This made me cry, a lot. I'm a queer person constantly trying to reckon with my experiences growing up religiously. I'm 38, have been married (once to a man and now to a non-binary AFAB human) and I am STILL grappling with how sex works and makes me feel and undoing all the shame of it all. And it never hit me before that the trauma IS the point -- it explains why I am constantly feeling like I am failing and ruined and bad, no matter what I do or how I work through things. Thanks for saying things I've found hard to put into words.
Thanks for so perfectly capturing what it’s like to grow up female in the evangelical church. It took years of deconstructing to get me to a healthier place, but I still resent how much shame I carry around. It’s not healthy or fair to compare, and everyone is fighting their own battle — yet damn, what must it be like to not be raised to think your own body is sinful and undeserving of pleasure (until a man validates your sexual identity by marrying you)? Happy to see young people of faith changing the narrative.
I grew up Catholic, which obviously meant I did sign a purity pledge as a young teen and was very dedicated to the idea of staying chaste, even as I realized I wasn't straight in high school. I don't know what happened or when, but sometime around the time that I spent a year reading the Bible in its entirety and meeting more people online, expanding my reading material, etc., I really started to question why so many of these things were so wrong and bad and awful if it left so many people hurt in the process. It just didn't make sense and no one could really explain it to me in a way that felt like it actually answered my questions head on.
Which meant that, rather than feeling shame around having had sex, I felt weird shame around the fact that I didn't feel shame because didn't that mean that I wasn't a good/true/etc believer and that I was minimizing my faith and God? For the most part, I've come to terms with the faith I have and the ways it differs from its place of origin and the reasons why I don't attend Mass, etc., but there are still moments where I'm very frustrated that the Catholic Church very much has not dealt or had these types of conversations in the open the way it seems like Mormons have.
Reading the Bible in its entirety was the first step in my journey to becoming an atheist. It’s astonishing how little modern Christianity has in common with its source material!
It still astounds me how few Christians have read the Bible in its entirety and who don't see a need to do so. How do you devote yourself to something you've never read and grappled with in any meaningful way on your own?! I know part of it is that, if you don't read it, you don't have to deal with the cherry picking, but that so many Christians just willingly choose to do so when it's so available has been so frustrating to me for so many years.
I belong to your readers who don't know nor care that much about the Baylor twins. I scan your posts about them usually because I like your writing and feel like I should have a passing knowledge of this subject. But this post was fabulous. I loved your take on what their messaging means, in the context of their culture(s). Big thank you and an endorsement to sometimes take a moment to read something you may not be interested in, cause it may surprise you.
AHP (and those who find the Baylor Influencer transformation to be interesting) might also like this set of blog posts from Amber Fillerup Clark, f/k/a Barefoot Blonde, one of the original millennial fashion bloggers. She has written about her own experience growing up in the Mormon church, how she views modesty, and her beliefs on sex. She has also had some really great sex-positive IG stories explaining how she will talk about sex to her own children when they ask her about it.
I went to Baylor in the late '90s/early '00s (I think there are a few of us alums who subscribe here), and I even took a "Marriage & the Family" course that was taught by an older married couple who were both profs. I thought it was surprisingly sex positive (they took anonymous questions at the end of each class period and always answered each one). Although I suppose the subtext was that "marriage" piece was what made the sex questions ok, that was never mentioned.
At any rate, although you could definitely find the purity/evangelical crowd on and off campus, in my experience hookup culture was alive and well even back then, and it was mostly a "normal" college experience, for me anyway. Baylor (and Waco) have also changed a lot in the last 20 years, as you mentioned in the piece. Baylor Twitter these days is pretty much dominated by younger, more liberal writers, podcasters, and contributors, with the conservative set relegated to Reddit, Barstool, and the like.
I grew up and am still a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and you are right about the difference in Mormon beliefs to other American Christian churches (as far as I can tell). What I especially liked in your essay was the distinction between doctrine and culture - official teachings and folk doctrine - and how the official doctrine can be overwhelmed by folk doctrine and culture borrowed from other places instead. My father left the church for a about a decade as a young man, and came back after he was able to separate the two in his head and reject all the folk doctrine. There isn't actually much official Mormon doctrine at all - it's a short list. Add to that the all-volunteer teaching and ministerial staff, and sometimes culture wins in the zeitgeist over doctrine. I am happy to have this sex positivity added to the culture.
Before today I had no idea these people existed and now I am so happy I do! What an incredible example to set, not only as a young woman, but also being a young woman from a faith that I really know very little (and nothing positive) about. This story fascinated and inspired me. Thank you for sharing this!!
The whole time reading this I kept thinking about my Mormon friend in high school, and that whenever we'd have sleepovers I'd stay awake staring at the poster in her room of grimy, greasy hands being washed with the caption "repentance is strong soap, but it feels so good to be clean."
The glimpse into this culture blows my mind a bit in that it’s so foreign to me. My parents both gave up church early on and moved us away from extended family, so church and all that it entails has just never been a part of my life. I feel…lucky? But also like I missed out on something, to some degree.
This made me cry, a lot. I'm a queer person constantly trying to reckon with my experiences growing up religiously. I'm 38, have been married (once to a man and now to a non-binary AFAB human) and I am STILL grappling with how sex works and makes me feel and undoing all the shame of it all. And it never hit me before that the trauma IS the point -- it explains why I am constantly feeling like I am failing and ruined and bad, no matter what I do or how I work through things. Thanks for saying things I've found hard to put into words.
Thanks for so perfectly capturing what it’s like to grow up female in the evangelical church. It took years of deconstructing to get me to a healthier place, but I still resent how much shame I carry around. It’s not healthy or fair to compare, and everyone is fighting their own battle — yet damn, what must it be like to not be raised to think your own body is sinful and undeserving of pleasure (until a man validates your sexual identity by marrying you)? Happy to see young people of faith changing the narrative.
I grew up Catholic, which obviously meant I did sign a purity pledge as a young teen and was very dedicated to the idea of staying chaste, even as I realized I wasn't straight in high school. I don't know what happened or when, but sometime around the time that I spent a year reading the Bible in its entirety and meeting more people online, expanding my reading material, etc., I really started to question why so many of these things were so wrong and bad and awful if it left so many people hurt in the process. It just didn't make sense and no one could really explain it to me in a way that felt like it actually answered my questions head on.
Which meant that, rather than feeling shame around having had sex, I felt weird shame around the fact that I didn't feel shame because didn't that mean that I wasn't a good/true/etc believer and that I was minimizing my faith and God? For the most part, I've come to terms with the faith I have and the ways it differs from its place of origin and the reasons why I don't attend Mass, etc., but there are still moments where I'm very frustrated that the Catholic Church very much has not dealt or had these types of conversations in the open the way it seems like Mormons have.
Reading the Bible in its entirety was the first step in my journey to becoming an atheist. It’s astonishing how little modern Christianity has in common with its source material!
It still astounds me how few Christians have read the Bible in its entirety and who don't see a need to do so. How do you devote yourself to something you've never read and grappled with in any meaningful way on your own?! I know part of it is that, if you don't read it, you don't have to deal with the cherry picking, but that so many Christians just willingly choose to do so when it's so available has been so frustrating to me for so many years.
I belong to your readers who don't know nor care that much about the Baylor twins. I scan your posts about them usually because I like your writing and feel like I should have a passing knowledge of this subject. But this post was fabulous. I loved your take on what their messaging means, in the context of their culture(s). Big thank you and an endorsement to sometimes take a moment to read something you may not be interested in, cause it may surprise you.
AHP (and those who find the Baylor Influencer transformation to be interesting) might also like this set of blog posts from Amber Fillerup Clark, f/k/a Barefoot Blonde, one of the original millennial fashion bloggers. She has written about her own experience growing up in the Mormon church, how she views modesty, and her beliefs on sex. She has also had some really great sex-positive IG stories explaining how she will talk about sex to her own children when they ask her about it.
https://amberfillerup.com/my-church-experience-part-1/
https://amberfillerup.com/my-church-experience-part-2/
https://amberfillerup.com/lets-talk-about-sex-part-one/
Oh thank you so much for these!
I went to Baylor in the late '90s/early '00s (I think there are a few of us alums who subscribe here), and I even took a "Marriage & the Family" course that was taught by an older married couple who were both profs. I thought it was surprisingly sex positive (they took anonymous questions at the end of each class period and always answered each one). Although I suppose the subtext was that "marriage" piece was what made the sex questions ok, that was never mentioned.
At any rate, although you could definitely find the purity/evangelical crowd on and off campus, in my experience hookup culture was alive and well even back then, and it was mostly a "normal" college experience, for me anyway. Baylor (and Waco) have also changed a lot in the last 20 years, as you mentioned in the piece. Baylor Twitter these days is pretty much dominated by younger, more liberal writers, podcasters, and contributors, with the conservative set relegated to Reddit, Barstool, and the like.
This has been your Baylor Culture Corner, lol.
I grew up and am still a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and you are right about the difference in Mormon beliefs to other American Christian churches (as far as I can tell). What I especially liked in your essay was the distinction between doctrine and culture - official teachings and folk doctrine - and how the official doctrine can be overwhelmed by folk doctrine and culture borrowed from other places instead. My father left the church for a about a decade as a young man, and came back after he was able to separate the two in his head and reject all the folk doctrine. There isn't actually much official Mormon doctrine at all - it's a short list. Add to that the all-volunteer teaching and ministerial staff, and sometimes culture wins in the zeitgeist over doctrine. I am happy to have this sex positivity added to the culture.
Before today I had no idea these people existed and now I am so happy I do! What an incredible example to set, not only as a young woman, but also being a young woman from a faith that I really know very little (and nothing positive) about. This story fascinated and inspired me. Thank you for sharing this!!
The whole time reading this I kept thinking about my Mormon friend in high school, and that whenever we'd have sleepovers I'd stay awake staring at the poster in her room of grimy, greasy hands being washed with the caption "repentance is strong soap, but it feels so good to be clean."
The glimpse into this culture blows my mind a bit in that it’s so foreign to me. My parents both gave up church early on and moved us away from extended family, so church and all that it entails has just never been a part of my life. I feel…lucky? But also like I missed out on something, to some degree.
Ah yes, a callback to THE ACT OF MARRIAGE, the Tim and Beverly LaHaye sex manual of my yoot:
https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/jonathan-zimmerman-tim-lahaye-sex-ed-legacy-article-1.2731036