There are innumerable challenges facing the church in the West (a cultural not geographic description) when it comes to upholding an orthodox Christian sexual ethic. In this post, I’m simply going to provide a whole set of links to recent posts and articles that should amply demonstrate the wide array of positions where the surrounding culture has diverged from historic Christianity. I’m not covering every area so, for example, divorce is now so ubiquitous that it rarely receives a mention despite the fact that it can still be devastating and difficult for those affected.

The challenge then, I think, is not necessarily to persuade the world to legislate a Christian morality but first to defend the teachings of the church. Secondly that we need to empower and equip the church to more faithfully hold to these teachings. If we succeed in that perhaps in the generations to come the church can once again present to the world a clearer and better alternative just as the early church did.

However, I’m very aware and alert to the fact that the church has, in many ways, failed to offer anything better. Instead it has fallen into the ditch on the other side of the road with other harmful practices. Tomorrow those issues will get their own post.

Cultural Trends

• Beware the linguistic Trojan horse (Lionel Shriver)
• How Sex Became King (Alex Duke)
• How do we make sense of this cultural moment? (Philip Jensen)
• A Proper Christian Response to Sexual Sin in Our Culture (Carl Trueman)
• ‘Mommy, What’s A Pansexual?’ (Rod Dreher)

Co-habitation

• The Cohabitation Dilemma Comes for America’s Pastors (Christianity Today)
• Share of live births outside marriage in Europe (Reddit)
• The demise of the happy two-parent family (Tyler Cowen)

Monogamy

• How polyamorists and polygamists are challenging family norms (New Yorker)
• Human sexual desire: Is monogamy natural? (Big Think)

Family

• Notes on Queer Conception and the Redefinition of Family (JSTOR)

Pornography

• I recently wrote this post with a number of relevant links so check that out.

Sexual Fluidity

• 1 in 6 Gen Z adults are LGBT. And this number could continue to grow. (Washington Post)
• LGBT Identification Rises to 5.6% in Latest U.S. Estimate (Gallup)
• The Queering Of Young America (American Conservative)
• Why Are Young Adults Increasingly Identifying as Bisexual? (The Gospel Coalition)
• Sexual Fluidity (Church & Culture)

Homosexuality

• Authors call for removal of Booker prize vice-president over ‘homophobic’ views (Guardian)
• Why the “born this way” argument doesn’t advance LGBT equality (TEDx)
• Gay marriage, gambling, and good deeds in the age of disappointment (Stephen McAlpine)
• 5 Questions about Homosexuality (Kevin DeYoung)
• Seeing Both Sides (Andrew Bunt)

Transgender

• Detrans Awareness Day (Andrew Bunt)
• Why I joined the trans debate (James Kirkup)
• The Green party’s gender intolerance problem (Debbie Hayton)
• Why does Penny Mordaunt think ‘trans men are men’? (Debbie Hayton)
• Rand Paul Blasts Levine’s Trans Radicalism (Rod Dreher)
• I miss lesbians (Andrew Sullivan)
• The Tragedy of the ‘Trans’ Child (National Review)
• A new pastoral problem (Carl Trueman)

Trans censorship

• Responding to Transgender Ideology—and censorship (Ian Paul)
• Damnatio memoriae (Alan Jacobs)
• Up the Amazon (Alan Jacobs)
• When Amazon erased my book (Ryan T Anderson)
• Amazon will not sell books that ‘frame sexual identity as mental illness’ (BBC)
• The Book Amazon Does Not Want You to Read (Justin Taylor)

Conversion Therapy

• We don’t need a new law against ‘conversion therapy’ (Douglas Murray)
• Ban Conversion Therapy, But Don’t Ban Support (Living Out)