HOW THE "SEXUAL REVOLUTION" HAS FAILED WOMEN

'Women are learning to have sex like men. But peel back the layers, and it becomes obvious that this transition is not a reflection of their power but of their subjugation to men's interests. If women were more in charge of how their relationships transpired - more in charge of the "pricing" negotiations around sex - we would be seeing, on average, more impressive wooing efforts by men, fewer hookups, fewer pre-marital sexual partners, shorter cohabitations, and more marrying going on (and perhaps even at a slightly earlier age too). In other words the "price" of sex would be higher: it would cost men more to access it. Instead, none of these things are occurring.'

Mark Regnerus, Cheap Sex, p.214.

MARIAGE IS A GATEWAY DRUG

'...at its best, marriage is meant to leave us wanting more: it is a gateway drug to a far more fulfilling relationship.'

Rebecca McLaughlin, Confronting Christianity, p.161.

THE BIBLE COMMANDS SAME-SEX RELATIONSHIPS

'People sometimes say the Bible condemns same sex relationships. It does not. The Bible commands same-sex relationships at a level if intimacy that Christians seldom reach. Jesus preached a gospel of radical intimacy: with him first and foremost, but through him also with each other.'

Rebecca McLaughlin, Confronting Christianity: 12 Hard Questions for the World's Largest Religion, p.155.

HOW GENDER EFFECTS SAME-SEX SEXUAL RELATIONSHIPS

'Men and women tend to conduct their relationships differently and exhibit different preferences in their relationships. When the partnership diverges from sexual complementarity - that is, a man and a woman in relationship - decidedly sex-typed preferences are consolidated, not moderated. It means that same-sex couple are ironically more subject to deep-rooted gendered patterns and habits, their stated egalitarian attitudes aside. There is nothing political about this; it is just the empirical reality, one that sexual economics make ready sense of. If the sexes were a simple social construction, utterly malleable, we should see very little distinction in how men and women pursue relationships, how they act within them, how they act apart from them, what they prioritize about them and how they conclude them. But we see all of that.'

Mark Regnerus, Cheap Sex, p.158. 

NEW IDENTITIES LEAVE US VULNERABLE

'...the identities we are chattering about today tend to be more rootless and directionless that those of the past. They do not instruct us in how we ought to live. In turn, this lack of social structure, as well as a dearth of tradition, means a lack of constraints, leaving people vulnerable.'

Mark Regnerus, Cheap Sex, p.155.

MY 2021 READING

Those in bold are my top 10: 

January 

1. Elizabeth Strout, Olive, Again 
2. Dane C Ortlund, Edwards on the Christian Life: Alive to the Beauty of God
3. Bryan Washington, Lot 
4. Dr Lisa Oakley & Justin Humphreys, Escaping the Maze of Spiritual Abuse: Creating healthy Christian cultures

February 

1. Chuck DeGroat, When Narcissism Comes to Church: Healing your community from emotional and spiritual abuse 
2. Leo Tolstoy, War and Peace (Translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky)
3. Katherine May, Wintering: The power of rest and retreat in difficult times 
4. Mark D Thompson, A Clear and Present Word: The clarity of Scripture 
5. Bryan Washington, Memorial
6. Diane Langberg, Redeeming Power: Understanding Authority and Abuse in the Church 
7. Tana French, The Wych Elm

March 

1. Wade Mullen, Something's Not Right: Decoding the tactics of abuse and freeing yourself from its power 
2. Stephen McAlpine, Being the Bad Guys: How to live for Jesus in a World That Says You Shouldn't 
3. Suzanne Heywood, What Does Jeremy Think? Jeremy Heywood and the Making of Modern Britain
4. Simon P Walker, Leading out of Who You Are: Discovering the Secret of Undefended Leadership 

April 

1. Fleming Rutledge, Three Hours: Sermons for Good Friday
2. Andy Friend, Ravilious & Co.: The Pattern of Friendship
3. Jane Austen, Mansfield Park
4. Tim Pears, In the Place of Fallen Leaves
5. Greg Johnson, Still Time to Care: What we can learn from the church's failed attempt to cure homosexuality

May 

1. Alan Don, Faithful Witness: The confidential diaries of Alan Don, Chaplain to the King, the Archbishop and the Speaker, 1931-1946 (Edited by Robert Beaken) 
2. Scott McKnight & Laura Barringer, A Church Called Tov: Forming a Goodness Culture  That Resists Abuses of Power and Promotes Healing 
3. Delia Owens, Where the Crawdads Sing 
4. Fiona Stafford, The Brief Life of Flowers
5. Bo Giertz, The Hammer of God
6. David Nicholls, Sweet Sorrow
7. Fiona Robertson, Rules of Belonging: Change your organisational culture, delight your people and turbo-charge your results  
8. Susan Howatch, Scandalous Risks

June 

1. Mark Vroegop, Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy: Discovering the grace of lament
2. Cathy Rentzenbrink, Dear Reader: The Comfort and Joy of Books 
3. Peggy Orenstein, Boys & Sex: Young men on hookups, love, porn, consent, and navigating the new masculinity 

July 

1. Susan Howatch, Absolute Truths 
2. Catherine Lacey, Pew 
3. William Trevor, The Old Boys 
4. Grayson Perry, The Descent of Man 
5. Samantha Harvey, The Western Wind 
6. Adam Sisman, John le Carré: The Biography 
7. RC Sheriff, The Fortnight in September 
8. Katherine Langrish, From Spare Oom to War Drobe: Travels in Narnia with my Nine Year-Old Self   
9. Francis S Schaeffer, The Church Before the Watching World
10. Matthew Mullins, Enjoying the Bible: Literary Approaches to Loving the Scriptures
11. Rachel Gardner, The Sex Thing: Reimagining conversations with young people about sex

August

1. Larry McMurtry, Lonesome Dove
2. Andrew Wilson, God of All Things: Rediscovering the sacred in an everyday world 
3. Jan Morris, Thinking Again
4. Brad House & Gregg Allison, MultiChurch: Exploring the Future of Multisite 
5. John le Carré, Absolute Friends

September 

1. Brandon Taylor, Filthy Animals 
2. An Yu, Braised Pork

October 

1. David James Poissant, Lake Life 
2. Natalia Ginzburg, The Dry Heart
3. Stewart O'Nan, The Odds: A Love Story
4. Natalia Ginzberg, The Little Virtues
5. John Stott, But I Say To You....Christ the Controversialist 
6. Darrin W Snyder Belousek, Marriage, Scripture, and the Church 
7. Susan Howatch, Mystical Paths 
8. Christos Tsiolkas, Loaded 
9. Amia Srinivasan, The Right to Sex 

November

1.  Michael Jenkins, A House in Flanders 
2. Henry "Chips" Channon, Diaries (Volume 1) 1918-38 (Edited by Simon Heffer) 
3. Gregg A Ten Elshof, I told me so: self-deception and the Christian life

December

1. Sally Rooney, Beautiful World, Where Are You
2. Beth Allison Barr, The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth 
3. Margaret Bullard, Endangered Species: Diplomacy from the Passenger Seat
4. Karen Soole, Liberated: How the Bible exalts and dignifies women 
5. Peter Davidson, The Lighted Window: Evening Walks Remembered
6. Gavin Francis, Island Dreams: Mapping an Obsession 
7. Jenny Offill, Weather 
8. Toby Faber, Faber & Faber: The Untold Story
9. Alistair Macleod, No Great Mischief

HOW SEXUAL LIBERATION HAS FAILED TO LIBERATE

'According to its claims, sexual liberation ought logically to have brought in a time of "naturalness," ease, and candor between men and women. It has, on the contrary, filled the country with sexual self-consciousness, uncertainty, and fear.'

Wendell Berry, Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community, p.141.

PRACTICING LOVE WHEN WE DON'T FEEL IT

'The proper question, perhaps, is not why we have so much divorce, but why we are so unforgiving. The answer, perhaps, is that, though we still recognize the feeling of love, we have forgotten how to practice love when we don't feel it.'

Wendell Berry, Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community, p.140.

THE PRACTICE OF LOVE

'...marriage, family life, friendship, neighborhood, and other personal connections do not depend exclusively or even primarily on justice - though, of course, they all must try for it. They depend also on trust, patience, respect, mutual help, forgiveness - in other words, the practice of love, as opposed to the mere feeling of love.'

Wendell Berry, Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community, p.139.

THE INDUSTRIALSATION OF SEX

'The triumph of the industrial economy is the fall of community. But the fall of community revels how precious and how necessary community is. For when community falls, so must fall all the things that only community life can engender and protect: the care of the old, the care and education of children, family life, neighborly work, the handing down of memory, the care of the earth, respect for nature and the lives of wild creatures. All of these things have been damaged by the rule of industrialism, but of all the damaged things probably the most precious and the most damaged is sexual love. For sexual love is the heart of community life. Sexual love is the force that in our bodily life connects us most intimately to the Creation, to the fertility of the world, to farming and the care of animals. It brings us into the dance that holds the community together and joins it to its place.'

Wendell Berry, Sex, Economy, Freedom, and Community, p.133.