Heightened awareness of the problem of sexual abuse has led to deep anxiety over adults touching children in nearly any context. This book probes the disquieting issue of how we can draw a clear line between natural affection towards children and perverse exploitation of them.

Sexual health is an essential part of maintaining professional relationships in ministry. Focusing on implications for the practice of ministry, this book engages all dimensions of theological education and academic disciplines. Each chapter includes an analysis of common ministry situations, discussion questions, practical guidelines, and resources for further study. The volume is ideal for use in courses on professional ethics for ministry, advanced leadership training, and continuing education for clergy.

A values-based, shame-free, pleasure-positive discussion of Christian ethics in response to a range of pressing issues in the digital age—including online pornography, dating apps, sexting, virtual-reality hookups, and sex robots. Digital innovation has rapidly changed the landscape of sexual experience in the twenty-first century. Rules-based sexual ethics, subscribed to by many Christians, are unable to keep up with new developments and, more often than not, seem effective at little other than generating shame. Progressive ethicist Kate Ott steps into this void with an expansive yet nuanced approach that prioritizes honesty and discernment over fear and judgment. Rather than producing a list of don’ts, Ott considers the possibilities alongside the potential harm in everything from the use of internet porn to the practice of online dating to human-robot intimacy. With the aid of thought-provoking anecdotes and illuminating research, Ott invites readers to wrestle with the question of how to practice a just and flourishing sexuality in the digital age—and does so by drawing on core values of the Christian tradition. A rich resource for both individuals and groups, Sex, Tech, and Faith includes discussion questions at the end of each chapter for those considering these issues in community, as well as extensive youth study guides for parents, pastors, and teachers in need of age-appropriate means of beginning these difficult conversations with teens. Readers of all backgrounds and identities will be challenged to consider how their choices and habits in the digital world can lead to sexual health, wholeness, dignity, and fulfillment—for themselves and those in relationship with them.

Combining over fifteen years of clinical experience with her groundbreaking research into the science of flow, Dr. Emily Jamea's ANATOMY OF DESIRE delivers a fresh perspective on the untapped potential of our sex lives, intimate partner connections, and personal wellbeing. "Dr. Emily Jamea makes difficult issues simple and accessible via her central tenet that expressing our authentic sexual selves is not about venturing into the unknown but rather searching within ourselves and tapping into our innate, albeit uncultivated, sexual potential. Dr. Emily guides us on this journey with care and curiosity” – Ian Kerner, PhD LMFT, NY Times best-selling author of She Comes First The experience of effortlessness, total absorption, and loss of space and time are feelings that everyone wants to enjoy while making love. However, regardless of everyone’s desire for better sex, passion and sexual satisfaction tend to diminish in longer-term relationships. This is a problem because studies consistently show that sexual satisfaction is key to relationship satisfaction. Great sex is something we all deserve. As a seasoned sex and relationship therapist, Dr. Emily Jamea has developed a unique approach for boosting sexual desire and pleasure. Anatomy of Desire identifies five secrets―sensuality, curiosity, adaptability, vulnerability, and attunement―that help her clients transform sex from sub-par to extraordinary. Woven through each secret is the science of “flow state.” Drawing from her first-of-its-kind published research, Dr. Emily teaches readers how to apply the science of flow to get the sex they want despite the challenges of today’s modern world. Clients, workshop participants, and hundreds of thousands of social media followers have already benefited from her approach. Dr. Emily Jamea’s debut book, Anatomy of Desire: Five Secrets to Create Connection and Cultivate Passion makes her novel approach available to everyone.

Awaken your mindful sensuality and reconnect with your partner with Passion and Presence. Most romantic relationships follow a predictable pattern of initial enchantment followed by inevitable disenchantment. But relationships don't have to stay in disenchantment or end! Passion and Presence offers readers a proven path back to connection and intimacy--often in deeper ways than before. Sex therapist Maci Daye draws on her popular international Passion and Presence workshops to show couples how their erotic difficulties can be a portal to creativity, compassion, and unparalleled growth. Exercises and reflections guide readers down what Daye calls the "naked path" of awakened intimacy. On this path, we courageously examine ourselves, our barriers, and our relationship patterns, ultimately finding fresh ways to heal and connect, and revitalize eros. With gentle clarity, Daye addresses the everyday challenges of "real life" sex, such as sex that has become routine, differences in preferences or desire, power struggles, a history of trauma, changes ranging from childbirth to aging, infidelity, communication challenges, and more. Engaging stories depicting couples of diverse ages, backgrounds, genders, and orientations illustrate how the practice of Passion and Presence can help any couple establish a more intimate and wakeful erotic life.

Offers a new theology of desire and delight based on the Christian hope for bodily resurrection. This work is part of a growing chorus of theological voices raised in support of erotic desire. Although most theologians have concluded that there will be no experience of sexual desire and delight in the world to come, Patricia Beattie Jung critically examines the historical traditions and biblical rationales for this teaching. She defends an alternative claim that there will be a healed and glorified experience of sex in heaven based on a compelling account of the Christian hope for bodily resurrection. The first half of the work focuses on Christian foundations for the notion of sex in heaven, while the second goes on to discuss some of the implications of those convictions for sex on earth. Jung concludes with discussions of how best to nurture sexual delight on earth and how and why internet pornography fails in that regard. “The book provides a valuable, alternative reading of Christian eschatological thinking about resurrected bodies and a sensitive, refreshing, and candid discussion about sexual delight.” — Adrian Thatcher, author of God, Sex, and Gender: An Introduction

Mothers, Sex, and Sexuality talks about things not normally dared spoken out loud—the interconnectedness and conflict between our parental and sexual selves, the taboo of the sexual mother, and why it matters so much to shatter it. What is it about the sexual mother that is incompatible, and at times even disturbing? Why are we threatened by maternal sexuality? And what does this tell us about the structures of gender and power that govern our bodies? Mothers, Sex, and Sexuality presents a rigorous academic analysis of the myriad ways in which the sexual/maternal divide affects women, birthing people, and those of us who assume or are ascribed the title "mother". We examine the way we as mothers talk to our daughters about sex, the way we talk about sex in a cultural context, and the deafening silence around sex in a medical system that overlooks maternal sexuality. We return repeatedly to the impact of both Christianity and Hinduism on the mother as someone to be revered but tightly controlled. We embrace the lost eroticism of mothering and hail breastfeeding as a sexual maternal practice, arguing for a new, broader, feminist understanding of sexuality. We discuss the way fat mothers destabalise the heteronormative maternal model, the way kinky queers are reconfiguring the sexual/maternal divide through erotic role-play, and we explore the strange, intense, and romantic domestic relationship that springs up between mothers and nannies—two heterosexual women trapped together in a homoerotic triangulation of need and desire. In a titillating climax we revel in the sexual maternal as embodied through performance art, poetry, installations, and comedy, disrupting queer readings of bodies as we are invited to both fuck, and fuck with, the maternal. This book boldly provides both a challenge to the patriarchal constraints of motherhood and a racy road-map escape route out of the sexual-maternal dichotomy.

It's socially acceptable to spend a day watching sports or sitcoms, but it's shameful and embarrassing to admit to the same about erotic media. Why is it that sex is so often deemed "inappropriate" and considered something we must keep private or even ignore? Our culture is afraid of sex. We feel the need to label what is normal and what isn't, and as a result, we live in a relational and sexually unhealthy culture. In reality, far more harm is caused by labeling sexual expression as "obscene" than by celebrating it. In Sex Outside the Lines: Authentic Sexuality in a Sexually Dysfunctional Culture, Chris Donaghue, PhD, explores and challenges the negative ideals that have warped society's view of sex. Sex Outside the Lines is not a dogmatic rule book, but a valuable guide to help you on your journey to sexual self-discovery and, most important, self-acceptance. Donaghue encourages you to not only explore your capacity for pleasure, but to be proud of it and to take a look at how you could be living. In his years of training in sex and couples therapy, Donaghue has developed highly successful methods for freeing clients from sexual hang-ups, enabling them to let go of shame and embarrassment. The goal isn't to be "normal"—there is no such thing. Donaghue pulls apart cultural phobias with a sex-positive therapy practice, as well as a kind of sexual deprograming that helps people see and accept that the desires they have—even if they don't align with society's expectations—are actually natural, healthy, and part of having a great sex life. Sex Outside the Lines addresses our diversity, challenges conventional psychiatric wisdom as classifying perfectly normal behavior as disorders, and disregards conventional advice from leading experts. It isn't advocating a "liberal" approach to modern concepts—it is seeking to redefine them altogether.

What does failure mean for theology? In the Bible, we find some unsettling answers to this question. We find lastness usurping firstness, and foolishness undoing wisdom. We discover, too, a weakness more potent than strength, and a loss of life that is essential to finding life. Jesus himself offers an array of paradoxes and puzzles through his life and teachings. He even submits himself to humiliation and death to show the cosmos the true meaning of victory. As David Bentley Hart observes, “most of us would find Christians truly cast in the New Testament mold fairly obnoxious: civically reprobate, ideologically unsound, economically destructive, politically irresponsible, socially discreditable, and really just a bit indecent.” By incorporating the work of scholars working with a range of frameworks within the Christian tradition, Theologies of Failure aims to offer a unique and important contribution on understanding and embracing failure as a pivotal theological category. As the various contributors highlight, it is a category with a powerful capacity for illuminating our theological concerns and perspectives. It is a category that frees us to see old ideas in a brand-new light, and helps to foster an awareness of ideas that certain modes of analysis may have obscured from our vision. In short, this book invites readers to consider how both theology and failure can help us ask new questions, discover new possibilities, and refuse the ways of the world.

Mara H. Benjamin contends that the physical and psychological work of caring for children presents theologically fruitful but largely unexplored terrain for feminists. Attending to the constant, concrete, and urgent needs of children, she argues, necessitates engaging with profound questions concerning the responsible use of power in unequal relationships, the transformative influence of love, human fragility and vulnerability, and the embeddedness of self in relationships and obligations. Viewing child-rearing as an embodied practice, Benjamin's theological reflection invites a profound reengagement with Jewish sources from the Talmud to modern Jewish philosophy. Her contemporary feminist stance forges a convergence between Jewish theological anthropology and the demands of parental caregiving.