Sex & God: How Religion Distorts Sexuality by Darrel Ray Page B

religion, people will go wild and do terrible sexual things. But the evidence doesn’t support this. How many headlines read, “Atheist leader convicted of molesting dozens of boys.” Or read, “Atheists have the highest divorce rate.” Non-religious people often have better control over their sex lives and relationships because they don’t have the constant interference of religious guilt. They don’t try to dam up their desires; instead, they channel them in appropriate ways.
    As we saw in Candace’s story, religious guilt does not stop behavior. It may slow you down, but biology wins. Candace’s behavior was not based on rational thinking and clear-headed decision-making. Religion put a dam across her sex drive. When it overflowed, she experienced horrible guilt, even physical revulsion. Guilt reduces the ability of a person to exercise rational control over sexual behavior. The result is something more unpredictable, even surprising to the religious person. Candace engaged in behavior atthe most unexpected times and was horrified that she could not control it. It is a common pattern among people of all the major religions, including many of the leaders.
     
    38 For a full discussion of this concept, see Chapter 4 in my previous book,
The God Virus: How Religion Infects Our Lives and Culture
, “God Loves You – The Guilt that Binds,” p. 83.
    39 For an in-depth look, see Steven Pinker's essay, “The Moral Instinct,”
New York Times Magazine
, 13 Jan 2008. Available online at http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/13/magazine/13Psychology-t.html?pagewanted=all .
    40 See, for example, “Earl ‘The Abomination’ Paulk is the Father of his own Nephew,” at
The Independent Conservative
, http://www.independentconservative.com/2007/10/24/earl_paulk_abomination/ .
    41 Overwhelming evidence suggests that religion is involved in abuse. See Jackson, et al. (1999). “Predicting abuse-prone parental attitudes and discipline practices in a nationally representative sample,” in
Child Abuse & Neglect
, 23 (1); and John Hules’ 2005 compilation of over 100 studies connecting religiosity of parents to child sexual abuse, available online at www.hules.us/SCI_SUM2.pdf .
    42 “Red Light States: Who Buys Online Adult Entertainment?” by Benjamin Edelman,
Journal of Economic Perspectives
, 23 (1), Winter 2009.
    43 From a speech titled “Rape and Religion,” delivered at SlutWalk KC in Kansas City, Sept. 2011.
    44 Miller, A.S. and Hoffman, J.P. (March 1995). “Risk and Religion: An Explanation of Gender Differences in Religiosity,”
Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion
, 34(1).
    45 Delivered at the Texas Freethought Convention, 2011. Available on DVD.
    46 For example, “Can you become a virgin again?” by Tim Stafford, available at http://www.christianitytoday.com/iyf/hottopics/sexabstinence/7c2041.html .
    47 Listen to more of Candace’s story at LivingAfterFaith.com , episode #26.

SECTION II:
FOLLOW THE BIOLOGY

CHAPTER 8:
HOLY BIOLOGY
    It is impossible to understand sex and sexuality without a minimal understanding of biology. To ensure that we are fair and balanced in our approach, we will first look at religious biology, then examine scientific biology
.
The Bible
    Bible biology begins with all creatures coming from nowhere. The first man, Adam, was created out of dust. Adam was given the responsibility for creating a classification system for all the animals by naming them. Adam was a bit lonely so he was put to sleep and a rib was extracted to create a “help mate.” 56
    In Genesis we find that at least one snake can talk and two trees have supernatural powers – the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and the Tree of Life. Humans could live for hundreds of years (Adam lived 930 years with Methuselah taking the prize at 969).
    We also know that animals were sexual creatures, hence Noah’s task of bringing all the animals on board the Ark in twos. (There is no mention of asexually reproducing salamanders