The death of my own purity culture.

The death of my own purity culture.

Sometimes I will come across ideas that completely shatter me. And by shatter me, I mean dissolve the framework of my world view and have me look through a new lens. Right now my favorite thinker is Jonathan Pageua. He’s an Orthodox Chrisitan Icon Carver and he has constantly destroyed my framework of existence for the better. I’ll watch thinkers I like for hours on end until I feel as though if a question was posed to that thinker I would know how they would answer it. This icon carver has changed my perspectives on things a lot, but I won’t be going into detail about all that has changed in this essay. To give a slight back story, he grew up in a baptist church with a preacher father, practiced post modern art in art school, and then later discovered the orthodox church, icons, the church fathers and his thinking of the world synchronized with them.

I was listening to a podcast with him and said something like this “I was in my baptist church and somebody said ‘we don’t practice sin. We live in a purity culture. We sin, but we don’t control or choose when it happens.’ This struck my framework because I never thought about our culture from this framework. Like yes, I could always see the foundations of state from arguably deriving from a christian culture, but I never thought about the specific christian culture it derived from. I mean come on, it was right there. The puritans came on the mayflower. Now I know nothing about the puritans, but that is not relevant. What is relevant is the idea that our entire current culture is built around the idea that one must be pure.

What does it mean to be pure? It means to be without stain. For example, the color white represents purity because it is without color, but it can be stained to any color. It is a blank canvas. You see this in the wedding dress representing the bride a pure. It can also be seen as raw form or without blemish. Perfect in nature. Having done no wrong. This is a universal symbol as pure, but under the christian umbrella it brings in morality as well and what it means to be pure. In chrisinaity we talk about how in the old testament for one to become clean, they had to slay a lamb to sacrifice to God to cover their sins. There was an emphasis on covering the sin and not being forgive of it. Then Jesus was slain and we were made new. Jesus was not the lamb that covered all sins and conquered them. It is as if instead of the wedding dress having blemishes and being covered as in the old testament. Once Jesus died on the cross he took those blemishes and the dress was made new, reborn. Another reference as to Jesus calling us the bride to His groom. We become free of our sin, we become pure in His image and can then have a relationship with Him. So what is purity culture and how does this conflict with the gospel’s message?

Purity culture is the idea that we must be perfect. The idea that there is no room for sin. How does this work given we admit we are sinners? Well in our culture despite us admitting we will sin, we expect ourselves not to. We expect all of us to live sinless lives, yet we know we will sin. Which brings me to the quote in the baptist church “we don’t practice sin.”

I’ve thought about my vices and how I might choose to indulge in one. I don’t think this is a good idea persay, but the message here is this. We are going to sin. It is inevitable. But in our purity culture we do not plan for when we sin. We simply accidentally sin. This gives sin the control to dismay of behaviors. For me personally, I find myself constantly trying to live pure. I am trying not to sin, but then constantly finding myself still sinning. It is a degrading feeling that leaves me feeling like a constant failure. I got in the conversation about God after drinking a few beers with some buddies who weren’t believers per say. One of them brought up this point unknowingly. He said something to the sense that he doesn’t believe in perfectionists and that everyone has their vices. If someone wasn’t willing to admit their vice then there was probably a very dark vice lurking in the background they were afraid to admit. I didn’t know at the time, but essentially he was calling out purity culture saying nobody is perfect. I quickly disagreed with him saying I think it is the opposite. If you press into your vices, the deeper and darker they are going to get. For example, you look at the atrocious things Jeffrey Epstiein was up to and you have to imagine it is only the elite sick minded who are interested in his pleasures. He was trafficking young girls through manipulation by having their friends bring them in for massages. In his case, imagine this developed from him having one vice, say watching porn. Then that turned into wanting to watch younger girls. That turned into wanting it be in person. That turned into him wanting multiple underage girls. I’ll stop here, but my point being that the dark vices people have develop from giving into the vices or feeding the demons. By feeding the demons I mean allowing yourself to give into your vices on a consistent basis. Now my buddies' argument is still valid in that nobody is perfect. I remember when he was brought up I was willing to admit I watched porn. This seemed to be a gotcha moment for them. I could feel the christian lifestyle I was trying to claim fell apart in their eyes because I was the hypocrite who could not live up to the expectations God demands. It made me think about how I was a failure for God. I could argue for the philosophy and lifestyle of God, but I could not live up to his perfect standards. But this is where my entire perspective has now changed.

I am not a failure. Sin is to be expected to have in one life. But the culture that we have developed has left out room for sin. Either we are full secularists like everyone else who sins at will, or we don’t take part in any sin. In Pageus’ discussions they began to talk about how it gets tricky because no sin is okay, but at the same time we can’t act like it is never going to happen. For example, he brought how someone asked him if the Orthodox Church has the same views as the Catholic Church when it comes to birth control. Catholics don’t use birth control because they believe sex is designed for creating chidlren. If you are not having sex to create children, then you shouldn’t be having sex. At that point you are simply pursuing a passion. Now Pageu’s response to this was that he wasn’t entirely sure, but he think its up to the individual and the priest. He said it is likely the Orthodox Church has the same views as the Catholic church, but these predicaments really depend on individual situations. I thought that was a great point because I am really not fond of blanket statements and views. Every situation is different and personal. We all assume things based on statistics, but we all know our lives are very personal and manifest to us uniquely than they do to someone else. So the idea that one person should be doing this or that should really come down to their decision through prayer, the priest, family and community.

Now how do we practice sin? I am not really sure, but that’s the point. Why do I not know how to properly express sin in my culture? Why was I never taught this? We all know I am going to sin. Wouldn’t it be better for the world if I sinned in a controlled manner? To give some examples, we have Mardi Gras before lent, Halloween, and carnivals. These are all holidays that represent something that isn’t holy, but we choose a day to celebrate them. We do things that are backwards and upside down for a day, then we say that’s enough, it is time to go back to order and sin no more. Would life be better if we chose when we sin or how we sin? Maybe instead of going to war we create sports teams to simulate a fight or war for us. To get out the aggression we have in a safe manner.

One constant theme Pageua talks about is a how the whole world feels like a carnival right now. Everything feels upside down. 2 plus 2 doesn’t mean 4. Things are backwards from how they should be. But he brought up how this stems from a retaliation against purity culture. We tried to be so pure and failed, so we turned the other way. We are trying to be the opposite of pure. Prohibition was 100 years ago. Not that long ago. Now we are talking about legalizing all drugs. If we want to live in a proper culture there has to be one with nuance. One that does not expect purity, but strives for the infinite in hopes to be touched by it.

This idea destroyed my framework because I no longer feel the need to try to live a pure life. I feel the need to simply try to grow closer with God with the expectation that I will sin. Even though it is not okay to sin, it is okay that I am sinner. Paul the apostle talks about how your works will be seen through your faith. If you pursue God, the goodness of your works will shine through in the right manner. It is not the works, but the pursuit of God that saves. It’s not that I know expect to plan out my sins per say, but I might sit with it better. For example, I usually plan a few days out of the year where there is a bachelor’s party or wedding knowing I will probably drink more than I should. If I plan for that night and agree with myself which lines I am okay with crossing and which lines I am not okay with crossing this may allow me to sin without destroying my life.

Recently a pastor stepped down from church because he said he drank one too many. I’m sure there was other stuff going on. He was a good and popular pastor. We talked about in group about how if every pastor admitted their vices we probably wouldn’t have any pastors and some sins are just more visible and require someone to step down. Maybe if we didn’t live in a purity culture he could continue to shepherd. Maybe if we knew how to sin and how to practice it, he wouldn’t be crushed by the expectations there are of a pastor in purity culture. We need the gargoyles at the edge of the church and God at the center. T