Sermon

Questions to Live By: What Role Does Sex Play In Your Life?

Sunday, September 26, 2004

By Rev. Dr. G. Penny Nixon

God, we open our hearts to you. You are the air we breathe and without shame, without hesitancy but only with anticipation do we come to you and with you tonight. Open us in our deepest places through your spirit in your many names. Amen.

So as many of you know, we’ve been doing a series in the evening service called, “Questions to Live By.” With a quote from the German poet, Rilke saying, “Try to love the questions and by loving the questions, someday you will live yourselves into them, into the answers without even knowing it.”

And so the first week we looked at the question, “What is my story?” Last week we looked at, “What do I love?” I hope you’ve been thinking about these questions during the week, pondering them. And tonight I want to ask the question that kind of goes along with the theme of today, Folsom Street Fair Day, and the question is this: What role does sex play in your life?

What role does sex play—not “sex play." I’m not even a minute into it and I’m having trouble. What role does sex play in your life? This is a question that relates to every single person in this room and I know that we have some little ones with us tonight, and I’ve already spoken to their mother, and so if it gets to a point where they need to slip out, they will.

It does relate to every adult in this room whether you are celibate by choice, whether you are in a new or long term relationship, whether you are married or not, whether you are leather or kinky or not, whether you are monogamous or polyamorous, whether you love recreational and casual sex or not, whether you are bisexual or pansexual, whether you’re feeling attractive or unattractive, whether you love your body or struggle with it, whether you are out and proud or are closeted, whether you are on medication or not, whether you are HIV+ or HIV-, whether your hormones are raging or they’re taking a long winter’s nap, whether you are a survivor of abuse or you have been blessed not to have that as part of your past, whether you are a man or a woman or you are trans or you are intersexed or you define your gender in ways that we haven’t even named yet, tonight this message is for you. And this question is for you whether sex has been a gift or a burden or both.

You know, it’s really complicated to talk about sex. We joke about it all the time, but we don't often really talk about it. It’s complicated. Number 1, no one ever tells the truth about sex (Laughter) so that makes it difficult. Number 2, you can find the most honest person in the world and if they have one area that they lie in, it’ll be sex. Guarantee it (Laughter) every time. Another reason it’s complicated is because we spend so much time in our lives hiding our desires. It’s complicated because we’ve kind of swung from shame to pride and it’s pretty easy for that pendulum to swing back at times when we least expect that it will. Just when we think we've got it down and we’re out and proud and we know who we are and all of a sudden we face a situation in an unguarded moment and we go right back into the closet.

It’s complicated to talk about sex. But whoever you are, wherever you are coming from, I think we can all agree tonight that whatever sex is or isn’t for you, sex is powerful. It’s a powerful force in our lives and in society regardless of your relationship to it, it has power. Power in mind and in expression. Our erotic lives, that dynamic force that is so charged within and between and among us, is alive in this place, that life force that we sense in communion with one another.

One of my favorite poems of all time is the poem by Rumi in which he says, “Don’t ask me how Jesus raised people from the dead, kiss me on the lips like this, like this.”

The men are getting nervous and the women are getting nervous. Kiss me on the lips because sometimes when we kiss one another—I love to kiss, how about you? (Yes) I hope I kiss a lot more people in my life. (Laughter) Not in the congregation but… (more laughter) Because when we kiss, that feeling that starts to rise, that’s resurrection. Don’t ask me how Jesus raised the dead; kiss me on the lips, that’s all. That erotic power and force squared a hundred, that resurrection. I kissed some people that could’ve raised me from the dead, let me tell you. (Laughter) And then there have been others, no. (More laughing)

In our mission statement, we say that we are committed to the integration of sexuality and spirituality and so I’m going to go there tonight. So what role does sex play in your life?

Is it the source of pleasure? Is it the measure of your self-worth and self-acceptance? Is it where you seek intimacy? Is it on the sidelines of your life or is something that takes center stage in your thought life? Is it an escape or is it a way to be fully present? Is it a way to communicate and express love or is it sometimes a way to act out and express anger? Is it what you joke about most? Is it the most powerful thing in your life? Is it when you feel most powerful or when you feel most vulnerable, or both? Is it where you are the most honest or the least? Is it where you affirm or deny or diminish another’s humanity?

Is your sex life, your intimate life, your making love, your recreational sex, your play, is it a vehicle for the Divine? Is it a path to the oneness for which we all long? Do you find in your lover’s body or in your own, a sacred altar?

You see, we love to talk about the integration of sexuality and spirituality. So we love to talk about sex here in this spiritual community but while you’re having sex, do you love to talk about spirit? Because you know what, integration goes both ways.

This morning I talked about redemption, that nothing is lost forever. And part of my calling in this world, my offer to you and to all that will listen, is to redeem that which has been taken from us so profoundly and so radically, to redeem spirit and sex together. We’ve been judged about our desires and about our preferences and about our loves. We’ve lived through a sexually transmitted disease. And it’s time for us to truly redeem that, to take back that which is rightfully ours as people, as humans who’s deepest desire in the world is to love and be loved. At the end of the day, isn’t that really what we are all looking for?

The most profound experiences in our life come when somebody actually loves us just for who we are, all of us. And the deepest pain that we often experience is when we are abandoned or rejected or we lose love. Are you with me? And sex can be one of the most powerful paths to understanding and knowing spirit in our lives or it can be a place of the most tremendous betrayal and pain. Both are true. And it is because sex and making love and bodies and intimacy is so sacred and meant to be that as a gift from God in the universe, that when that is defiled, it is literally like desecrating a temple. It is literally like somebody throwing a bomb into a church or a synagogue or a holy site or a mosque.

And when sex is perverted in these ways, through abuse, through power over, it is the cause of some of our most deeply held pain. But the good news is that in community, in loving, in learning to navigate our erotic energies, in seeking by any means necessary to integrate spirit and sex, there is great healing and that’s why I say whoever you are tonight, whatever role sex has played in your life, is playing in your life and will play in your life, this question for you to reflect on is for you and you alone.

And only you know the ins and outs of your journey; only you know what needs to be healed; only you know your deepest longings. But I say to you tonight that there is healing always available in the very place where we have been wounded. And it is powerful. Sometimes instead of covering up a wound, we look right into it because the light enters the wound and that is where healing is. And it is available to all of us.

Shall I keep going or do you want me to stop? Ok. Sex is where we meet the world with our full selves, where we connect with others with mind, body, spirit and soul and potentially it can be one of the most transcendent experiences available to us. It can be the intersection of justice and equality and bodies and gender. It holds the promise of a total embracing of a full self and that’s the beauty of it, the deep knowledge of another. And when bodies meet in right relation, and by that I mean, sex that is loving, sex that is justice making, whether it’s a committed relationship and open relationship, a casual encounter or even sex with oneself, all these avenues can be about justice and about values and about knowing who we are.

Think about it, passion, love, pleasure are all gifts that are associated with spirituality and that spirituality can be present in sexual encounters that are in right relation. Think about it. One of the things that I believe our job is here, our calling at MCC San Francisco is to make sex sacred again. (A laugh) Yea. (More laughter) See, joy. Did you hear that joy? (More laughter) That was the spirit speaking. That was the spirit speaking. Think about it, candles, music, flowers, food, these we know as the stuff of romance. They’re also the stuff of ritual.

Think about it. What if we had a high holy day celebrating our sexuality? Well we kind of do? (Laughter) What if you walked into many churches and heard this as the opening gathering words, “I who am the beauty of the green earth and the white moon among the stars and the mystery of the waters, I call upon your soul to arise and come unto me. From me all things proceed and unto me they must return. Let my worship be in the heart that rejoices for behold all acts of love and pleasure are my rituals.” (Amen) Isn’t that beautiful? All acts of love and pleasure are my rituals.

If that happened, a paradigm shift would begin to take place where we honor all of ourselves. And when we say here, whoever you are, wherever you have come from, all of you is welcome, we mean it! We mean it.

You know, the language of the meal, the Eucharist, is the language of connection, union and communion. We are invited to participate in the life of the Divine in a way that involves intimate sense of taste and touch. We are seduced, as it were, to the table to consume the life, the body of the Divine. And the mystics of all traditions knew this. Listen to the words again; this is invitation week after week, “Take, eat, this is my body. This is my love; drink deeply.” It’s divine seduction and divine surrender.

Incarnational sexuality, sexuality and spirituality coming together, when we come together in these ways, God is being incarnated.

What role does sex play in your life? Can you sense spirit present in your lovemaking? Between and among others, we could more deeply call God’s participation in our love-making if we want to and if we are open to that. And if the thought of that just freaks you out, just have that tonight, but know that it is possible.

I’ve experienced it; I know that it’s possible. Some of my most profound worship experiences come in lovemaking with different bodies, with differing abilities and different colors. You know our utterances and implications during lovemaking are not coincidental. (Laughter) The journey to the big “O” often has a lot of prayers in it. (More laughter) That’s not coincidental; it isn’t. We can use that as a conduit. I know you, half of you think I’ve lost my mind (Laughter) but I haven’t. Well I may have but I think I found it just for tonight.

We can use that as a conduit for spirit, to welcome that in, in those moments when you feel most fully alive and you begin to offer, (what is lovemaking if it’s not offering). You know, when I learned to trust another person and to open and receive and sometimes that’s a bit of a journey for someone who likes to be in charge of things, I learned what it is to trust God.

My only experience in life of true surrender comes through sexual experience and by that, I understand what it is to give myself completely, more and more open and open to God and to spirit. (Amen) And it is a beautiful thing. We sing it in Taize, “Take, O take me as I am. Summon out what I shall be." Take me. If that’s not the language of sexuality, I don’t know what is. And however you name spirit tonight, I invite you to think, “Can sex play a role in your life that is a conduit to the divine, a way of experiencing spirit where you will be consumed with the great beloved?”

Sometimes in orgasming, we go to that place where we are experiencing ourselves outside of ourselves momentarily. They say it’s sometimes the closest thing to death. And the veil is very thin at that moment. That can be a God moment, a spirit moment in profound ways. There are times and I struggle, if I don’t say it right, please forgive me, but there are times when I’m caught up in the ecstasy of worship that it is the same feeling as when I’m caught up in the ecstasy of loving someone or the ecstasy of erotic power. Could you feel that at all tonight if you began to let yourself go and sing, “I long for you?” And as you say you feel an opening, it’s the same place that it comes from.

There is no more fundamental question than how we love and after all, everything I’ve said tonight is rooted in the deepest part of our tradition, the great commandment, “Love God with all your heart, all your soul, all your mind, all your strength, the totality of who you are.”

This is still the greatest commandment. And we have only begun to explore the strength and the meaning and the beauty of the ways that we are capable of loving. We know love continues after death, changed inalterably but no less a physical experience. And we are a community of myriad relationships, strangers, friends, colleagues, lovers, ex-lovers, almost lovers, lovers yet to be (Laughter) and there is a rich texture here of great complexity and beauty.

I say all these things tonight because I long for spirituality that is radical, that is liberating and that is sufficiently profound for the complexities of our sexual lives. I long for that. And I hope that you in your own body and soul and mind experience will long for that too so that we might find ourselves on the path to kinder days and gentler ways in our world.

What role does sex play in your life? Let that be your spiritual reflection this week and invite the divine right into the center of it. Amen.