Yay, a new post!

So, do I understand this right, is this just the age old question of 'can men and women be just friends?'

If that's the question then I would say the answer is yes they can. However in my case that has yet to be proven true because at some point of another in all those kind of relationships I can bring to mind things have gotten a little, lets say, blurry.

Oh but wait... I can think of one such relationship where there has never been and will never be any 'blurriness' because the girl in question is really fat. So perhaps the secret is that one or other of the parties involved has to be really fat and unattractive.

Of course, you're writing this from a churchy perspective so there's an element to this that I'm probably not quite getting because I'm not, shall we say, 'intimately involved' with a church. So perhaps I don't fully understand the question.

I've often wondered how the older single people in churches handle the fact that they can't, you know, get some. With all the strict rules in place it must be pretty frustrating and I didn't even think about the Genesis thing. I guess maybe they have to think it's all God's will right? I mean that's what most Christians do when things aren't going well. They stuff like "It's all in Gods hands" or some such thing. So then from that maybe we can conclude that God wanted some people to be alone?

Heck, in the old testament the men had multiple wives and was it Abraham who married his half sister? But by the time the apostle Paul came around he was telling men that they should only take a woman if they couldn't control their lusts. (I think Paul must have had a bad romantic experience somewhere along the line.)

Maybe a single person can find a really rewarding relationship in a small group, or through close friends, but there can be no way that these environments can provide the kind of intimacy that God was thinking about when he gave Adam a naked lady to play with! To even suggest such a thing would be daft, right?

@thekingofnonomia - The king said "...Maybe a single person can find a really rewarding relationship in a small group, or through close friends, but there can be no way that these environments can provide the kind of intimacy that God was thinking about when he gave Adam a naked lady to play with! To even suggest such a thing would be daft, right?"

Actually this is my point...almost.  God did give Adam a lady; but it was the same lady for all of his life (mind you, all the rest were his offspring).  But contrary to what the king may be suggesting, sexual coupling in and of itself, though quite pleasurable, would not address the aloneness God wanted to save Adam from.  After all, if intercourse/orgasm by itself could alleviate this aloneness that could have been addressed by coupling with an animal (though some practice such debauchery to this day).  The quest for the experience of sexual coupling may an attempt to address aloneness, but the results are temporal at best.  Some who are bonifide sex addicts may be successful at sexual coupling 3-6 times a day, but no report is given by them (and I know a few) that their activity fullfils their need for relational intimacy.  If it did male or female prostitutes would have more relational intimacy than the rest of us.  No, sexual coupling doesn't even come close to addressing what God was referring to when he said "It is not good for man to be alone."

Oh come now, I wasn't suggesting that the only ingredient to intimacy was shagging, far from it. I was pondering whether a man and a woman could fulfill one anothers needs for intimacy without there being some kind of sexual/romantic connection or at least confusion.

As I said, in the old testament the men had multiple wives and Abraham was busy getting down and dirty with his half sister for heavens sake! Such debauchery would be scandalous nowadays but thankfully for Abe his shenanigans with his half sister were before the days of CNN and the 700 Club.

I think that 'the church' today isn't as important as it thinks or wishes it was. We have lost our sense of community among the mixed messages and blurred lines of wealth and responsibility. We live on streets where we barely know the names of those around us and where we, by default, assume that everyone is suspect until proved otherwise. The church is no longer a community focal point, instead it is merely a religious clubhouse where the faithful and the faithless go to sing a few songs, and hang out with people just like themselves. We live completely disconnected lives at a time of interconnectivity never seen before in the history of mankind.

Your question might sound simple, but the reality of it is anything but. The need for intimacy is a basic human need and while friends and 'small groups' might be able to provide a single person with a great deal of support, they fall short of ticking all the boxes. Strangely enough, while Christians believe God is capable of all things, it seems that providing this basic level of intimacy is something even he can't do.

@thekingofnonomia - "Strangely enough, while Christians believe God is capable of all things, it seems that providing this basic level of intimacy is something even he can't do."

Actually I think He can meet our need for intimacy, but we miss it in our efforts to not wind up in a "compromising position".  Many Christian singles are very nervous relating to the opposite sex.  They either distrust their own resolve about abstinance (not that resolved), or they may wrongly believe that there's no need to have close friends of the opposite sex because they'll have a spouse one day, or perhaps they don't know how to be vulnerable and disclosing with someone other than an exclusive romantic partner.   From my point of view they're missing out on a very good gift from their heavenly father in the other.  I think men and women can be intimate friends, and there are an abundance of scriptures helping us know how to love one another well.  If we view one another rightly, without objectification, without seeing the other as a way to meet our need, but relate to one another in unselfish and sacrificial ways, then the relationship has a chance to become mutually beneficial, interdependent, and, dare I say, intimate, without romantic feelings or sexuality ever becoming part of the equation.  I'll go a step further and say that if one has intimate relationships with mutiple members of the opposite sex, and within the context of faith and the admonitions of the scriptures, then objectivity regarding a "more special one" is more within reach, given the intimacy is being enjoyed with several already.

Perhaps a better question to ask then is this. Hw many Xian singls out there are currently involved in a non-romantic or sexual intimate relationship in which they have no at any time thought about shagging the brains out of their opposite sex friend?

Of course, this question is probably not really going to get many (if any) answers because you unfortunately haven't updated your blog in so long I doubt that there are many people left out there in Xangaland who are reading this as they all seem to have defected to Facebook (Boo!). But of those who are single and do read this then I wonder if they are brave enough to come forward and say that they have an intimate friend of the opposite sex who they have never at any point wondered what they would look like without clothes.

One of my Christian friends believes that men and women can't be intimate friends because people might assume that they are intimate in more ways than just the friendship way. This falls into their "avoid the appearance of evil" which is to my mind the single most evil instruction in the Bible.

So come on people. Speak up, how many of you single out there are involved in a really rewarding intimate relationship with a single person of the opposite sex? Name names, if it's all above board and there is no hanky panky going on then there shouldn't be a problem right?

Of course, the problem is, if there is any hanky panky going on the church is hardly a place where people feel like being honest about sex. The church is the most fumblingly ill equipped social body when it comes to dealing with issues of sex or sexuality. It steadies itself by standing in the quicksand of religious rules and bigoted dogma, avoiding the appearance of evil while hiding behind tried and tested party lines hoping the world doesn't notice that they're just as sex obsessed as everyone else on the face of the planet.

I think I rest my case.

Good, because I think you veered from my intended query.  Many of my acquaintences are experiencing healthy relationships for the first time in their lives, learning to view each other through the cross of Jesus, maybe the way God must see each respectively.  I am hoping more will see "the other" in these healthy ways, rather than wishing to address whatever sexual urge may distract from such.  Though there may initially be some thought of seeing the other in a sexually objectified way, they are able to move past that and into intimacy of an emotional and spiritual nature, genuinely caring for the other without the anticipation of sexual connection, without seeing the other as a path to sexual-gratification.  I have experience this myself.

Rather, I believe the lack of response is what you referenced earlier...the defection to Facebook, and not an admission of guilt to what you suggest. 

It is true that all of us are sexual persons, but not all of us are on the make.  I for one do not struggle with what you suggest all must surely struggle with regarding relating to another, though I am not immune to imaginative fantasy.  And I have not found it to be true that sexual copulation is foremost in everyone's mind like you insecently purport.  If it is for you then fine, I believe you, really I do, but that does not prove it the universal pursuit of every person on the planet under the age of 40.  I am close friends with a couple of the people that you have admitted on this forum that when around them you consider them as potential sexual partners, and I believe you.  However when I am around them I do not think about them in that way.  Believe it or not, not every person is scheming regarding their next orgasm, though I do know of some who are. 

I believe in intimacy beyond genetalia.  And that was the subject of my post.  Maybe you missed that.

Well that's a telling off if ever I had one.

Maybe I missed your point David. I'll grant, not being a churchy person I think that perhaps I did, but I think maybe you missed mine too when you were stuff those words in my mouth. But hey, I won't go telling you off for that

No it wasn't.  Go back and read my post (I just did).  I am not telling you off.  I am getting back to the subject of my blog.  I even agree with you at some of your points.  And I am telling you why I disagree on the others.  Such is the nature of posting comments...right?  I don't believe our need for intimacy is fulfilled on a deep level in small groups or with casual friendships.  But neither do I believe casual sexual liasons fulfill the need either, at least long term, though it may be an attempt at such.  I have deep friendships with women other than the one I'm married to.  I do not consider them in sexual ways because when that initial tension arose (if it did) it was moved past that in a matter of minutes, and went on to years of meaningful intimate friendship; these relationships truely being gifts to me.  My wife has similar friendships with men other than myself.  Sorry to disappoint, but neither the two of us, nor the ones we're friends with endure ongoing thoughts of shagging the other.  If there ever were such a fleeting thought (we are human after all) it was put behind us in short order and we moved on to building a friendship within the parameters of two married people in committed, happily married relationships.  I can think of 10 women off the top of my head that I have this kind of relationship with, all of them blessings to my life and my wife's as well.

Saw this and thought it might be of interest to you David.

http://www.wcco.com/video/?id=59319@wcco.dayport.com

Hope you're well and all that.

Simon