Free America Unzipped by Brian Alexander Page A

Jesus. Not only has Beam talked about oral sex right out in the open, he approves. He’s encouraging! This is the first time some of us, including me, have ever heard this message from a self-described man of God. The big room has gone buoyant with relief, enthusiasm, joy.
    Joe builds on the swelling mood. You might be surprised, he says, how many commonly assumed sins aren’t really sins at all! “You can have fun!”
    â€œAmen!” somebody shouts.
    This is the crux of Beam’s message. The secular world has nothing to offer you that you cannot have within the sacred bonds of your marriage. Joe believes that “one of two things is happening in evangelical marriages. One or the other wants to do something they are not doing because they are scared God is going to zap them, so they live with this frustration, or they are doing it and feeling guilty about it. When someone who is considered to be a Christian authority says, ‘Hey, it’s okay,’ they have peace. They can enjoy it and not think they are going to die and go to hell in the middle of it. They assume they are wrong because they have been taught everything is bad. So they go outside their marriage to get it and say, ‘Oral sex is pretty cool. I enjoyed the way that felt’ and that’s so frustrating to me. Why can’t we get that kind of freedom inside marriage?”
    We learn just how much freedom we can have in marriage when Joe tells us to turn to page 32 in our workbooks. He throws up a slide summarizing the page, a list of God’s prohibitions. “A great deal of what the Bible teaches about sex comes in the form of prohibitions,” the book states. “Don’t let that make you think God is against sex. He made it! But he made it to be enjoyed in His design—not in any human aberration of that design.”
    I’m not really surprised when I read down the list. God is pretty firmly opposed to having sex with your mother. You can’t have it with your father’s new wife, either, though I once knew a kid who dreamed of doing exactly that because his dad’s new wife was about thirty and very sexy, which was, of course, why she was his dad’s new wife. No sex with stepsisters or sisters or the grandkids, your aunt, sisters-in-law, daughters, or granddaughters.
    No homosexuality. In the Bible you get the death penalty. No shock there, but Joe seems very sensitive about this when he says it, almost apologetic. He’s bound by the Bible, he insists. It’s not a political choice or a prejudice. “If you are a literalist, you have to understand the Bible says you cannot do that.” Then he moves on quickly as if walking on hot coals.
    No adultery, fornication, rape, prostitution, or sex with animals or women having periods. Joe says that this particular law was created for Old Testament–era health reasons that no longer apply and so maybe you can have sex with a menstruating woman, but “others feel that it lists God’s view of the sanctity of blood and should still be observed by Christians who respect God’s feelings.”
    Even though Joe has given this seminar hundreds of times, he seems to struggle with two entries on the list. The first is from St. Paul the Apostle again, who told the Corinthians, “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor your God with your body.”
    Well, he asks us, what does that mean? What could harm the body?
    â€œWhips and chains?”
    â€œWell, yes.”
    â€œAnal sex?” somebody asks.
    Joe appears grateful for the segue from whips and chains. “Anal sex? Well, let’s talk about that a minute. All the doctors have told me anal sex does irreparable harm to the anus. Remember, it’s only wrong if it harms the body. Now the vagina can be stretched. It’s