God’s in the clean-slate business! And we have plenty of work to do by focusing on people who need to understand God and His holiness better, to challenge those in unrepentant sin, and to help people heal from their past.

In regard to Denise’s comments on conflict between girls, there did seem to be a dichotomy in the messages we received back in the day, i.e., that on the one hand abstaining from sex made a girl a “prude” (as in my case), while too much sex (or a reputation thereof) made her a (ahem) “slut”. We may see less of this today with the backlash against “slut-shaming” and the assumption that every teenage girl is having sex, but in the absence of a how-much-is-too-much definition the effect was/is that there is no way to avoid girl-on-girl hazing of one form or another.

Nope, they sure don’t. But I don’t find them all that attractive, so there is that. Grin. Men can chose to sin regardless of what a woman is wearing and men can chose not to sin regardless of what a woman is wearing. Just thought I would answer the question.

Also, it is sad that we shame one side more than the other as it takes two. It is also sad that people are shamed at all when they have turned away from their sin in any area, not just sexual immorality. God chooses to remember our sin no more. He has every right to remember, but offers complete forgiveness. I am certainly not more righteous than God, so who am I to shame a person for their past? And frankly, I don’t want people to dig into my past either.

Good points. I have written about modesty before, and it’s in that Purity Culture post I reference (I think…). Also, my post on Do Our Yoga Pants Make Men Sin? may have got more comments than any other post I wrote!

I know that you didn’t include modesty in your post. How I was brought up modesty was tied in with some of the virginity talks. I know I am not alone, but some of the chatter behind closed doors was very cruel and it was very much a “the end justifies the means” delivery of the topic.
I’m not sure why we are averse to finding kinder, gentler ways of discussing these topics.

As to some of Terry’s points—-I think at least when we teach topics of virginity etc. in such an extreme way it can pit some girls/women against each other. I personally see shades of this in how some Christians write about this today. I think God meant us to keep track of our own journey—and pay less attention to how “loose” or immodest we might perceive others to be. Also I believe God meant for both women and men to bear the burden of sexual integrity. But we still today will shame women more than men, for example, when an unmarried woman becomes pregnant.

I really appreciate this thoughtful comment. Some excellent insight here!

Maybe it’s because sex is an external behavior (however private) that’s easy to throw a lasso around so we can point to it and say “don’t do this,” whereas meanness is harder to pin down as an attitude of the heart (although this also manifests in behavior). But if so, why is recovery from past addiction (an external behavior) celebrated openly while a promiscuous past, however forsaken, is swept under the rug? The best answer I can think of for the world’s emphasis is the importance men have traditionally placed on their brides’ virginity, which in turn is a reflection of the Church’s response to the biblical analogy of physical sex being a picture of our faithfulness to God, or lack thereof.

Good to know! Thanks.