Real Sex: The Naked Truth about Chastity

by Lauren F. Winner

Overview

SEX. Splashed across magazine covers, billboards, and computer screens--sex is casual, aggressive, and absolutely everywhere. And everybody's doing it, right?

In Real Sex, heralded young author Lauren F. Winner speaks candidly to Christians about the difficulty--and the importance--of sexual chastity. With honesty and wit, she talks about her struggle to live a celibate life. Never dodging tough terms like "confession" and "sin," Winner grounds her discussion of chastity first and foremost in Scripture. She confronts cultural lies about sex and challenges how we talk about sex in church. Her biblically grounded observations and suggestions will be especially valuable to unmarried Christians struggling with the sexual mania of today's culture.

Real Sex is essential reading for Christians grappling with chastity and a valuable tool for pastors.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781441218278
Publisher:	Baker Publishing Group
Publication date:	07/01/2006
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
File size:	3 MB

About the Author

Lauren F. Winner (PhD, Columbia University) is the highly acclaimed author of the memoir Girl Meets God. She is assistant professor of Christian spirituality at Duke Divinity School in Durham, North Carolina, and has written for the New York Times Book Review, the Washington Post Book World, Publishers Weekly, Christianity Today, and Christian Century. Visit her website at www.laurenwinner.net.
Lauren F. Winner (PhD, Columbia University) is the highly acclaimed author of Girl Meets God, Still, Mudhouse Sabbath, and Wearing God. She is associate professor of Christian spirituality at Duke Divinity School and vicar of St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Louisburg, North Carolina. Winner has written for the New York Times Book Review, the Washington Post Book World, Publishers Weekly, Christianity Today, and Christian Century.

Hometown:

Charlottesville, Virginia

Date of Birth:

October 13, 1976

Place of Birth:

Asheville, North Carolina

Education:

B.A., Columbia University, 1997; M.A., Cambridge University, 1999

Table of Contents

1	Unchaste Confessions: Or, Why We Need Another Book about Sex	9
Part 1	Talking about Sex
2	Real Sex: Creation, Scripture, and the Case for Sex in Marriage	29
3	Communal Sex: Or, Why Your Neighbor Has Any Business Asking You What You Did Last Night	43
4	Straight Talk I: Lies Our Culture Tells about Sex	61
5	Straight Talk II: Lies the Church Tells about Sex	85
Part 2	Practicing Chastity
6	On the Steps of the Rotunda: Line-Drawing and Formation	103
7	Chastity as Spiritual Discipline: Conforming Your Body to the Arc of the Gospel	123
8	Communities of Chastity: What Singleness Teaches the Church	133
9	Responding to M.: The Practicalities of Repentance	149
	Notes	163
	Acknowledgments	173
	Author's Note	175

Editorial Reviews

Winner, author of the critically acclaimed memoir Girl Meets God, weaves an intriguing tapestry from sociological, autobiographical, pastoral and historical threads. She balances a journalistic report of how difficult chastity is for American Christians; a personal account of how she and her friends have approached premarital and marital sex; a survey of what the Bible, pastors and good Christian books say about the topic; and an overview of how chastity has been understood throughout Christian history. The candor with which Winner writes about sex may alarm some Christian readers, but those who follow her arguments to their conclusions will find themselves rewarded with fresh insights about an overdiscussed but still deeply entrenched problem among Christians. Interestingly, some of Winner's best insights are about married sex. She states early on that "in Christianity's vocabulary the only real sex is the sex that happens in marriage; the faux sex that goes on outside marriage is not really sex at all... [it] is only a distorted image of sex, as Walt Disney's Wilderness Lodge Resort is only a simulation of real wilderness." Winner places real sex not in the passionate world of one-night stands and dating relationships, but in the ordinary, domestic life of married couples. As such, she helpfully and perhaps even radically reframes both the Christian and cultural discussion of chastity and sexuality. (Apr.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly