germany.

Journal of Sex & Marital Therapy, 24109-142, 1998 10s

Copyright 0 1998 Brunner/Muel, he.
OO9.?42(Ix/98 $12.00 + .OO
104 G.Runkel

Law, ethics, and morality in the western culture are essentially formed
by Christianity. Therefore, Christianity re resents the macro theory of
morality that governs the other domains. 79
ORIGIN OF RELIGION

Religion came into being on a historical level on which the world was
seen as shamanistic-prophetic. On this level elements of dreams are
infiltrated into the real surroundings, which the individual does not inter-
pret as an illusion but as an indication of a higher world (p. 31).5
Emile Durkheim saw the origin of religion (p. 83) in the act of calling
ancestors and spirits for help in order to free oneself of the dependency
on nature by propitiatory sacrifice and prayers. He considered the divi-
sion of the world into secular and sacral areas to be characteristic of
religion (p. 50f).I9According to Max Weber, religiously or magically
motivated action is aimed at this world, and the averting of evils and the
allotment of benefits in this world are the goals of all prayers, even in
the most otherworldly religions (p. 27).lo1Religion is extended world (p.
27) ,9 the deities of the moment are adjusted to the level of the respective
knowledge. For the traditional sociology of religion the sacred, the numi-
nous, is the essential part of religion and a category a priori (p. 119) .65
Cicero was more reserved in his definition of religion because for him
the reference is a certain higher nature that one calls divine (p. 148).
Norman Birnbaum proved the fruitfulness of the concept of ideology
for the sociology of religion.6Religion is defined as countertruth, hence
itself becomes ideology, that is, a countertheory of world explanation,
formulation of action opposed to other ideologies (p. 171).86

FUNCTIONS OF REUGION
During the Age of Enlightenment, criticism of the sacrally sanctioned
authority went along with criticism of religion. Holbach was one of the
first to address the domesticating function of religion (p. 71).43This
function helps the authorities to use religion as an instrument for their
own benefit (p. 551) .loo
The integrating function of religion that stabilizes behavior and pro-
vides a socially centered force in society was made a topic early on b
(among others) Holbein, Helvetius, Machiavelli, and Hobbes (p. 14). J
Ludwig Feuerbach humanized the gods again; what w a s looked on and
worshipped as God is now recognized as something human (p. 40).23
Hegel in turn exposed the compensatory function of religion: Religion
especially looked for and recommended for the times of public hardship,
of confusion, and suppression, and pointed to for comfort for injustice
and for hope as substitution for the loss (p. 104).40Religion is seen as
compensation for frustration and restitution for wordly sufferings. This
thought is later carried on by Karl Marx: Religion is the universal theory
of this world,. . . its universal grounds of comfort and justifica-
tion . . . Religion is the sigh of the distressed creation, the soul of a heart-
less world, as it is the spirit of a spiritless condition. It is opium for the
Sexual Morality of Christianity 105

masses (p. 378).58 With Sigmund Freud this compensatory function is

put in place in a system of the genesis of religion whereby primitive man
humanizes nature surrounding him to reduce its threat and his fear
resulting from the latter (p. 340).25 To Freud religion is psychology pro-
jected to the world outside (p. 287).26According to Jones it represents
the dramatization of feelings, fear, and longing projected into the cosmic
world, feelings that result from the relationship between the child and
its parents (p. 12),45in connection with which the relation of god with
father for example, is often stressed by Christians (p. 80f):36Yet from
such a projection estrangement arises because the projected meaning of
human action consolidates to a mysterious other world that seemingly
floats above the world of man ( . 93).4Religion is based on the situation
of dependency and tribulationT6In his analysis of religion Freud stated
the grounds of one essential function of religion to be its compensation,
to illusorily compensate the oppressed for their renunciation and to
console them with the prospect of the hereafter.25
Another function of religion lies in the provision of last, basic reduc-
tions, which convert the uncertainty and indeterminability of the world
horizon to certainty and definability of a specifiable manner (p. 11) .56
Yet another function of religion lies in its transformation of an indetermi-
nate complexity into a definable one (p. 118).55The possibility of stan-
dardized reformulation becomes more and more difficult as the latter is
displaced from nature. Thus today the transformation of diffuse anxiety-
producing complexity into a tangible peaceful one is taken over more
and more by science. In the course of the disenchantment of the world
and with the increase of rationalism in the empirical sciences, religion
is being displaced out of the realm of rationality into the irrational one
and becomes the irrational suprapersonal force per se (p. 564).0

RELJGION AND ANXIETY

Because religion has arisen from the situation of dependency and trib-
ulation, it is filled with anxiety. The permanent anxiety in religion is
activated by a guilty conscience that originates from the violation of fixed
norms, an example of which is provided in the area of sexuality. Even
Adam became burdened with guilt because he ate the forbidden apple.
Yet the consumption of the forbidden fruit represents only the facade,
as the necessity of guilt for religion, particularly also for Christianity,
stands behind this facade. To be a Christian one has to feel guilty and
develop fear of a reality perceived as alien, the human construction of
which one no longer recognizes or has repressed. Consequently, fear
and a guilty conscience underlie faith as a communication medium in
the same way as physical force underlies power and sexuality love; com-
munication medium here in the interpretation of Luhmann as symbolic
codes that define the rules of possible combinations of symbols and which
thus at the same time can secure a transfer of selections like truth, love,
and power (p. 30).56Accordingly the basis for religion is not the concept
of God, but an underlying principle that only then generated a concept
106 G.Runkl

of God, namely, the fear that precedes sin (p. 85) .47 Religious experienc-
ing is tuned to disappointment, surprise, and anxiety. The anxiety gener-
ating anomic forces must then be reduced by sacralization and taboo.
Thus, the anxiety that lies at the bottom of religion is also the basis for
the rites of pas~age,~ those rights that accompany a primarily biological
change of status in society, as conversely the intensity of the religious rites
of passage shows the significance of anxiety for religion. This relation is
also expressed in the following joke: A lady enters a bookstore and says:
I would like a book for an ill person. Something religious? No,
he is better already (p. 59).lo3
In archaic societies the ritual and religious life of men and women is
guided along life crises, which primitive religion tried to master. Rites
of passage relating to the primarily biological change of status and com-
bines here with their Christian rites-birth and baptism; puberty and
first communion, confirmation; traditionally accepted consummation of
sexual intercourse and marriage ceremony; death and the last rites and
Christian burial-are the subjectively most important religious ceremon-
ies. Even among secularized groups these religious rites of passage distin-
guish themselves from other religious rites by increased resistance. In
addition, one has to take into account the existence of different dimen-
sions of religiosity, like belief, practice, experience, knowledge, and con-
sequence (p. 265f),94which do not diverge completely. Anxiety and the
defense mechanism caused by it lead traditional societies to ritualization
and the invention of ceremonies.
In traditional societies ritual proceedings are managed by a charismat-
ically qualified person-the wizard, the early priest. He instrumentalized
ecstasy as the sign of his charisma because ecstasy is only occasionally
accessible to the layperson. As the social form in which this happens, the
orgy is the original form of religious socialization (p. 228).O Later, the
priests of a religion of redemption stand up against the orgiastic cults to
found a permanent habit of the religious that is aimed at the possession
of the divine itself, at selfdeification whereby the physical area is de-
famed as nondivine. Within Christianity this dissociation of body and
God leads to the dualism of matter and spirit (p. 137f)85that forms the
basis of the Christian enmity with sexuality. The fight against ecstasy
leads to its privatization by which ecstasy as a relevant and binding quality
of experience is annulled (p. 96).89
The disparagement of the natural, the bodily, and the sensual and
the pushing aside of normal sexuality for the benefit of substitutional
abreaction by the priests in turn heightens the anxiety that now is fed
by sexuality as well. If religion continues to be favored for functional
reasons, the increasing manipulability of nature necessitates a new source
of anxiety for religion. In a religion opposed to sexuality (e.g., Christian-
ity), the satisfaction of sexual desires is made out to be something bad
and sinful; permanent production of anxiety and of a guilty conscience
is the result of it (p. 104).* So Christianity represents a religion of fear
that inflicts punishment (hell) on sexual satisfaction, and that not only
condoned the most abominable murder of witches and the most bloody
Sexual Morality of Christianity 107

religious wars but demanded them.68Anxiety gives priests the chance to

permit the alleviation of anxiety, whereby confession is an institutional-
ized form of reducing anxiety and guilt by which the priestly authority
is strengthened furthermore. Thus, the suppression of sexuality and the
fear resulting from it become the main sources of religion. The demoniz-
ing of sexuality presents itself as a means to keep a person in doubt
(because of alleged guilt) and thus in religious dependency (p. 135).
The analyses of Catholic publications on sex education show the cathexis
of sexuality with fear (pp. 78f; 92f, respectively)50,78
and the generation
of guilt feelings (p. 122).78Very early on in Christianity, adultery and
prostitution (which arose also from the original prostitution within the
temple) were considered to be the most serious deviations from the
norm, absolutely mortal sins. However, even sexuality suppressed in the
Christian way presses for presentation again and again, so that the at-
tempt to prevent satisfying sexuality permanently fails. As the anxiety
stemming from the repression of sexuality represents a permanent prob-
lem, it thereby supplies the rationalization of its permanent mock solu-
tion, namely the religious institutions, because the continuing influence
of an institution is based on its social acceptance as a permanent
solution of a permanent problem.

THE CONSTRUCTION OF h4XAiV.G

The construction of meaning is an important function of religion. The
establishment of an integrated collection of definitions of reality, which
serves the members of a whole society as a common world of meaning
(p. 129),4 is the essential traditional task of religion. Religion claims
the world to be a cosmos arranged by God and therefore meaningfully
oriented. The religions show the necessity and intensity with which hu-
mans search for meaning. These projections of the religious conscious-
ness are human efforts to arrange reality meaningfully at all costs.
Religion is one form of establishing meaning. It explains the existence
of suffering and evil (p. 45f)3 and becomes a means of legitimization.
In every ideology and in every action theory the explanation of meaning
and the subjective definition of the situation are dominant. Parsons
stated: Functional analysis of the structure of action shows that situa-
tions must be subjectively defined, and the goals and values to which
action is oriented must be con ruent with these definitions, must, that
F
is, have meaning (p. 209f) .6 For Parsons the interpretation of mean-
ing is central to Christianity, and because this interpretation becomes
increasingly problematical, the crisis of religion arises (p. 420) .66 The
construction of religious structures of meaning results from the tech-
nique of anxiety reduction that humanizes nature and thereby lends it
a manipulable meaning.
One means of Christian interpretation is Chiliasm, which promises
compensation for worldly sufferings in a better hereafter and which legit-
imizes anomic phenomena by their future nomization and thus reinte-
grates them into a meaningful order (p. 68).4 The Christian Chiliastic
108 G.Runkel

prophecies (Matthew 26:29; Revelation 20:2f) that predicted the immi-

nent Kingdom of Heaven on earth, which turned out to be empirically
wrong, then were immunized by their transcendentation (compare to
this technique of immunization (pp. 21, 243f) .~
Another form of religious construction of meaning is the dualistic
theodicy that had taken shape in Manicheanism and in the teachings of
Zarathustra. Manicheanism separates the world into light and darkness,
whereby man is hindered from entering the realm of light by his body,
which is seen as the source of all evil. Christianity let this dualistic theod-
icy join a more inconsistent eschatology where God triumphs over the
devil. The devil whom God first created, but who nevertheless is put
opposite to him as a foreign principle, is a fallen angle; hell emerges
from heaven. While doing so the Christian doctrine of the omnipotence,
the omniscience, and the boundless love of its God is inconsistent with
the creation of a power of evil and with the eternity of the torment of
hell for finite sins, which later led to the introduction of purgatory.
Christian asceticism is essentially Manichean; lust, which becomes source
and expression of sin, is supposed to be controlled by asceticism and
spiritual exercises. Christian theodicy is masochistically centered and cul-
minates in Calvinism in the vision that even damned souls join in the
praise of that God who condemned them to eternal damnation. These
different theodicies that appear in the varying historical forms of Chris-
tianity in different alloys are the attempt to give reasons for structures
of meaning. This bestowal of meaning is supplemented by mystification
whereby the sociocultural world, which is a result of human interpreta-
tion, is postulated to be nonhuman, to achieve an absorption of frustra-
tions for the prevention of which other means would be necessary.

ASCETICISM

Christian suppression of sexuality leads to the propagation of asceti-

cism as the taming of the sensual corrupt that in the long run only
religious virtuosi can maintain and who for this reason are awarded spe-
cial prestige. Asceticism depicts an ambivalent relationship to the world.
On one hand it means seclusion from the world and on the other hand
it means rule over the world by virtue of the prestige and charisma at-
tained by seclusion. In Christianity asceticism manifests itself in celibacy,
in the reduction of sexuality to reproduction, and in an ambivalent rela-
tionship of Christianity to women who on one hand are degraded and
on the other hand are spiritually raised.
Having developed from fear of the scary nature, religion originally
had integrated sexuality within religion, as sexual intercourse-as part of
the magic cult of orgies-and any ecstasy was considered to be sacred.
Tension between sexuality and religion occurred only in the old tempo-
rary ritual chastity of the priests caused by the fact that sexuality was
considered to be easily demonically influenced. This tension was further
increased by religion when the diminishing fear of nature made a new
source of anxiety necessary and when sexuality took up a sharp contrast
Sexual Morality of Christianity 109

to the salvation religions. The development of the religions to salvation

religions like Christianity let these be opposed to sexuality, as sexuality
as worldly possibility of the salvation sensation, competed with the devo-
tion to an otherworldly god.
Asceticism thus becomes a medium to gain an otherworldly salvation
sensation; passion is denounced as that which causes suffering. Very early
in Christianity asceticism is propagated by Paul: A man does well not
to marry (1 Corinthians 7:l); it would be best if everybody stay like
him, that is, celibate (1 Corinthians 7:7; and even married men should
live as though they were not married (1 Corinthians 729). Thus, in the
tradition of the Christian churches, sexuality appears as a dangerous
enemy of religion (p. 38) The Christian traditional defamation of eros
(p. 123) 02 and the demonizing of sexual (p. 259) Io4 led to the fact that
for centuries a pleasure-seeking consummation of marriage presented a
hindrance to receiving Communion. As late as this century the sugges-
tion was made to punish nymphomania with castration (p. 109).59 In the
18th century this idea was widely spread among medical men like Dossier
de Sauvages, Linne, and Weikard (cf. p . 189-191).24Sexual deviation is
*b
labelled as mental disease (cf. p. 88); persons whose sexual practices
are disapproved of are stigmatized as animals. As distinct from stigma-
tization, more moderate forms of Christian enmity with sexuality are
the mere listing of erroneous forms of love-life (p. 165f)41and the
replacement of sexuality by the interest in the family (p. 91). The nega-
tive moralization of sexual desire sees the latter only as a bonus of nature
for the rearing of offsprings (p. 124).37

CELIBACY
Celibacy is one realization of asceticism whereby Christianity adopted
the idea from Buddhism that an unmarried man ought to be more highly
respected than a married man (p. 478). Celibacy is a consequence of
the dissociation of the body and mind. It goes back to the idea which
was once spread in paganism and possibly was part of every cult in the
times of the Roman emperors that sexual intercourse made a person
unable to celebrate sacred services (p. 199).15In Catholicism celibacy is
demanded despite strong opposition by the lower clergy; celibacy was
supposed to heighten the respect for the clergy by the people who started
to regard marriage as sinful. In 589 the third council of Toledo set down
the regulation in the fifth canon to sell women who are suspected of
having sexual intercourse with priests and to distribute the purchase
price among the poor. Officially celibacy was introduced in the Catholic
Church only in 1074by the decree of celibacy by Gregory VII and in 1139
by the second Lateran council (pp. 171-173) .16 The strong opposition on
the part of many priests to the decree of celibacy quoted even at that
time among other things the passage from the Bible, 1 Timothy (3:2f) :
A church leader must be without fault; he must have only one wife,
. . . he must be able to manage his own family well and make his children
obey him with all respect, in which marriage is at least not impossible
I10 G.Runkeel

for priests. Therefore celibacy is not in the first place justified by the New
Testament, but by the tradition of the ecclesiastical school of thought and
by the benefit for the Catholic church which the Catholic Kopp sees in
financial and political advantages: Which conflict could the priest get
into, if he had to take care of a family and possibly had to endanger the
advancement of his children. It is also probably no coincidence that the
surge of the Russian revolution first smashed a church largely favouring
priests (p. 59).52Because of celibacy, marriage as a sexual outlet was
dropped after all other forms of sexual activity were negatively sanc-
tioned and were punished in hell.
Celibacy leads to a regression of the celibates into the childlike paren-
tal dependency whereby the part of the mother is taken up by the church
and the part of the father by the bishop (pp. 77,79).72 This infantilization
of celibates who regress to the oedipal sexual level leads to a permanently
reflexively institutionalized sensuality as manifest sexuality is suppressed.
The claim to power by the ecclesiastical bureaucracy is internalized in
the celibate and causes a weak self that is susceptible to manipulation
(p. 139f) .8 A frequently mentioned accusation of young celibates against
their superiors is that they are pigeonholed and that any spontaneous
liveliness is suffocated (p. 355) .38 In Catholicism celibacy institutionalizes
enmity with sexuality and results in a permanent depreciation of real
sexuality in favor of one projected onto the mother church and the
Mother of God, the Virgin Mary. Thus, the sexual anxiety on part of the
celibates produces a fear of women. This then leads to a distinct worship
of the Virgin Mary (p. 257) .42 Consequently celibacy does not only turn
against celibates, but it reinforces the ambivalent relation of Christianity
toward women, as the decree of celibacy is based on magic primitive
perceptions of ritual purification, of the supposed biological and per-
sonal inferiority and of the alleged demonic element of the woman (p.
92) .39 Thus, over and over again celibacy creates the dissociation of mind
and body for the Catholic priest anew; the woman is degraded and
demonized in her physical and sexual existence, and as compensation
she is elevated in her Christian existence, that is as a subjective image,
in the worship of Mary and in the belief in her virginity. A masochistic
feature that manifests itselfin celibacy becomes obvious in the demanded
suppression of human libidinous needs, when Miiessener emphasized
the sacrifice of abstinence (p. 26)61and Pope Paul VI explained that
Christian teaching cannot be understood without struggle, neither with-
out deadening, neither without occasional self-sacrifice (p. 16) ,l as tra-
ditionally the ascetic-gnostic defamation of eros is bound up with the
demand for deadening the affects. A sexual feature shows itself espe-
cially for feminine celibacy in the bridal relationship to Christ as com-
pensation for human sexuality. The secret of virginity is . . . the mystery
of the marriage to Christ, the bridal relationship to Christ in a total
exclusiveness of love. This bridal relationship to Christ is the essential
core of virginity (p. 31) ,l whereby in the Catholic Church male celibacy
is also described with the feminine term for
Sexual Morality of Christianity 111

REDUCTION OF SEXUALJTY TO REPRODUCTION

Another consequence of asceticism was the reduction of sexuality to
reproduction. One could not extend asceticism much further, although
this was tried as well for example by the Marcionites, an early Christian
sect that (consequently) put a speedy end to themselves.
The church allowed marriage as an outlet and a condition of its sur-
vival all right, but it defamed even this last legal possibility of sexual
activity. Thus, the church father Hieronymus appreciated marriage only
from the aspect of producing virgins. According to Hieronymus, saint of
the Catholic Church and patron saint of scholars, married people live
by manner of livestock, and because of the sexual intercourse with
women, people do not differ in any way from pigs and mindless beasts.
The reduction of sexuality to reproduction (e.g. in the papal encyclical
Humanae), so that every marital act has to stay aimed at the produc-
tion of human life (p. 18),73was confirmed by the recent papal encycli-
cals of Pope John Paul 11, Veritatis Splendor (The Splendor of Truth)
in 1993, and Evangelium Vitae (The Gospel of Life) in 1995. This is
part of the repressive church morals, whereby the church hierarchy of
power was reinforced by means of the religiously indoctrinated fear of
the sex drive, the instilled guilt complex, and the promised salvation
(p. 178).34The criticism of the encyclical Humanae Vitae emphasized
especially the untenable conce t of natural law that it is based on (pp.
21,160f; 157; 16f, respectively)384~M the inherent instigation to overpopu-
lation (g 88), and the suppression of all nonreproductive sexuality
(p. 45).
This then leads first to the fight against male homosexuality, which is
punishable with the death penalty in the Old Testament. If a man has
sexual relations with another man, they have done a disgusting thing, and
both shall be put to death (3 Moses 20: 13; cf. 18:22). Paul demonized
homosexuality of men and at one point that of women, too (1 Corinthi-
ans 6:9f; Romans 1:18f. Compare in the New Testament regarding homo-
sexuality: 2 Peter 2:6f; Jude 6f. Roman 1 2 6 speaks against lesbian love).
The antihomosexual regulations have been renewed again and again.
Thus in 1120 the synod of Nablis demanded the burning to death for
voluntary homosexuality and in 1566 the Papal bull Cum Primum
demanded the extradition to and the execution by the state (p. 313f),16
These Christian, especially Catholic, assaults on homosexuals continue
to this day. Sexuality primarily aims at the gain of pleasure; physiologi-
cally the ability to gain erogenous pleasure is potentially permanent for
humans whereas potency and the childbearing capability are limited by
the time factor. Although Luther,57like the Catholic Church, saw the
difference between matrimony and fornication in the fact that sexual
love is tolerated in the former for the purpose of procreating children,
Lutheran Protestantism is sexually more liberal than Calvinistic Protes-
tantism or Catholicism. In the more conservative forms of Christianity
like Catholicism, sexuality is reduced to procreation. Since the second
century the Christian church has therefore fought against abortion on
112 G. Runbl

which the severest punishment was imposed. Today the Catholic Church
still prohibits abortion even in the presence of the eugenic indication
(e.g., because of genetic disease), the ethical indication (e.g., after rape),
or the social indication (e.g., economic plight or a mother who is too
young). More liberal positions in Christianity, however, emphasize the
intrinsic value of sexuality in the relationship of two partners (so the
minority comment of a commission that was set up by the British Council
of Churches, 1967); for example, the German Protestant maintained:
The sexual opposite and the contact between men and women have
their meaning in themselves. Therefore sexuality does not mainly serve
procreation (p. 17) .51369

In the Christian natural rights doctrine, assumptions are introduced

in a decisionistic manner, like original sin and revelation, on grounds
of which subsequently a natural and common code of morals is con-
structed that is supposed to be recognized by all peoples. The Jesuit
Simmel accuses rationalism and the Enlightenment of having separated
natural rights (i.e., the natural code of morals) from God (p. 220).92The
Catholic Church itself has again used its strategy of immunization, has
removed the reference to reality and the intersubjective verifiability, and
has then put into words a hollow formula strengthening the organization
for questions that cannot be answered: As the church has been ap-
pointed guardian of His revelation by Christ, it can explain this question
of the natural code of morals as well (p. ZZO).*
Another vivid example for moral values penetrating even biological
processes in a decisionistic manner is provided by the Catholic Oden-
wald. How do spermatozoons get to the ovum in the womb of the
mother? That happens by means of love between married people (p.
19) .63

CHRSTIANIlYAND THE WOMAN

The call for asceticism and the suppression of sexuality go hand in

hand with a defamation of the woman who was pronounced to be the
invasion gate of the devil by the church father Tertullian. Although
Christianity penetrated the educated classes because of women especially
(p. 160) ,54 and although today more women than men are the upholders
of the Christian religion, Christianity has an ambivalent relationship to
women. In a patriarchal society, which is based on a strict separation of
pleasure and performance, women are cut off from the area of perfor-
mance outside the family and are referred to the area of pleasure within
the family as demand on the woman to give pleasure to the man. In a
patriarchal society the pleasure principle is subordinated to the perfor-
mance principle; thus, the possibilities for the defense of male supremacy
are that the woman submits to the performance principle or that she is
made indirectly subservient to it, which includes raising her in the ab-
stract as the whole one, the donor of tranquillity and home where the
inner decoration of the patriarchal world of values is concerned.
Sexual Morality of Christianity 113

Jewish patriarchal thinking-especially pronounced within Essen-

ism-had great influence on Jesus and the New Testament (Mark 14:3-9;
Luke 7:36-50 and 10:38-42). So in Christianity women as well as evil
were excluded from the deity.46The hierarchy God-Christ-man-woman
was laid down in the New Testament: But what I want you to understand
is that Christ is supreme over every man, the husband is supreme over
his wife, and God is supreme over Christ (1 Corinthians 11:3). If a
woman wants to learn anything she is supposed to ask her husband: If
they want to find out about something, they should ask their husbands
at home. It is a disgraceful thing for a woman to speak in a church
meeting (1 Corinthians 14:35).Even today this subordination of women
to men is maintained; within Catholicism, for example, the man allegedly
is the head of the woman who is subject to him (p. 16).75So the Catholic
theologian Leclerq pointed out that one must not carry the demand for
independence too far as the very nature of the deep desires of the woman
corresponds to the fact that the man is her head (p. 327),53whereby this
dubious thought of natural rights is again called on to rationalize the
oppression of women. The encyclical Casti Connubii provides an addi-
tional example for the Christian ambivalence toward women by warning
against the unnatural equality with men, which would cause women to
descend from their alleged throne: All those who try to obscure the
glory of matrimonial faithfulness and chastity, are the ones who as in-
structors of errors would like to upset the devoted and honourable obedi-
ence of women to men (p. 44).74Pope Pius XI described that a few
audacious ones go even further and maintain that both spouses have
equal rights. This wrong freedom and the unnatural equalization to men
will result in the womans one ruin because if she decends from her
height and the throne that she was elevated to within the family by the
gospel, she will soon be driven back into the former slavery (maybe less
in the outer appearance, but in reality).74 With this separation of outer
appearance and reality he immunized the consequences of his
prophecies against empiricism because he can retreat to a reality that
lies behind the concrete reality which in turn is referred to as outer
appearance. In Christianity women are conceded a mystic oppression
as compensation for their real social oppression (obedience of women
to men, subordination), though the former only enforces the real oppres-
sion for which the theologian Meinertz provided a vivid example: The
subordination of the wife to the husband is transfigured by Christian
love and is put into the right balance (p. 207).60
Women themselves often adopted these demands and obstructed their
own emancipation. Among Mormons, for example, among whom eman-
cipation of women is the lowest in comparison with other inhabitants of
the USA and Denmark, the men are more likely prepared to accept
greater freedom for women than the women themselves who are caught
more intensely in the traditional double standard. Thus 67% of Mormon
women (as opposed to 36% of Mormon men) believe that coitus is to
be approved only for men, if both have the desire at an incidental date.
In the Midwest the figures amount to 59% of the women and 31% of
114 G.Runkel

the men. On the other hand, 55% of Mormon men approve of coitus
for both sexes in the same situation, contrary to 33% of Morman women.
In the Midwest these figures amount to 69% versus 40%, respectively; in
Denmark, 90% versus 91% (p. 52).12
In Christianity the woman is put into service and degraded as an object
of lust and of permanent threat on one hand, and on the other hand
she is idealized and raised in the abstract as for example in the cult of
Mary. Her real sexual existence is removed from her, she is robbed of
satisfymg sexual possibilities of expression, and in the image of conserva-
tive Christians she is shaped into a prostitute or a witch or into their
counterpart, the virgin; however, the concretization of the woman as
prostitute as well as the dematerialization of the woman as virgin are
infantile solutions: The virgin typified the elements of purity and the
witch typified the counterpart (p. 125).96Witches were assumed to have
sexual intercourse with the devil: Persons of both sexes forgetting their
own salvation and falling away from the Catholic faith, do misuse with
the devils which mix with them as men or women, . . . (p. 27f).70In
I

the papal bull Summis Desiderantes of Pope Innozenz VIII Heinrich

Institoris and Jakob Sprenger, the beloved sons (Pope Innozenz VIII)
are once more given special authority by the pope for the witch-hunt,
because local resistance had risen against these especially cruel inquisi-
tors. Even 3- and 4year-old children were accused of sexual intercourse
with the devil and were p~nished.~
According to Sprenger and Institoris, women are more susceptible to
witchcraft because they have less faith, which the authors try to derive
from the etymology of the word feminu. Femina to be precise comes
from fe and minus (fe = faith, minus = less, therefore femina = the
female who has less faith) (p. 69f).93Witchcraft happens because of
carnal lust, which is insatiable among women. That is why they have
dealings with demons to satis@ their lust. The field of sexuality, which
the woman was regarded to belong to more than the man, was considered
to be especially open to the clutches of the devil. In the witch-hunts
sexual voyeurism is mixed with sadism, which the selfconstructed witches
were subdued to. Elaborate suggestions were made to the interrogation
by torture by Sprenger and Institoris in volume 3 of the Hexenhummer.
The mania about witches was a result of the Christian sexual suppression
and of the ambivalence toward women.96This Christian mania about
witches which represents the aggressive dissipation of permanent sexual
frustration and which was eagerly pursued by Protestants as well, was
immunized by the declaration that only heretics do not believe in the
existence of witchcraft (p. 214f) .93

FUNCTIONS OF CH..STIAN SEXUAL M O W

The sexual enmity of the Christian churches is no coincidence that

arises out of the individual dispositions of some of their theorists like
Paul, Augustin, Thomas A uinus, Luther, and Calvin, as Demostenes
Savramis suggested (p. S6)Ig5but it issues from the stabilization of the
Sexual Morality of Christianity 115

power of the priests whereby the repression of sexuality creates anxiety

as a basis of religion. This function of power of religion could then
expand to a general function of power whereby even in Christianity that
initially is a religion of pariahs (Max Weber), the rich and powerful
instrumentalize the this worldly function of religion for purposes of do-
mestication and disciplining, although they were excluded from the
promised otherworldly gratifications. Accordingly, Matthew said: It is
much harder for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of God than for a
camel to go through the eye of a needle (Matthew 19:24; see also Mark
10:23; Luke 1:53; 6:24; 12:16f). Christianity provides an example how
even a staunch pariah religion is put into service of the rulers for. func-
tional reasons, who in addition to their well-being want the approval and
religious legitimization of their power.

As a person in bliss is not content with the fact of that bliss in

view of the less fortunate, but moreover wants to have the
right to his fortune, that is to say the awareness to have de-
served it in contrast to the less fortunatewhereas the latter
must have deserved his misfortune somehow-this spiritual
need for the legitimacy of bliss is taught by every experience
of everyday life. . . . The legitimization in this inner sense is
what the positively privileged inwardly demand of religion.
(p. 281)

This instrumentalization of religion comes from the transcendation of

earthly toils to a better hereafter. The possibility of this instrumentaliza-
tion of religion to an instrument of disciplining (even with religions that
started as revolutionary ones) originates from the invariably conservative
trait of religion that has a stereotyping effect on the conduct of ones
life. Any alteration of a custom that somehow takes place under the
protection of supernatural forces can touch on the interests of spirits
and gods. Religion thus adds powerful impediments to the natural uncer-
tainties and inhibitions of everything new: The holy is the specifically
unchangeable (p. 231) .lol Although religions can have a revolutionary
effect in the political area-for example, when they set their particular
ideas as general ones-they cause the preservation of the system because
of their institutionalization and because of the monopolizing of their
world of meaning. They become conservative on their own as soon as
they have successfully established their monopoly in an existing society.
When sexuality and religion are not understood as antithetical but as
synthetical like in Taoism, the power of the priests is unimportant. All
main ideas of Taoism (the teachings of Kung-fu-tse) are aimed at ethics
and entirely refer to life on earth.29~00
This religion has the tendency to
render itself unnecessary, whereupon the bureaucracy favors magic and
ancestor worship as functional equivalents to religion.
The internalization of the rigid sexual morality evokes inwardly puni-
tive reactions that lead to the introversion of anxiety and obedience.
116 G.Runkel

This morality produces its own necessity in the awareness of its support-
ers. Thus, for example, the damage that the Christian churches maintain
to follow masturbation comes from their own accusations. Far more than
90% of the patients at risk of committing suicide with the symptoms of
scruples about onanism, of impotence, and of frigidity had experienced
an ecclesiogenically neuroticizing upbringing. The restriction of the
inner living space of these neurotic individuals that never reach their
goal of purity under constantly increasing guilt feelings leads them
essentially to be at risk of committing suicide (of 149 students at risk
of committing suicide, more than half suffered from an ecclesiogenic
neurosis (p. 248) At the same time onanism represents a special p r o b
lem for the ecclesiogenically neuroticized; many of them escape to them-
selves because of the socialized Christian enmity with the body and
because of fear of others.
Christianity suppresses sexuality because this suppression is functional
to its further existence. It follows that an attack on a sexual taboo is at
the same time regarded as an attack on the religion itself (p. 9) .20 Another
modern strategy consists in the fact that attacks on the traditional Chris-
tian sexual morality are themselves made out to be Christian (pp. 7; 123,
respectively).9310

Christian natural rights negates the right of nature. Asceticism as a

central component of Christian morality is decisionistically introduced
to possess a permanent instrument of power because of the ensuing
overstrain of the faithful. This instrument of power makes the latter
susceptible to m a n i p ~ l a t i o n . ~ ~
There are also attempts to blame Christian sexual suppression on the
rising capitalist middle class,S8which only adopted the existing patterns
in order to save an imagined, true Christianity that stands in contrast to
the one which has formed historically. The true Christianity, however, is
the concrete Christianity.

FACTUAL CONSEQiXNCES OF CHRISTIAN SEXUAL MORALITY

In the following the concrete consequences of Christian sexual moral-

ity for sexual behavior and the possible correspondence of the empirical
data with the developed theses are examined. Religion is an institution
that greatly influences the sexual attitudes and behavior patterns of the
individual. Thus, the entire instinctual gratification correlates negatively
with the church affiliation. The frequency of the entire sexual instinctual
gratification is determined by the religious commitment whereby a
weaker affiliation with the denomination causes a more fre uent sexual
9
instinctual gratification (p. 53; 422f; 413f respectively) .27,48,4 The differ-
ences in the frequency of instinctual gratification are significant both

with coital and with noncoital activities (p. 424; 163f, respe~tively.~~*~
Thus the frequency of remarital coitus (p. 84f; 47; 306f; 430f; 255f; 40;
150; respectively) 122732,4 ,498738 and of extramarital coitus (p. 5436 340f)48,49
depends substantially on affiliation. Even the frequency of marital coitus
is directly linked with religion; active followers of religions of redemption
SexaaE Morality of Christianity 117

like Christians and Jews have a lesser frequency of marital intercourse

than religiously indifferent ones. The internalization of the depreciation
of sexuality for Christians limits the only permitted possibility of sexual-
ity, namely marital coitus. Thus, the average monthly marital coitus fre-
quency is inversely proportional to the religious c o n v i ~ t i o n ~ and
~.~~
church affiliation (operationalized on the basis of church attendance,
(p. 306f).32
In my own research on the sexual behavior of Germans80,81,82,83,84 one
can clearly detect the influence of religious commitment on sexual be-
havior. Thus, the weekly frequency of sexual intercourse amounts to 3.1
with male and female nondenominationals 2.57 with Protestants, and
2.27 with Catholics. In the use of condoms the religious factor becomes
evident as well. Thus, 39% of the nondenominational men, 20% of the
Protestant men, and 12% of Catholic men use condoms.
In American studies of differences in sexual behavior depending on
the denomination, one must remember that Protestants in America are
more strongly influenced by Puritan Calvinism than they are in Germany.
However, a fundamental order in the frequency of sexual activity and its
affirmation can be observed there as well. Thus, Jews are sexually less
active than Catholics and Protestants (p. 422f) .48 Between the members
of the two denominations, Protestant and Catholic, the differences of
sexual activities are significant in Germany as well; Lutheran-influenced
Protestantism allows greater permissiveness toward sexuality than Calvin-
ism or Catholicism.
On the basis of the empirical material, it can be shown that the propa-
gated Christian enmity with sexuality is not even completely accepted by
active followers, although their sexual behavior is fundamentally limited
by the influence of the church. With restrictive norms one can note a
weakening of the restriction from norms to attitudes and from attitudes
to behavior. The discrepancy between attitude and behavior can be ol,
served with the group of religiously active people. Although only 44%
of regular churchgoers declared the necessity or permissability of pre-
marital sexual relations, 67% of the same group had sexual relations
before or rather without marriage (p. 50)." A discrepancy between atti-
tude and behavior toward sexuality is absent in those who never attend
church, because their sexual instinctual gratification can take place in
accordance with their needs.
Another observation takes a critical look at the connection of religion
and aggression. In a cross-cultural study, Christensen (1971, pp. 66-97)
investigated the sexual behavior of Mormons, American midwesterners,
and Danes. A positive connection was proven between strong religious
commitment and frequent church attendance on the one hand and the
use of force and moral constraint with sexuality on the other hand.
The frequency of church attendance (i.e., the portion of those who had
attended church events at least once a month during the last 12 months)
amounts to 73%, 62%,and 9%,respectivelywith Mormon men, midwest-
erners and Danes and to 89%, 83%, and 17% respectively with women
of the same groups. With the respective groups the use of force or moral
118 G. Runkel

constraint at the first coitus amounts to 14%,9% and 4% with men and
43%, 38% and 36% with women. With both sexes forced coitus occurs
most frequently with Mormons and least frequently in Denmark (pp.
66-97).12 The most strongly religiously influenced groups feel more in-
clined to use aggression to reach sexual aims than religiously indifferent
groups do. The higher share of aggression and violence with religiously
active groups also stems from the sexual frustration to which those
groups are more subjected. After reaching coitus this heightened aggres-
sion suddenly changes to feelings of increased anxiety and guilt. Thus
with Mormons, persons of the midwest, and Danes, positive reactions to
the first coitus amount to 44%, 52%, and 73%, respectively, with men
and 25%, 40%, and 83%, respectively, with women. The negative reac-
tions are complementary: with men, 56%, 48%, and 27%, and with
women 75%, 60% and 17% (p. 102).
Sexual repression produces anxiety in committed Christian groups
because the restrictive norms cannot be observed. So Christian sexual
suppression is an institutionalized, self-fulfilling prophecy; it offers reduc-
tions for the anxiety and guilt that it causes.

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