Welcome to a node of the Pandeism index!!
Sexuality as put down in Theistic Faiths:
When the impact of
religion on
sexual freedom is considered, it most generally is a strongly
negative one. For it is the gist of most religions that sex is either highly regulated by suppressive divine
decrees, or that it is at least some sort of inherent
flaw, distracting men from the path to
enlightenment.
The most typical restriction imposed by religion is that sex must be restricted to married couples -- which, in this day and age oddly juxtaposes secular
government giving its stamp of approval on a piece of
paper, without which it matters not what the couples' religious advisers contend, nor what their congregation would have. It seems these days no one is married until the government puts in its two cents. As to actual sexual activities, the 'marriage' requirement effectively precludes
threesomes (and
foursomes, and fivesomes, and I think anything above that would qualify for general
orgydom).
Polygamy (and
polyandry) might ameliorate this a bit, but both are becoming rarer and less acceptable amongst the religious, even amongst those whose doctrines once lauded the practice -- and to the nonreligious, they have little relevance because marriage itself originates as a religious institution, and outside of that life is the free-for-all.
Religious mores may require the wife to be submissive (and note, it is
always the
woman whom theistic religion puts down; and with all that
submissiveness implies); may limit sex to purposes of procreation (which cuts out a great many activities and endgames); and may bar
masturbation,
oral sex,
anal sex,
homosexuality, partner swapping, and all other activities consensually maximizing sexual variety. Theistic adherents may contend that they are able to find sufficient sexual release within the constraints of their own beliefs, though this is hardly a justification for wishing to will others sexual rights away.
Sexuality as uplifted in Pandeism:
But quite a different approach can be found in
Pandeism. So much so that it may well be claimed to be the most
sex-positive of all religious beliefs. Indeed, the sacredness of sexual
pleasure is consistent with the core of understanding and practice of Pandeism, and one reason why it might modernly be enjoying greater popularity as it receives wider exposure to open-minded persons of a spiritual bent. Pandeism is the belief that our Creator not only created the Universe, but in fact ceased to be a separate entity and instead
became our Universe in order to experience existence through the experiences of the Universe (and thereby to learn what it was like to face obstacles and limitations unknowable to a deity). This notion is reflected in texts such as the
Bhagavad Gita. Pandeism teaches therefore that our Creator shares in and learns from all of our experiences, and thus our positive experiences, including our consensual and mutually enjoyable sexual practices, must be no less than a gift to our Creator!!
Now it must as well be further recalled that Pandeism holds our Universe and our experience of it to be essentially natural phenomena, existing in accordance with the governing dynamics designed by our Creator and actuated in its becoming of our Universe. But within that scheme, our ability to experience pain and pleasure, joy and sorrow, are not intentional bestowals from a Creator using such things to
test or control us. They are evolved capacities. True, they have come to pass in accordance with our Creator's physical laws, but not as part of a specified plan. They are instead happenstance outcomes, outpourings of the randomness with which our Creator imbued our Universe, so that it might generate a useful variety of experiences. Thus, there is no 'wrong' in receiving pleasure sexually, any more than in receiving physical pleasure through other natural functions such as eating, drinking, or basking in a cool breeze on a hot day or a warm spot on a cold day. In each of these instances we may be assured that nature rewards our essential enjoyment of them because they in some way tend towards the benefit of our progression as a species -- a progression which is itself surely appreciated by our Creator.
In this light, there can be nothing immoral about any consensual act between persons who are competent to make decisions for themselves. When a man and woman (or two men, or two women, or any number of other combinations, if so inclined) find mutual attraction in a smoky bar, and hasten to release their desires in a one-night-stand of
passionate pleasuring in multiple positions, our Creator necessarily shares in each moment of pleasure, for they are of our Creator. When one person
contracts with another to be brought to
orgasm with the other's
mouth, our Creator experiences the wonder of orgasm (and perhaps the prostitute ought to rejoice in giving to our Creator that wonderful experience); when one is privileged to participate in a menage a trois with two sensual specimens of the opposite sex, who pleasure the lucky third with their fingers and toes and multiple orifices, perhaps even their
elbows, our Creator shares equally in this arousal. Our Creator must delight in the pleasure of those moments as much as either of their human actors; and when a man (or woman) sits alone in front of the
tv or computer
screen or simply a
magazine and masturbates while viewing the
topography revealed by
pornography, our Creator shares in the
enjoyment of that orgasm as much as its individual recipient.
There can be few better lives lived than those in which the experience of giving and receiving pleasure is maximized by the sharing as great a variety of sensual joy with as many people as possible!! So long as this is done honestly and consensually, it is no harm but a positive good to share sexual pleasure with others, and reap the same for oneself, to be shared among all in the end.
It is true, naturally, that sex may be used to inflict suffering, which imposes suffering upon our Creator -- and in the end we will perhaps share in this suffering as well -- and the responsible party will have the most poignant experience of the suffering he has caused. There may be no question that to force sex on another, through brute strength or through more subtle emotional or financial extortion is still an immorality!! Although I lauded the gift of the prostitute before, if that person is not acting of his or her own free will, but instead out of a compulsion to feed a terrible drug habit or provide for an abusive pimp, so would our Creator experience the deprivations of such a condition. And further, some consideration must be given to the suffering that even consensual sex can cause to the spouse who finds him or herself cheated on, to the parent who fears their offspring's loss of 'innocence,' even to the complete stranger who is distressed that sex is happening at all. But these feelings must be taken with a grain of relative
rationality -- consider the racist or the homophobe, who is angered by sex between people of different races, or of the same gender -- this act does him no harm, so his 'suffering' is irrational, a self-inflicted
bogeyman; it may only be in another next life, when he shares in the pleasure of these experiences (which he may have denied himself in life) that he will realize what a gift he was receiving when these objectionable acts were carried out, and how thoughtless was his
disdain for the experience of them!!
So let us not disgrace our Creator by denying ourselves the wonderful gift of sexual titillation, the pleasures of sensual play, and the ultimate joy of a rain of orgasms!! An understanding of Pandeism opens our eyes to the possibility that it is the
denial of pleasure which is the greatest immorality!!