Answer

If We Both Consent, Why Does God Care What We Do Sexually?

Everyone around you treats consent as the whole of sexual ethics. If two people agree and nobody is hurt, the reasoning goes, there is nothing left to discuss, and a commandment on top of that starts to look like interference. It is worth taking that argument seriously rather than dismissing it.

Consent matters enormously. Nobody should ever be pressured, coerced or forced, and any framework that says otherwise is wrong. But consent answers a different question from the one you are asking. It tells you whether both people chose. It does not tell you what the thing is for. God’s position is that sexual intimacy has a purpose, and consent cannot make something into what it is not.

Eternal Truths

Paul heard this exact argument and answered it. The Corinthian Saints had a slogan: “All things are lawful unto me.” Paul quoted it back at them, agreed that they were free, and then said that not all things are expedient, and that the body is the temple of the Holy Ghost (1 Corinthians 6:12-20). Being permitted to do a thing and having chosen well are separate facts.

The powers involved are creative ones, which is why they are fenced. The Family: A Proclamation to the World teaches that the sacred powers of procreation are to be employed only between a man and a woman lawfully wedded as husband and wife. A real possibility of a new life is part of what is on the table, and consent between two people does not speak for a third.

Intimacy is treated in scripture as a symbol, not merely an act. Elder Jeffrey R. Holland described it as a sacrament and as the ultimate symbol of total union in “Of Souls, Symbols, and Sacraments”. A symbol says something. What it says is not decided by whether both parties agreed to say it.

What Can Make This Confusing?

A good principle has been made to do a job it cannot do. Consent is a floor, and the mistake is treating a floor as a ceiling. It rules out the worst thing that can happen between two people, which is a real achievement. It has nothing to say about whether the relationship is honest, whether either person is ready for a child, or what happens to the bond that forms whether or not anyone intended it.

Questions to Think About

• Am I asking whether this is allowed, or whether it is good?
• What am I actually saying with my body, and would I say it in words?
• Would I want the person I eventually marry to have used this reasoning?

What You Can Do

Read 1 Corinthians 6:12-20 this week and notice how Paul moves from freedom to purpose in a few verses. Then write down what you believe sexual intimacy is for, in your own words, before the next time it is a live question. Consent protects agency; the gospel adds that your body is part of your discipleship, yours to consecrate rather than merely to consent with. The essay behind this Answer takes the argument apart more carefully.

Jesus Christ does not treat your body as shameful, and He can show you what He intends it for.