Abstract
Don’t be misled by the title; this book is more than a collection of tawdry affairs or the moral vicissitudes of the United States’ born-again Christians. In fact, Christians Under Covers is nothing short of a modern flagship for the academic study of religion and sexual culture. In this book, Kelsy Burke addresses one of the most influential forces in setting the tone for sex and gender norms in the West – evangelical Christians. The author provides titillating insight into a territory seemingly more liberated and uninhibited than evangelicals’ own bedrooms: that is, their personal internet browsers. This book provides a ‘win–win’ in both content and methodology via a thorough methodological triangulation of the perceptions and lived experiences of US Christian evangelicals.
For two years, Burke ‘lurked’ behind the screens of no fewer than three dozen blogs, online storefronts, and message boards built for and by Christian evangelicals seeking greater fulfillment via the pursuit of ‘godly sex.’ Burke utilizes every qualitative tool at her disposal including an online ethnography, interviewing, and content analysis – just short of participant observation (because Burke herself never directly participated in or posted to discussions threads). Combined with quantitative analysis of website users via the author’s Christians, Sexuality, and the Internet Survey (CSIS), the book builds a sophisticated and rich account of this enigmatic subculture, providing illustrative, witty, and often contradictive commentary as a ‘voyeur’ into the chat rooms of websites of the likes of the aptly-monikered, BetweenTheSheets.com or LustyChristianLadies.com (which, according to Burke’s descriptions, are much less hedonistic than their addresses might suggest). Like Laud Humphreys’ (1970) notorious Tea Room Trade, Burke performs an innovative ethnography that breaks down the assumed privacy of online discourse that many mistakenly assume. Although the study brings to question the validity and feasibility of informed consent and transparency when conducting ethnographic investigation online, the author’s ethical considerations are overtly disclosed throughout the book, ensuring that Burke’s methods will not gain the same infamy as her predecessor. What they hold in common, however, is the same exposure of an unknown and subversive subculture of sexual deviants existing invisibly in plain sight. In addition, Burke is aware of the necessities of layering evidence when disseminating some newly revealed social phenomenon and, again, like Humphreys, depends on meticulously defined divisions of scrutiny. It is obvious that the author is not under the impression that she has stumbled upon a simple niche support group, but on the makings of a reformative movement.
For the field of sociology of religion, this study speaks to the dynamics and complexities that are not often captured in the typical rhetoric of invariable religious followers. The ethnography provides a more accurate portrayal of a group that at first glance might appear even more traditional than their mainstream counterparts. Burke’s CSIS study finds that compared to General Social Survey results, the subjects of the study population are more likely than average evangelicals to describe sex between two same-sex and/or unmarried adults as ‘always’ wrong and report higher rates of weekly church attendance. It is a contradictory narrative. Though one might expect that those willing to discuss their sexual life and faith with strangers would be more progressive, the participants described in Christians Under Covers actually tend to reinforce and propagate traditional gender and sex identity beliefs.
Burke is clear that any sexual revolutions that are achieved as a result of this online reference group’s activity are strictly exclusive and come with limitations. Heteronormativity, binary definitions of sex and gender, and patriarchal subservience of women to men are among the most common ideals that the participants in these online communities protect vigilantly. Odd that, in these second-life communities where women may find the tools to bring about a sexual awakening, they are also encouraged to offer their bodies selflessly and sacrificially to their husbands. And although the men in these communities may engage in nonconforming ‘submissive’ roles, defying the accepted sexual boundaries between the traditional roles to which Christian husbands and wives are expected to adhere, it is clear that these notions do not extend past the bounds of physical pleasure, a construct the author refers to as gender omniscience. Regardless of the challenge to physical sex roles, the spouse, in particular the husband, is sure to reiterate themselves or their partners as being ‘100% man.’ Though embracing sexual behaviors that feminists such as Judith Butler (2004) might hail as a preemptive challenge to sexual differences, these evangelicals are clear on their cisgender stance – they are not in any way meaning to contest traditional views of gender, sex, or sexuality. The pleasure seekers instead conform their deviant sexual expression into the confines of preexisting normative restrictions, a counterintuitive response.
In addition, the text provides a somewhat unintentional insight into what is accounted to the individual’s will and responsibility, and what is accounted to sin and the will of God, a line that often seems blurred and murky. As the participants share their most delicate and intimate issues – from apprehensions and uncertainties about one’s partner’s expectations to fears about an unfaithful spouse – these very fleshy and mortal concerns are often attributed to an inadequate foundation of faith or inactive prayer life. But what of free will? What of the individual’s responsibilities, traumas, and fault? Though Burke repeats this theme a few times, it is apparent that the participants are unable to reconcile this paradox. Instead, they circle round this complexity, only alluding to the unreliability of such a paradigm in extreme situations, such as one discussant who, after describing months of dissatisfaction with her new groom’s selfish approach to lovemaking, ignores several participants’ advice that she and her beau seek counseling in light of the power of the groups’ prayers and God’s will – prayers that she believes have led to an overnight transformation of her husband’s heart. Even these stringent believers, who have pledged their prayers and recited scripture in lieu of the discussant’s situation, are unable to accept such a miraculous turn of events, leaving readers to wonder: ‘then what is it all about?’
And the latter, in turn, is the question readers are confronted with time after time for the duration of the text. For social scientists seeking a connection between this type of study and progressive gender and sex lived experience, what does this study matter? Does this online demographic increase the diversity of sexual narratives, or does it have a more limiting effect? Is this a gaggle of sexually liberated religious adherents or a flock of conservative born-again sexual deviants? Although we are not completely clear on what to make of Christians Under Covers in application, we can be sure that this will not be our last chance to witness this emerging movement.