Real Sex: The Naked Truth about
Chastity by Lauren F. Winner
Very Real
SEX. Splashed across magazine covers, billboards, and computer
screens--sex is casual, aggressive, and absolutely everywhere. And
everybodys 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 todays culture.Real Sex is essential reading for
Christians grappling with chastity and a valuable tool for pastors. A new
discussion guide has been added to the paperback edition.

Personal Review: Real Sex: The Naked Truth about Chastity by
Lauren F. Winner
In Real Sex: The Naked Truth About Chastity (Grand Rapids: Brazos
Press, c. 2005), Lauren F. Winner persuasively argues (from a very
modern perspective) the case for an ancient virtue. "Chastity," she notes,
"is one of the many Christian practices that are at odds with the dictates of
our surrounding, secular culture" (p. 9). However unpopular, however, it is
perennially right, for it "is God's very best for us. God created sex for
marriage and that is where it belongs" (p. 15).
Real Sex, in many ways, is a profoundly personal story, for Winner
transparently details her less-than-chaste pre-Christian life. Coming to
faith in Christ, however, led to conviction for sin (while receiving the
sacrament of penance in an Episcopal church) and (through many
struggles) commitment to chastity. Her position, importantly, is deeply
rooted in the scriptures and traditions of the church. Neither a subjective
personal opinion nor a simplistic citing of selected Bible verses, it's an ethic
grounded "in the faithful living of the fullness of the gospel" (p. 30).
What's needed in our day is a faithful explication of this gospel.
Everyone seems to freely talk about sex. Talk is truly cheap when it's
about sex! All the talk, all the sex education, all the "liberated" TV and
seminar discussions of a "new morality" have de-sanctified and vulgarized
what ought to be one of the most precious of human interactions. "The
problem is not that we talk about sex," Winner says. "The problem is how
we talk about sex" (p. 63). We need some "straight talk," refuting the
secular lie that "sex can be wholly separated from procreation" (p. 64).
Christians need to carefully consider the ethical ramifications of
contraception. For "if contraception invites us to be carefree, it also
encourages us to be people who think we can control and schedule
everything including the creation of our families, down to the month, down
to the week. And, most important, it invites us to be people who have
utterly separated sex from procreation" (p. 65).
Talking straight also leads us to reject the lie that "how you dress
doesn't matter" (p. 70). Modesty and appropriate clothing cannot be
severed, though we have, as a society, increasingly failed "to discern why
clothes matter, and what clothing is appropriate when" (p. 71). Winner
argues that "casual Fridays" reveal much about our "confusion about
clothes. Professional workplaces have dress codes in part because
managers know that how we dress shapes our behavior" (p. 74). This is
powerfully evident in students' classroom behavior, where casual clothing
encourages "a casual attitude, a slouching, an irreverence. But it is not my
students' fault. Some of their teachers wear blue jeans to class, so why
should students dress up? They are, as it were, just following suit" (p. 76).
So too, she says, casual dress (e.g. flip-flops) in church leavens a flippant
attitude towards God and the holy.
Christians in earlier eras understood this. Granted, some preachers erred
in their single-minded criticism of women's fashions. But both men and
women need to take seriously their appearance. "There is," she argues, "a
certain power in modest dressing, an assertion that though my body is
beautiful, I am more than a sex object designed for your passing

entertainment. But the power of dressing is also the power of narrative.
For our clothes tell stories, and it would be naïve and irresponsible to
pretend otherwise" (p. 77).
The "straight talk" Winner desires means the church must stop telling lies
about sex! Despite much rhetoric, it's not true that premarital sex will
"make you feel lousy." In truth, it often feels great. But feelings, of course,
are often deceiving! And the Father of Lies generally "whispers to us
about the goodness of something not good. It makes distortions feel good"
(p. 89). What the church ought to clarify is this: "premarital sex is bad for
us, even if it happens to feel great. In other words, sexual sin is not
subjectively felt" (p. 90). That women dislike sex, that sex is somehow
dirty, are other lies occasionally promoted within Christian circles.
Supported by "straight talk," Christians can live chastely. Winner explains
why fornication--and pornography and masturbation as well--must be
rejected if one practices chastity. It takes self-discipline and the support of
a strong faith community, but it's possible to follow God's will in this area.
And it's truly what's good for us. "That people have sex outside marriage
is understandable; we fornicate for the same reason we practice idolatry.
Idolatry carries in it the seed of a good impulse--the impulse to worship our
maker. Idolatry is that good impulse wrongly directed to disastrous ends.
Like idolatry, fornication is a wrong reflection of a right creational impulse.
We were made for sex. And so premarital sex tells a partial truth; that's
why it resonates with something. But partial truths are destructive. They
push us to created goods wrongly lived. To borrow a phrase from Thomas
Cranmer again: they are ultimately destructive to our selves, our souls and
bodies" (p. 121).
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