Beloveds, tell me. How did you learn about your sexuality? What is your story? 

Who were the people whose messages were most influential? What were the typical spaces in which sexuality was discussed or explored? What news sources, movies, magazines, or screens populated your imagination with images and ideas? 

Were these messages, images, and ideas generally sex-positive, and did they help you accept your sexuality as an integral part of your wholeness (whatever your sexual orientation happens to be)? Did they help you learn to accept others? 

Or were they merely clinical and taught you only sexual mechanics and machinery? 

Or, worse, were they fear-based and judgmental? Mean-spirited, divisive, even hateful? 

What story are you bringing to church this morning? 

Here’s some of mine. 

Most days after elementary school, when I was around nine, I’d go to dad’s medical office and hang out in the doctor’s lounge. It wasn’t far to walk there, and it was a safe place to hang out. At home, I would have found my mother passed out on the couch, or in a manic state, or in a state of punishing rage. 

Far better to kill time at dad’s office.

Once and a while one of dad’s colleagues would come through the lounge, see me and say hi, and float out again in his ghostly white doctor’s coat. Sometimes it would be a nurse. Sometimes it would be dad himself. But mostly it was just me in a space with 1970s metal and leather sofas and chairs, surrounded by shelves full of books. 

First thing to do was pour myself a cup of coffee and jazz it up with three sugars and a dollop of milk. 

Second thing to do was pull my homework out of my backpack and do it. 

Third thing to do was find ways to amuse myself until dad was done and we could go home. 

It didn’t take long to start exploring what was on the shelves. Much to my surprise, I discovered Playboys wedged in between the medical textbooks. You heard me right–Playboy magazines, in between weighty tomes about anatomy and physiology, internal medicine, surgery, and dermatology. On the cover of one of these Playboys was a woman whose head was slightly tilted down and her eyes peered at me through her eyelashes. Her hands were unbuttoning her blouse and I could see a hint of her breasts. 

This was way better than coffee. I felt warmed in a way that was strange for a nine-year-old. Listening beyond the lounge’s doorway for any telltale signs of someone approaching, I flipped the magazine open. The things I saw. 

One time dad caught me. He laughed. “It’s ok. It’s good to want to explore.” I felt relieved of course, but I waited for him to leave before I dived back in. It seemed to be the sort of thing that was private.

And private it remained. There were some brief conversations years later, in high school, when dad endorsed our church’s message of strict abstinence. Though my raging hormones thought otherwise, at some level I understood. My mom and dad’s constant fighting–full of physical and emotional abuse–got under my skin and made me afraid that any relationship I had would end up the same. In this way, I began to fear my sexual urges. This fear existed in strange tension with dad’s positive permission to explore. It was confusing. 

Our church–the uber-fundamentalist Crockett Road Church of Christ–also taught that being gay was completely unnatural and hateful to God. The message was only emphasized in youth group gatherings on Sunday evenings. I remember one of these times and how, by sheer accident, I happened to glance at the person sitting across from me in our circle. You know how it is when you see someone’s social mask fall off and then, startled, they put it right back on? The evils of homosexuality were being preached, and I saw this sweet teenager’s face turn horrified and afraid and then, instantly, the mask was back on, and his face returned to calm composure. 

Later I asked if he was alright. “Absolutely,” he said, and then he paused and asked softly. “Do you really think God hates gay people? Doesn’t Jesus love everyone?” 

I wondered exactly the same thing. 

It only meant more confusion. Then horror, when I’d learned that he’d come out and his parents kicked him out of the house and he was gone. I never heard from him again. 

That fall I started college, and that’s when I experienced my very first romantic relationship. It took that long for me to, as some say, “bloom.” But it was restricted to marathons of kissing, mostly. One time, during spring break, she interrupted our kissing marathon with a clear request that we go further. 

Further? I told her I couldn’t. 

After all, I’d made a vow of abstinence to Jesus. 

We broke up near the end of my freshman year. And then, a month into my sophomore year, Jesus and I broke up. I couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t accept anymore the teaching that Jesus and God hate people for something they were born as. People are born gay as much as they’re born straight. (Transgender issues were not on my radar back then, but it follows along the same lines. Sometimes people are born into bodies that honestly don’t match their deepest sense of who they are.)

Is the hate from God, truly, or is the hate from human prejudice and cruelty? 

I was so tired of all the hate. The God I believed in wasn’t a hateful God at all.

People needed to stop putting words in Jesus’ mouth!

The spring of my sophomore year, I took an honors Introductory to Psychology class, and half of our grade came from a term paper. The topic was completely up to the individual. I chose the psychology of masturbation. That desire to explore sexuality, which I’d tapped into in my dad’s doctor’s lounge years earlier, felt stronger than ever. And what I learned shocked me and delighted me. Did you know that masturbation has been witnessed in elephants, walruses, squirrels, porcupines, bats, lizards, turtles, penguins, killer whales, and two types of river dolphin? I could go on. Masturbation wasn’t just a human psychological, physiological thing. But the bigger point to me was that the religious indoctrination I’d grown up under always acted like it knew what was natural and God-ordained and what was unnatural and sinful. My science-based exploration of masturbation proved that the emperor had no clothes. God had made the world mind-bogglingly diverse, and that’s exactly how God made it good. What was sinful–what was perverse–were all the human-based efforts to fit sexuality into a tiny box and to condemn anything that wouldn’t fit. 

That’s my story–just a part of it. I pretty much navigated my sexuality all alone. To me it felt huge but also frightening and confusing. My dad did give me permission to explore–but it was porn I initially explored and my child’s mind made up stories to explain the outrageous things I was looking at. Popular media and music constantly churned out sexual innuendos. The only clear direction I really received about sex came from the church I grew up in, but that direction turned out to be a complete dead end. Only in college did my curiosity take a more constructive form, and my mind was opened when I learned that nature is no narrow thing. Radical diversity is natural. Radical diversity, like the colors of the rainbow, is true. 

And now here I am, and here you are, with your stories. 

As for where we are, all here together: we’re at church!

But it’s nothing like the church of my childhood. If you went to church as a kid, it might be nothing like yours growing up either. 

Thank Buddha. 

Thank Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva.

Thank Zeus, Hera, and Poseidon.

Thank Obatala, Olokun, Orunmila.

Thank Odin, Thor, and Frigg.

I’ll stop while I’m ahead. You get my point.

To all the gods and goddesses, I’m grateful!

What this church does with sexuality education–what Unitarian Universalism does–is truly unique. If our Unitarian Universalist faith is one of the best kept secrets in the world of religions, then the Our Whole Lives comprehensive sexuality education classes we teach is the best kept secret of all our best kept secrets! 

The reality in America today: it is a tremendously oversexualized society populated by millions and millions who simply don’t want to talk about sex–or they don’t know how to talk about it in candid and informed ways. Too many parents freak out if children are brought into honest and practical conversation about it; too many parents want their kids to remain perfectly innocent, even though those kids are bombarded by media-based sexual imagery and innocence is a lost cause.

When innocence is a lost cause, what’s really needed is a capacity for self-defence. Not less talk but more. Not less information but more. And sooner rather than later. Once people have experienced a few sexual bumps and bruises and fallen into certain patterns, they can be harder to reach. Healthy sexuality can be a harder thing to teach. 

One could only hope that public education might help, but not really. Slightly less than half of all American states actually require sex education in public schools. Of these states, less than forty percent require their curriculums to be “medically, factually or technically accurate.” Furthermore, many school districts requiring sex education choose to go the abstinence-only route. Doesn’t matter that abstinence-only has been an abject failure in every place it’s been tried. Doesn’t matter that study after study shows that comprehensive sexuality education like OWL actually decreases the likelihood of teens having sex. Millions of dollars are still spent on abstinence-only.

On top of all this, on his first day in office (January 20, 2025), President Donald Trump issued an Executive Order entitled “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.” This is essentially a rejection of something we know to be true: that sex refers to biological differences, typically assigned at birth based on physical characteristics like genitalia and chromosomes, while gender is a social construct that encompasses roles, behaviors, expressions, and identities. Sex is biological, and gender is social and psychological. This is noncontroversial, settled science. But the government now rejects it as “ideology,” and it is aggressively seeking to end legal recognition of transgender and nonbinary people. It’s wanting you or people you love to disappear. 

This Executive Order also paves the way for the government to remove protections against sex stereotyping and sexual harassment. Act queer, and you’re in for a world of hurt, and the government thinks that that’s just fine. You’re safe only if you fall in line with how “normal” women and men are supposed to present themselves. If you’re a woman, don’t act too masculine. If you’re a man, you better not wear pink. 

It’s layer after layer after layer of problems, from the government to schools and families in a society that pulses with hypersexuality. 

And we wonder why there is so much sexual dysfunction and violence in our world!

Unitarian Universalism says no to this! 

NO!

And we’ve been saying it for more than 50 years now.

Go back to Hugh Hefner’s Playboy magazine. Also go back to Helen Gurley Brown and her magazine Cosmopolitan, which preached the “Cosmo Girl” ideal which embodied a combination of ambition, sexuality, and a desire for a fulfilling life, often associated with success and a “you can have it all” mentality. 

Both these magazines were part of the 1960s sexual revolution, which swept through America and delinked sexuality from hard and fast rules of right and wrong. Sexuality was reframed as a means of expressing your individuality, and people had a right to that. Your emotions, your personal beliefs and values, and your quest to become self-actualized now became the touchstones of sexual ethics.  

The times were exciting for everyone and also confusing. Unitarian Universalist leaders were very aware of how UU parents found themselves at a loss about how to educate their children about sex. 

Enter “About Your Sexuality,” the UU comprehensive sex-ed curriculum, starting in 1972. That’s when our church started saying: all persons are sexual; sexuality is a good part of the human experience; sexuality includes much more than sexual behavior; human beings are sexual from the time they are born until they die; it is natural to express sexual feelings in a variety of ways; people engage in sexual behavior for a variety of healthy reasons–so as to express caring and love, or to experience intimacy and connection with another, or to share pleasure, or to bring new life into the world, or simply to experience fun and relaxation.

For more than 50 years, we’ve been providing up-to-date information and candid answers to questions about sexuality; activities to help people clarify values and improve decision-making skills; effective group building to create a safe and supportive peer groups; opportunities to critique media messages about gender and sexuality; acceptance of diversity; and encouragement to act for justice.

About Your Sexuality touched thousands of young lives, and changed them for the better.

And then it became clear that an update was necessary. By the late 1990s, three decades after the Summer of Love and Woodstock, the downsides of the sexual revolution had become clear–its tendency to commercialize and dehumanize sexuality. There had also been significant strides made in birth control, LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, safer sex, and assault prevention. Furthermore, the radicalism of the left was now being balanced by backlash from the right, with conservative groups organizing against LGBTQ+ rights and respect and installing abstinence-only programs in schools. 

Times had evolved. The needs were different now. 

And we weren’t the only liberal church aware of this. The United Church of Christ–not the non-united and fundamentalist Church of Christ I used to go to–partnered with Unitarian Universalism, and after seven years of collaboration, Our Whole Lives (OWL for short) was born in 1999. 

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OWL is a lifespan-oriented program, offering an age-appropriate exploration of a wide variety of sexual topics for grades K–1, 4–6, 7–9, 10–12, as well as for young adults (18- to 35-year-olds), adults, and older adults. The emphasis is on self worth, sexual health, responsibility, and justice and inclusivity. Abstinence is okay, coercion is never okay, and sexually transmitted diseases are real and must be dealt with. 

OWL’s guiding precept is that honest, accurate information about sexuality changes lives. It dismantles stereotypes and assumptions, builds self-acceptance and self-esteem, fosters healthy relationships, improves decision making, and in general defangs all the cruel and hateful messages out there that impact the most vulnerable among us. 

OWL is also interactive and engaging. During the grades K-1 class, for example, the kids will explore the topic of consent through a scenario about Uncle Fred. Uncle Fred comes to visit for Thanksgiving and the first thing he says when he comes through the door is, “Give Uncle Fred a kiss.” The kids are then asked, Do you think it’s ok not to give Uncle Fred a kiss if you don’t want to? They talk about it. They struggle with it. They are wrapping their minds around the critical fact that their bodies are their own. That they have a right to make decisions about it! 

Consider another activity, this one for grades 7-9. The students are given onions to chop. The inevitable result is crying, and the class talks about how that is a physiological response to the chemical fumes in the onion. “When you shed tears, did that mean you were sad?” asks the teacher, and the students say no. A physiological response can be separate and apart from an emotional one. “So does that mean,” continues the teacher, “when a boy has an erection, it doesn’t necessarily say that he wants to have sex?” The kids think about that one, and they agree. It doesn’t. Then the teacher gets to the critical point, about how people can use the argument that Oh, well, he had an erection so he couldn’t have been raped, or She had an orgasm so she couldn’t have been raped. 

It’s a lesson about autonomy. Autonomy is about all of a person, body and heart and mind. Abuse of autonomy can never be excused even if physical contact leads to an automatic physical response….

Talk about powerful! It’s about children and people of all ages learning how to make healthy decisions and having the opportunity to think about things before they happen in real life.

But now, let me ask you: what’s your best guess about the level of controversy this has sparked? The level of press coverage? The number of allegations that we’ve violated obscenity statutes? Best guess, anyone, anyone?

Oh yes. We cannot underestimate how countercultural the values are that animate Our Whole Lives, or its predecessor program, About Your Sexuality.

I was reading an article in The Atlantic from several years ago, and I found this statement from Sharon Slater, the president of the advocacy group Family Watch International which has a documentary out entitled “The War on Children: Exposing the Comprehensive Sexuality Education Agenda.” 

Here’s her statement: “Comprehensive Sexuality Education encourages children to engage in sexual experimentation and high-risk sexual behaviors.” And then there’s Dr. Miriam Grossman, a psychiatrist who regularly lectures on the topic of sex education, who argues that abstinence-based education is essential to protecting children from sexually irresponsible behavior.

Absolutely untrue!

There’s nothing new about this sort of uninformed and irrational opposition to programs like OWL. Rev. Jennifer Hamlin-Navias tells the story of the time (about 25 years ago) when the TV show 60 Minutes did an “expose.” “Originally,” she says, “the Unitarian Universalist Association had offered to have a male professor who taught in the area of human sexuality for the interview.  But 60 Minutes did not like him.  Rev. Makanah Morris [then the head of the UUA’s Religious Education Department] got the sense that 60 Minutes wanted to interview someone who would be easy to manipulate.  Eventually the UUA suggested Bobbie Nelson, a Director of Religious Education from Massachusetts who had worked with the development of our sexuality education. 60 Minutes liked her. However, she wasn’t the pushover they’d hoped for. Bryant Gumbel barely got a word in edgewise. When the interview was over he said, ‘Well that wasn’t so bad was it?’ Bobby Nelson just shook her finger at him and said, ‘You should be ashamed for what you just did.’” Rev. Hamlin-Navias ends the story by saying, “I think maybe 60 Minutes expected some sweet little church lady – they did not know how fierce our [religious educators] can be in helping to raise up our children. 60 Minutes’ sexism did not serve them well that day.”

That’s right. Unitarian Universalist religious educators are fierce. Us too. We are fierce for our children and we are fierce for people of all ages and all sexual orientations. We are fierce about the truth, which is that talking about sex in candid and factually-informed ways does not so much inspire irresponsibility as responsibility and respect. We are fierce about that. Fierce about helping people make wise decisions about their sexual health and behavior. Fierce about equipping people with accurate, age-appropriate information in human development, relationships, personal skills, sexual behavior, sexual health, and society and culture. Not just negative stuff but positive stuff too. Fierce about providing facts about anatomy and human development. Fierce about helping people clarify their values, build interpersonal skills, and understand the spiritual, emotional, social, and political aspects of sexuality as well.

Fierce.

Listen to writer Melinda Gebbie when she describes the magnitude of what sex represents in our lives. “Sex is a metaphor for everything else and everything is a metaphor for sex as well. Because sex is a coming together of two weather patterns, two separate countries, two entities in a conscious state of potentially blissful crisis. Or chaos, or harmony. You’re not quite sure what’s going to happen, but it is the most catastrophic, exciting, and [beautifully] weakening thing that can happen to us.”

Sexuality is that powerful. Therefore it can also be that devastating. No less than life and death consequences stem from choices around sexuality, as when we consider STDs or the epidemic of suicides in LGBTQ+ teens.

So we are fierce
Because it’s worth being fierce about the most important things in life.
Because the implications are life and death, or lifelong.
We are fierce for that.
We are fierce for life, lived fully, and well.
We are fierce.