A Sexular Society

 By Mark Loughridge - Posted at Gentle Reformation:

(Sexular—coined by Australian pastor, writer and blogger Stephen McAlpine in ‘A Sexular Age’. This article was sparked by his use of the word.)

We used to live in a religious world, where your religious belief defined who you were—it was where you got your identity from. Religion flavoured every aspect of life from the cradle to the grave, taking in education, community, family, even work. But things have changed, now we live in a secular world—one, in a sense, stripped of religious input.

In this secular world people get their identity from many things—work, success, family, sport, looks—the list is endless.

Or at least it used to be endless. But that list has narrowed largely to one single item—Sex. Not simply the act, but all that goes with it. It has been transformed into our sole source of identity.

For the vast majority of history sex has been seen exclusively in terms of what we do rather than who we are. When I was at secondary school in the early 90s (not that long ago!), sex was a bodily function. But it is that no longer. Sexuality = Identity. You can see it in the vast array of labels there are to go under: homosexual, heterosexual, bisexual, asexual, gray-asexual, pansexual, polysexual, lesbian, transgender…

Continue here...