Intimacy Cover Up: Uncovering the Difference Between Love and Sex

Rating:
Summary: Christian propaganda...
Review: I was very disappointed by the author of this book, who uses the excuse of the difference between sex and love to make a propaganda for forbidding sex before marriage, for forbidding cohabitation before marriage. The difference between love and sex is essential (I would refer to Patrick Carnes and Charlotte Kasl), but it should not be the ground for rigid intrusiveness of the religion. Yes it is important to learn that sex is not love, yes it is important to reconnect spirituality with sexuality but no it does not mean that sex before marriage is wrong (regardless of marriage or not, sex should not be the foundation of a relationship).

I was particularly shocked when the author used statistics to show his point of view about (against) cohabitation. The author mistakes a successful (sexual) relationship with a lasting marriage (w/o divorce). I know so many cases of couples who never divorced, but which I would never consider as successful (physically or emotionally abused partners, etc.).

The author confuses commitment with the life of a love. I would invite the author to read Jacques Salome's books, where Jacques Salome describes that a love has a life (a birth but also an end), and as people changes through life, through experiences, it does not make any sense to be stuck in a commitment when the commitment no longer makes sense. It is not a way to escape commitment, it is simply an open-minded view (unlike the author's rigid concepts) over the unexpected, over the miracles of life. Yes, a true intimacy but also a true self-love are the essential ingredients to a successful relationship. Like Karl Menninger wrote, sex is not wrong but how we value (or disqualify) sex which makes is constructive or destructive.

As a conclusion, please do not buy this book, please do not read this book. If you want to learn about the difference between sex and love, I strongly recommend you read "Women, sex and addiction" by Charlotte Kasl and "Out of the shadow" by Patrick Carnes.