Mormon Beliefs: Chastity

The Law of Chastity is an important commandment from God that never changes. It demands abstinence from sexual activity outside of marriage (which is defined as the legal union of a man and a woman) and complete fidelity within marriage.

How Living the Law of Chastity Brings Blessings

Studies have shown that sexual behaviors outside of marriage dull our ability to love fully and our ability to commit fully in a loving, long-term relationship.

Recent findings uphold the doctrines of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, sometimes mistakenly called the Mormon Church. One is that intimate affection brings about a chemical, biological, and emotional bonding between participants, that is painful to break. Many teens go to counselors, unable to separate themselves emotionally from prior relationships where intimacy, even brief intimacy, was shared. Once sexuality becomes frequent without deep, shared affection, people subconsciously disassociate themselves from the partner as an emotional protection. This is called "objectification" — the other person becomes an object of sexual adventure, rather than a person worthy of unselfish, committed love. Objectifying kills love, and indeed, once an entire society descends into promiscuity, love dies all around. The apostle Paul said of the promiscuous(referring also to those participating in homosexual encounters),

"...Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful..." (Romans 1:29-31).

Objectification is the result also of indulgence in pornography. The addicted person objectifies the spouse and even the children in a family, thus ending the loving relationships that once existed, leading to divorce and estrangement.

This result is even seen in co-habiting relationships wherein people live together, even intending to get married someday. When they do eventually wed, the relationship is fragile, the divorce rate higher, not lower, even though the live-in relationship was intended to deepen familiarity and lead to a better marriage.