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Sex, God, and Marriage
In this groundbreaking book, Arnold addresses the pain resulting from broken relationships and the misuse of sexual intimacy. He provides fresh biblical insights into critical issues including the sacredness of sex, the struggle against temptation, the decision to remain single or to marry, child rearing, homosexuality, divorce and remarriage. Available as a free ebook in seven languages as .pdfs and in English as .prc (Kindle) and .epub(Nook)files at www.plough.com
192 pages, Paperback
First published May 1, 1996
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93 people want to read
About the author
Johann Christoph Arnold
43 books64 followersPeople have come to expect sound advice from Johann Christoph Arnold, an award-winning author with over two million copies of his twelve books in print in more than twenty languages. A noted speaker and writer on marriage, parenting, and end-of-life issues, Arnold was a senior pastor of the Bruderhof, a movement of Christian communities, until his death in April 2017.
Arnold’s message was shaped by encounters with great peacemakers such as Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa, Dorothy Day, César Chavez, and John Paul II. Together with paralyzed police officer Steven McDonald, Arnold started the Breaking the Cycle program, working with students at hundreds of public high schools to promote reconciliation through forgiveness. This work also brought him to conflict zones from Northern Ireland to Rwanda to the Middle East. Closer to home, he served as chaplain for the local sheriff’s department.
Born in Great Britain in 1940 to German refugees, Arnold spent his boyhood years in South America, where his parents found asylum during the war; he immigrated to the United States in 1955. He and his wife, Verena, have eight children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Arnold’s message was shaped by encounters with great peacemakers such as Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa, Dorothy Day, César Chavez, and John Paul II. Together with paralyzed police officer Steven McDonald, Arnold started the Breaking the Cycle program, working with students at hundreds of public high schools to promote reconciliation through forgiveness. This work also brought him to conflict zones from Northern Ireland to Rwanda to the Middle East. Closer to home, he served as chaplain for the local sheriff’s department.
Born in Great Britain in 1940 to German refugees, Arnold spent his boyhood years in South America, where his parents found asylum during the war; he immigrated to the United States in 1955. He and his wife, Verena, have eight children and many grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
January 11, 2017
This book, which was endorsed by former Pope Benedict, written by a pastor who was endorsed by Mother Theresa, considers the very earth-bound subject of sex and marriage from a strictly spiritual, specifically, Christian perspective. It is simply written but for the vast majority of people, it is perhaps a "hopeless" or "unrealistic" perspective, given the social changes that have transformed most countries in the past hundred years or so. Even so, it is still perhaps "poetic" to read about sex as an expression of love, rather than sex as a purely physical act - and how love between man and wife itself should be modeled on the Christian conception of Jesus as the bridegroom with the church as the bride, and so forth.
It'd be difficult for me to begin to list all the areas of disagreement I have with the book, which is obviously, perhaps aimed at the ultra religious Christian community, or perhaps at those who are striving to achieve greater Christian spirituality. One notion that particularly stands out as highly anachronistic or backward, is the idea that the man must have "headship" over the woman. Obviously, this is not in sync with today's world, where women often work, and feel empowered/enfranchised - might be considered co-equals to the man. Many women today work and raise kids - thus, they are doing at least two jobs, with the second job of taking care of the house and the kids, uncompensated. Of course, anyone who works outside the house, man or woman, must also take care of their home - thus, the work of housework no matter what the living arrangement (single/married/kids/no kids/etc) means the worker must also work for no pay to "reproduce" themselves within decent living surroundings daily. On the other hand, many times the woman who works and has a family, is doing housework that men may not do on a regular basis - thus, she is not only doing the cleaning/cooking for herself, which she would do anyway even if she were living alone, she is also taking care of the others by looking after the home. Naturally, she would do this work without a second thought once kids are involved - but doesn't she become a sort of "superwoman" once she takes on the "traditional" household tasks in addition to a career? I don't see why a woman must be "subordinated" to a man, simply because centuries ago, the man was the breadwinner and so forth. No doubt, even in "primitive" societies, there was joint decision-making, even if the woman did not go out on hunts or raids but instead stayed at the home with the kids, or worked in a garden or took care of livestock and so forth. So I do not see why women should be "lesser" or "lower" on the totem pole than men; Father Arnold's take on the subject is one I certainly do not agree with. So many aspects of religions seem to be designed to reinforce the concept of patriarchy, which is no doubt related to the rise of the concept of private property way back when. The concept of private property, that is, accumulating property in excess of personal items one might need to complete tasks (in a hunter-gatherer society, this might mean tools one has made for one's own use such as agricultural or hunting implements) no doubt eventually led to the panoply of persistent social ills, and then the need to actually invent religions to keep social order, i.e., enforce patriarchy as a social organizing principle.
But, back to Father Arnold's book: The book overall is touching, and idealistic in its own way. One only wishes human relations could be as "spiritual" and "pure" as he describes. I doubt, though, that they ever were - the concept of not dating, or not dating according to what the modern concept of dating is, is a throwback to a much earlier era, prior to the emancipation of women. Women today would never stand to be put back into a social cage, locked in with a key controlled by their parents, perhaps subject to arranged marriages and so forth. I'm not sure what audience Father Arnold was addressing in his book, or perhaps he was simply trying to encourage readers to be more considerate and to see sex only in the context of marriage and even then as a spiritual act. Obviously, this view is far from the reality as it exists since at least the 1960s if not earlier. There is something to be said about the possibility of heartache and breakups and that one could avoid the messiness of having relationships and so forth, if one has no relationships other than a single marriage. Oh, he's also quite opposed to divorce - which is also a viewpoint that is of a different, past era, although of course it's best for marriages to stay together, if at all possible. Of course, Father Arnold is opposed to abortion, even opposed to birth control and is opposed to gay relationships. Thus, Father Arnold holds ideas that are very similar to those espoused by Catholicism, which is quite strict when it comes to social issues. All of these religious views aren't considered modern today, nor were they considered modern 50 or 60 years ago (although it did take several decades for the acceptance of gays and lesbians to occur).
I do not know how it would be possible to reason with Father Arnold, to try to point out that although the early Christians meant well, and there are indeed many good things about Christianity, from the social perspective, the church - at least the Catholic church - has not kept up with social developments, with modernity. The patriarchy has effectively been upended in the past century, in a process that started with woman suffrage, women working outside the home, women taking on factory jobs during WWII, women taking on increasing responsibility as military personnel in WWII, women increasingly obtaining secondary/professional education and beginning to file into many job categories that were previously exclusively male enclaves, and finally, with the advent of the birth control pill, and more effective and widely-available means of birth control, finally able to plan usually smaller families rather than be subject to repeated, eventually harmful to the mother's health, pregnancies. As a last resort if birth control fails, abortion was legalized in the 1970s - which meant family planning was then guaranteed and families could logically decide when and how many children to have and so forth. We can only say that all this social progress - which might be deemed "anti-Christian" by someone like Father Arnold - has brought decades of every imaginable economic progress, as the other half of the workforce, which was previously untapped in their usual roles as home-makers, made and continues to make, incredible and incalculable contributions every day worldwide, including in the sciences and other professions. However, if it were up to Father Arnold, women would still be at home, regularly enduring pregnancies, because no birth control would be allowed, no divorce and so forth. This "fate" sounds like a sort of "slavery" for women - chained to a "workplace" of sorts from which no mobility and no variation is possible - although there's no doubt that in pre-agricultural societies, the female would probably have had a fairly responsible role in hunter-gatherer societies, despite the household responsibilities undoubtedly falling on her as usual.
Father Arnold has a lot to say about sin, and Adam and Eve - but this is a story that I discount can't take seriously from the outset. I don't believe in the story of Adam and Eve and the Serpent - although as an allegory, I can appreciate it. It's a shame that Eve is made out to be the "bad guy" in the story - why couldn't Adam have eaten the apple? Why must the woman be the guilty one? This is yet another example of religion "enforcing" the concept of patriarchy, of male "superiority" and so forth. Although I do subscribe and of course support the Decalogue I don't think we're all naturally sinful, because of Adam & Eve. I think this concept is not correct and may have been invented to "hook" people into the idea that they need to be "redeemed" because of what Eve did at the Creation and so forth. The sin and guilt concept as intrinsically built into mankind I don't buy, even though I know it's central to Christianity; without it, the Church would have no function more or less. I don't think I need to be redeemed because I do not subscribe to the idea that mankind has some sort of original sin because of Eve (or for any other reason). This may be throwing fake guilt onto people for something they didn't do and something they aren't (sinful) just so the church will have something to do (redeem/forgive/remove the sins of the churchgoers - if there was no original sin, what function would the churches have). If you can read the following sentences of Father Arnold outside the context of Christian thought, or you can read it within that context if you are a Christian, it makes some sense:
"Sinful pride bears its bitter fruit in estrangement, separation from God, from our true selves, from others, and from the earth. Satan and sin shatter the most fundamental relationships we have."
The above is probably true - absent the following words: "Sinful" "from God" "Satan and sin." Pride itself - overweening pride - is of course identical to hubris, which leads invariably to nemesis - the fall. Father Arnold's sentences are a different way of saying pride goes before the fall.
I gave the book two stars although it's simply written, it's straight-forward, and can be understood by anyone, Father Arnold is looking at society from a perspective of the 19th Century, or repeatedly criticizes the social progress of the past hundred years or so. Yet this viewpoint is unrealistic; steady social progress has occurred and it the progress has resulted in a better world for all, especially a better world and life for women. I understand that Father Arnold is expressing the Christian "ideal" which was formulated two thousand years ago, a spiritual ascetic ideal that may have only been achieved by very few even so, in any of the intervening centuries. Everyone probably once strove to live up to this ideal, but subscribed to it as a matter of course, without seriously thinking they were going to express Christian love in every aspect of their lives, including within the sphere of sex. On the other hand, it's possible that in a world without too many other distractions or not much else going on, such as in the middle ages, perhaps religion loomed considerably greater in peoples' lives. The arrival of the technology of movable type in the West meant that information began to circulate more readily and more cheaply - this was probably the key turning point in freeing people from superstition and looking only to the Bible for answers. As literacy and then education became more widespread, populations gradually were able to free themselves from many religious social restrictions - even though the religious founders must have meant well - especially ones that had to be considered anachronistic or backward after a while. This is actually the paradox that Christianity finds itself in today: A religion that enshrines patriarchy finds itself out of step with a world that is rapidly evolving away from patriarchy. Christianity literally needs to update or reinvent itself - but I'm not sure how this is possible; moreover, most of the major religions have the same problem. The establishment and enforcement of patriarchy by means of religion, can no longer be taken seriously - at least not by most. However, there are important ethical concepts enshrined by religion that should be promulgated, perhaps in a secular context. Obviously, the Decalogue is key, but there are many other insights and sayings of Jesus, for example, that still resonate today, even if one doesn't exactly believe in the supernatural aspects of any religion and so forth. But that is a discussion for another day - my review of this book is that it's still of interest, if only to see how a committed Christian would approach the social questions of today; the answer is, such a believer would apply the same precepts and recommendations today, as those that are contained in the Bible, although centuries of social progress have resulted in the smashing of one of the central concepts contained in the Bible: The patriarchy.
It'd be difficult for me to begin to list all the areas of disagreement I have with the book, which is obviously, perhaps aimed at the ultra religious Christian community, or perhaps at those who are striving to achieve greater Christian spirituality. One notion that particularly stands out as highly anachronistic or backward, is the idea that the man must have "headship" over the woman. Obviously, this is not in sync with today's world, where women often work, and feel empowered/enfranchised - might be considered co-equals to the man. Many women today work and raise kids - thus, they are doing at least two jobs, with the second job of taking care of the house and the kids, uncompensated. Of course, anyone who works outside the house, man or woman, must also take care of their home - thus, the work of housework no matter what the living arrangement (single/married/kids/no kids/etc) means the worker must also work for no pay to "reproduce" themselves within decent living surroundings daily. On the other hand, many times the woman who works and has a family, is doing housework that men may not do on a regular basis - thus, she is not only doing the cleaning/cooking for herself, which she would do anyway even if she were living alone, she is also taking care of the others by looking after the home. Naturally, she would do this work without a second thought once kids are involved - but doesn't she become a sort of "superwoman" once she takes on the "traditional" household tasks in addition to a career? I don't see why a woman must be "subordinated" to a man, simply because centuries ago, the man was the breadwinner and so forth. No doubt, even in "primitive" societies, there was joint decision-making, even if the woman did not go out on hunts or raids but instead stayed at the home with the kids, or worked in a garden or took care of livestock and so forth. So I do not see why women should be "lesser" or "lower" on the totem pole than men; Father Arnold's take on the subject is one I certainly do not agree with. So many aspects of religions seem to be designed to reinforce the concept of patriarchy, which is no doubt related to the rise of the concept of private property way back when. The concept of private property, that is, accumulating property in excess of personal items one might need to complete tasks (in a hunter-gatherer society, this might mean tools one has made for one's own use such as agricultural or hunting implements) no doubt eventually led to the panoply of persistent social ills, and then the need to actually invent religions to keep social order, i.e., enforce patriarchy as a social organizing principle.
But, back to Father Arnold's book: The book overall is touching, and idealistic in its own way. One only wishes human relations could be as "spiritual" and "pure" as he describes. I doubt, though, that they ever were - the concept of not dating, or not dating according to what the modern concept of dating is, is a throwback to a much earlier era, prior to the emancipation of women. Women today would never stand to be put back into a social cage, locked in with a key controlled by their parents, perhaps subject to arranged marriages and so forth. I'm not sure what audience Father Arnold was addressing in his book, or perhaps he was simply trying to encourage readers to be more considerate and to see sex only in the context of marriage and even then as a spiritual act. Obviously, this view is far from the reality as it exists since at least the 1960s if not earlier. There is something to be said about the possibility of heartache and breakups and that one could avoid the messiness of having relationships and so forth, if one has no relationships other than a single marriage. Oh, he's also quite opposed to divorce - which is also a viewpoint that is of a different, past era, although of course it's best for marriages to stay together, if at all possible. Of course, Father Arnold is opposed to abortion, even opposed to birth control and is opposed to gay relationships. Thus, Father Arnold holds ideas that are very similar to those espoused by Catholicism, which is quite strict when it comes to social issues. All of these religious views aren't considered modern today, nor were they considered modern 50 or 60 years ago (although it did take several decades for the acceptance of gays and lesbians to occur).
I do not know how it would be possible to reason with Father Arnold, to try to point out that although the early Christians meant well, and there are indeed many good things about Christianity, from the social perspective, the church - at least the Catholic church - has not kept up with social developments, with modernity. The patriarchy has effectively been upended in the past century, in a process that started with woman suffrage, women working outside the home, women taking on factory jobs during WWII, women taking on increasing responsibility as military personnel in WWII, women increasingly obtaining secondary/professional education and beginning to file into many job categories that were previously exclusively male enclaves, and finally, with the advent of the birth control pill, and more effective and widely-available means of birth control, finally able to plan usually smaller families rather than be subject to repeated, eventually harmful to the mother's health, pregnancies. As a last resort if birth control fails, abortion was legalized in the 1970s - which meant family planning was then guaranteed and families could logically decide when and how many children to have and so forth. We can only say that all this social progress - which might be deemed "anti-Christian" by someone like Father Arnold - has brought decades of every imaginable economic progress, as the other half of the workforce, which was previously untapped in their usual roles as home-makers, made and continues to make, incredible and incalculable contributions every day worldwide, including in the sciences and other professions. However, if it were up to Father Arnold, women would still be at home, regularly enduring pregnancies, because no birth control would be allowed, no divorce and so forth. This "fate" sounds like a sort of "slavery" for women - chained to a "workplace" of sorts from which no mobility and no variation is possible - although there's no doubt that in pre-agricultural societies, the female would probably have had a fairly responsible role in hunter-gatherer societies, despite the household responsibilities undoubtedly falling on her as usual.
Father Arnold has a lot to say about sin, and Adam and Eve - but this is a story that I discount can't take seriously from the outset. I don't believe in the story of Adam and Eve and the Serpent - although as an allegory, I can appreciate it. It's a shame that Eve is made out to be the "bad guy" in the story - why couldn't Adam have eaten the apple? Why must the woman be the guilty one? This is yet another example of religion "enforcing" the concept of patriarchy, of male "superiority" and so forth. Although I do subscribe and of course support the Decalogue I don't think we're all naturally sinful, because of Adam & Eve. I think this concept is not correct and may have been invented to "hook" people into the idea that they need to be "redeemed" because of what Eve did at the Creation and so forth. The sin and guilt concept as intrinsically built into mankind I don't buy, even though I know it's central to Christianity; without it, the Church would have no function more or less. I don't think I need to be redeemed because I do not subscribe to the idea that mankind has some sort of original sin because of Eve (or for any other reason). This may be throwing fake guilt onto people for something they didn't do and something they aren't (sinful) just so the church will have something to do (redeem/forgive/remove the sins of the churchgoers - if there was no original sin, what function would the churches have). If you can read the following sentences of Father Arnold outside the context of Christian thought, or you can read it within that context if you are a Christian, it makes some sense:
"Sinful pride bears its bitter fruit in estrangement, separation from God, from our true selves, from others, and from the earth. Satan and sin shatter the most fundamental relationships we have."
The above is probably true - absent the following words: "Sinful" "from God" "Satan and sin." Pride itself - overweening pride - is of course identical to hubris, which leads invariably to nemesis - the fall. Father Arnold's sentences are a different way of saying pride goes before the fall.
I gave the book two stars although it's simply written, it's straight-forward, and can be understood by anyone, Father Arnold is looking at society from a perspective of the 19th Century, or repeatedly criticizes the social progress of the past hundred years or so. Yet this viewpoint is unrealistic; steady social progress has occurred and it the progress has resulted in a better world for all, especially a better world and life for women. I understand that Father Arnold is expressing the Christian "ideal" which was formulated two thousand years ago, a spiritual ascetic ideal that may have only been achieved by very few even so, in any of the intervening centuries. Everyone probably once strove to live up to this ideal, but subscribed to it as a matter of course, without seriously thinking they were going to express Christian love in every aspect of their lives, including within the sphere of sex. On the other hand, it's possible that in a world without too many other distractions or not much else going on, such as in the middle ages, perhaps religion loomed considerably greater in peoples' lives. The arrival of the technology of movable type in the West meant that information began to circulate more readily and more cheaply - this was probably the key turning point in freeing people from superstition and looking only to the Bible for answers. As literacy and then education became more widespread, populations gradually were able to free themselves from many religious social restrictions - even though the religious founders must have meant well - especially ones that had to be considered anachronistic or backward after a while. This is actually the paradox that Christianity finds itself in today: A religion that enshrines patriarchy finds itself out of step with a world that is rapidly evolving away from patriarchy. Christianity literally needs to update or reinvent itself - but I'm not sure how this is possible; moreover, most of the major religions have the same problem. The establishment and enforcement of patriarchy by means of religion, can no longer be taken seriously - at least not by most. However, there are important ethical concepts enshrined by religion that should be promulgated, perhaps in a secular context. Obviously, the Decalogue is key, but there are many other insights and sayings of Jesus, for example, that still resonate today, even if one doesn't exactly believe in the supernatural aspects of any religion and so forth. But that is a discussion for another day - my review of this book is that it's still of interest, if only to see how a committed Christian would approach the social questions of today; the answer is, such a believer would apply the same precepts and recommendations today, as those that are contained in the Bible, although centuries of social progress have resulted in the smashing of one of the central concepts contained in the Bible: The patriarchy.
January 11, 2023
The first half of this book deserves 5 stars. The second half deserves zero.
The first half of the book is really good. It talks about dating, the seriousness of marriage, and the love of God and married couples. It even talks about the importance of girls and boys being able to be friends without harassment from outsiders insinuating that their friendship isn’t platonic, which is so rare for people of dating age. I really enjoyed the first half of the book and it helped me view my marriage and sex through a new lens.
(Warning, there’s a whole lot of my personal opinion in this paragraph) The second half of the book was not for me. Maybe it’s because I’m not catholic and lean more liberal, but yikes. No mention of consent, attacks on sex education, and entire chapters on lgbtq and abortion. The abortion chapter even goes so far to say that if a woman’s life is in danger during pregnancy, we should pray that’s God’s will be done because her life is not more valuable than the child. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think abortion is a good solution in most cases. And God’s will is going to happen regardless of our intervention. That being said, I’m not going to pray in the car instead of wearing a seatbelt because if it’s Gods will for me to survive a car accident, he will save me. I believe in the power of prayer, but I also believe in being a responsible adult and taking action when things are going south. If I’m ever pregnant someday and in a life-threatening situation, I want people to pray for me AND for doctors save me. My goodness. Johann Arnold, a male author, has a lot of nerve to say that. He also says in one quiet sentence that if there is abuse in a marriage, they should have a short separation and then come back together. Seriously? Awful. Just awful.
There were a few good nuggets in the second half but they were few and far between. The second half of the book was so focused on sin that it left me feeling hopeless. As humans we will never live up to what God wants of us, but that’s why Jesus came. Should we try our best? Absolutely. But we’re going to fail. Period.
Anyway, that’s my review. Longest one I’ve ever written on this site. Wish it was a good one.
The first half of the book is really good. It talks about dating, the seriousness of marriage, and the love of God and married couples. It even talks about the importance of girls and boys being able to be friends without harassment from outsiders insinuating that their friendship isn’t platonic, which is so rare for people of dating age. I really enjoyed the first half of the book and it helped me view my marriage and sex through a new lens.
(Warning, there’s a whole lot of my personal opinion in this paragraph) The second half of the book was not for me. Maybe it’s because I’m not catholic and lean more liberal, but yikes. No mention of consent, attacks on sex education, and entire chapters on lgbtq and abortion. The abortion chapter even goes so far to say that if a woman’s life is in danger during pregnancy, we should pray that’s God’s will be done because her life is not more valuable than the child. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think abortion is a good solution in most cases. And God’s will is going to happen regardless of our intervention. That being said, I’m not going to pray in the car instead of wearing a seatbelt because if it’s Gods will for me to survive a car accident, he will save me. I believe in the power of prayer, but I also believe in being a responsible adult and taking action when things are going south. If I’m ever pregnant someday and in a life-threatening situation, I want people to pray for me AND for doctors save me. My goodness. Johann Arnold, a male author, has a lot of nerve to say that. He also says in one quiet sentence that if there is abuse in a marriage, they should have a short separation and then come back together. Seriously? Awful. Just awful.
There were a few good nuggets in the second half but they were few and far between. The second half of the book was so focused on sin that it left me feeling hopeless. As humans we will never live up to what God wants of us, but that’s why Jesus came. Should we try our best? Absolutely. But we’re going to fail. Period.
Anyway, that’s my review. Longest one I’ve ever written on this site. Wish it was a good one.
June 9, 2019
Written in the 1990s, this book presents a very orthodox Christian explanation of sex and marriage. It makes a strong argument overall, but it seems somewhat dated with the author worried about high rates of teenage pregnancy. I thought he focuses too much on the necessity for men to be the leaders of their families. The author takes a very strong stand against abortion, which I agree with in almost all cases, but in cases where the mother's life is in danger, he says that the people should pray. While I agree with praying in such cases, I think that they should also seek some medical intervention, to hopefully save both the mother and baby's life.
April 11, 2018
Disclaimer: I'm a practising Catholic.
I agree with most of what the author puts forth, but I don't find it to be anything new. The Catholic Church has been teaching and warning about all of this for many decades.
While I find Arnold's book to be written in very accessible language, I also find it lacking in depth in its theological and spiritual insights. He's on the right path and off to an excellent start, but there is so much more. I think particularly of Ven. Fulton Sheen's Three to Get Married or even some works by Christopher West that cover St John Paul II's Theology of the Body.
I agree with most of what the author puts forth, but I don't find it to be anything new. The Catholic Church has been teaching and warning about all of this for many decades.
While I find Arnold's book to be written in very accessible language, I also find it lacking in depth in its theological and spiritual insights. He's on the right path and off to an excellent start, but there is so much more. I think particularly of Ven. Fulton Sheen's Three to Get Married or even some works by Christopher West that cover St John Paul II's Theology of the Body.
April 15, 2023
In the place where he really does hit the nail on the head and says what we need to hear as a society today, I found it wasn't written to the current generation; and some of what is said seems more an expression of his own generational/ cultural context.
August 28, 2025
definitely outdated for today's open marriage and blending concepts but some interesting views and never the less knowledge
February 18, 2013
I absolutely loved reading this book! I began reading it assuming that it would literally only focus on God, Sex & Relationships, and it did just that, but on a much larger scale than I was prepared for. Arnold covers subjects I never thought would immediately relate to God, Sex & Relationships like the attitude that goes along with being intimate with your partner, the perverseness of sex even within a marriage and the importance of what to/what not to share with your children. I learned something new in every chapter and everything he shares is backed in scripture. This book is phenomenal and will definitely leave you thinking.
October 28, 2015
Balanced reflections in opposition to the course, calloused and cynical view of love so common today. While I do not share the catholic view of divorce, I agree we may be made whole in sacred service in union of masculine and feminine. Love is not free, it always has a price, marriage does not guarantee purity, no does legalism.
The book encourages a purity of heart, quoting from Kierkegaard, is to will one thing. One should marry only if you perceive it is gods will concludes Arnold, and not seek a release if marriage is gods will.
The book encourages a purity of heart, quoting from Kierkegaard, is to will one thing. One should marry only if you perceive it is gods will concludes Arnold, and not seek a release if marriage is gods will.
November 27, 2012
Good book. I liked how pastoral he was in addressing the "non-remarriage" ideal in the life of the church... He, Cornes and Wenham I believe hold to very helpful and pastoraly sensitive positions in this regard. Overall though a helpful book on sex and the individual in general. Concise yet deep. Firm yet gentle. Great stuff really... Definitely worth reading.
March 27, 2011
Too much repetitions and not enough guidance. For a book like this, you really will expect to find advices and insights to lead you. While the message is clear, there is no great substance to the book. The author certainly has done better in his other books.
November 26, 2012
Great explanation of the Christian sexual ethic. The author is protestant but i saw no doctrinal discrepancies between it and Catholic teaching. It's great to see coherency in such an important topic amongst Christian groups.
February 11, 2017
I'm loving this book.♥
August 29, 2013
A very good book with a Christian viewpoint. A good read for parents with preteens and older, and for young adults.
November 8, 2013
كانت محاولاتي لقراءته مضيعة للوقت لا أكثر، ليس لأنه عن التعاليم المسيحية لكنه أضاع وقتي بالفعل!
November 25, 2013
Great book filled with information on marriage.
November 27, 2012
See my notes from _Sex, God and Marriage_.
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November 4, 2017Gostaria de ler o livro!
Gracias
Gracias
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews