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I was at a wine tasting raising money for the local library, when a colleague told me about a girl in grade three who was found flipping through a copy of Fifty Shades of Grey, the pseudo-masochistic, erotic book which has topped all bestseller lists, and is, to put it blatantly, literary pornography.
Apparently the girl told her teacher that her mom had ordered it through the library and she was bringing it home for her, and I’m weeping into my wine, wondering what kind of world allows pornography into our children’s libraries.
I haven’t read the book. I don’t plan to read the book.
I’ve read the synopsis and it made my fragile mind do gymnastics. I couldn’t handle the book, and I’m proud of the fact. I’m proud that I have a pure heart and I wish purity was something we as parents encouraged more adamantly amongst our children.
I also wish purity was as popular as sex, but it isn’t, and it never will be, and if you must write bluntly and crudely about sex to be a famous author, I will never be able to secure the kinds of sales that author E.L. James has, because I have morals. And I have a conscience that doesn’t allow me to do that.
“Well, is it at least well written?” I ask someone.
“No, not at all,” they tell me.
And I’m wondering: at what point, as a believer, once you open the cover oblivious to the content, do you stop reading?
My husband is one of those kinds of people that has to finish a book, no matter how poor it is (thankfully he hasn’t picked up Fifty Shades, and knowing him he never will), but don’t we ever just stop because it’s damaging our souls? Don’t we ever walk out of a movie theater, because it’s too crude or vulgar, because there are too many swear words or too many sex scenes?
Don’t we do that anymore?
How do our standards, as Christians, differ from the world’s? And how is it that books like Fifty Shades are ending up in third graders’ backpacks because their moms have ordered it?
First of all, as a mom, I can’t imagine asking my children to do my dirty work for me.
And secondly, I wish we could all live with a more vivid understanding that our children are watching. They’re flipping through those pages and reading graphic, sadistic sentences and wondering why their mother is reading this and if she is, then it must be okay.
I believe sex is personal, and private, and worth waiting for. I think you gathered that from my post, To the Last Virgins Standing.
But more than that. I think sex is holy.
We may not believe in much that’s black and white. We may live in a culture of 50 shades of grey.
But there’s one thing that will never stop being blatantly true for me, and that is, the value of my child’s skin, the value of his mind and his heart.
My son’s value as a human being is black and white for me, and one day, he’s going to make love with a girl. And I want his sex life to be one that respects his value as a person, and hers. I want it to be one that honors the values of commitment, and purity, and perseverance. I want it to be protected by time and devotion, because sex is spiritual. Not just physical.
And when our children can’t even walk into their libraries without finding pornography on the shelves, I’m shuddering.
For their souls.
(Are there things that, for you, are black and white? What are they?)
[Photo: Marina, Creative Commons]
The post Fifty Shades of Grey — And Why it’s Black And White For Me appeared first on Prodigal Magazine.