Steve Watters, M.A., from Boundless Webzine.

Ken* knew it wasn't right. He struggled with pornography throughout high school and going to college didn't change things, but he thought it was just a private little habit he'd have to work on.

"What drew me in deeper to pornography was the secrecy, shame, and guilt that is usually associated with it," says Brad* who struggled throughout college. "I felt like I couldn't tell anyone about my problem, and this began to snowball. The deeper I became involved in pornography, the harder it was to climb out."

Here's how the cycle works. Whether they recognize it or not, guys like Ken and Brad need relational intimacy - they need for people to know them and like them. Early on, however, they realize that relationships can be awkward and complicated. Meanwhile, their needs are still strong and they see that pornography can at least give them some sense of satisfaction without all the complications of human relationships. Now they have a secret - a dirty little habit they don't want anyone to know about. They still need intimacy, but they think, "if anyone knew what I did last night, they wouldn't love me." And so they build walls that make it even harder to be known and loved.

Guys aren't known for sitting around and talking about an underlying need for intimacy. More often they can be found in testosterone-fueled conversations about the more physical aspects of sexuality. But intimacy - that experience of being known and loved - is a powerful need that nevertheless drives sexual desire. That's why the act of intercourse was once described as "being known" (as in "David took her into his tent and knew her.")

But who is "knowing" anybody when a guy stares at an airbrushed image on a computer screen? The tragedy is that pornography pretends to meet a need for intimacy while systematically making intimacy impossible. In his book, The Centerfold Syndrome, Dr. Gary Brooks explains that pornography erodes a man's ability to relate to a woman in an intimate and honest way because it "pays scant attention to [his] needs for sensuality and intimacy while exalting [his] sexual needs."

An image of a woman without her clothes creates sexual excitement, but disconnected from marital closeness, it fails to deliver the closeness and oneness that complement visual stimulation. C. S. Lewis paints a great word picture for this in Mere Christianity. "You must not isolate [sexual] pleasure and try to get it by itself," he says, "any more than you ought to try to get the pleasures of taste without swallowing and digesting, by chewing things and spitting them out again."

Worried that his porn habit had damaged his sexual appetite, a student named Tyler* vowed he wouldn't take a porn problem into his marriage. It wasn't easy, though. His commitment required him to fight back years of experiencing sex as a selfish and controlling act through pornography and masturbation and to replace it with a selfless and intimate view of sex in the context of serving his wife. "Marriage won't cure a porn addiction, so don't wait until then to address it," Tyler says, "It isn't fair to your future wife and it shortchanges the relationship that God has for you."

The notion that intimacy heightens sexuality even made it to the hip and worldly pages of Men's Health magazine recently. In a surprisingly critical look at Internet porn surfing, the writer questioned the value of sexual pleasure that is disconnected from a committed and intimate relationship. One of his better quotes comes from Carl, an oceanographer, who says, "It is a constant battle to remind myself, when arousal material is so easily accessed, that to attain a higher level of real sexual fulfillment takes intimacy."

One concept Men's Health magazine probably won't tackle however, is the idea that real intimacy begins with God. In a fallen world, anyone who desires to be known deeply and loved deeply will inevitably be disappointed by his or her relationships. Only God can know you and love you completely. Think about that. He's the only person who sees you around the clock and knows your every thought. He sees all the good things in you that you want the world to see, but He also sees all the bad stuff you want to hide. And remarkably, He loves you unconditionally.

In response, God asks that you love the people around you in the same way He loves you. Instead of being focused on having your needs for love and intimacy met by others, God calls you to receive His love and then focus on loving others. So what it comes down to is this. Pornography promises something like intimacy and then cheats you of real intimacy twice. First it pushes a wedge between you and God - the only one who can know and love you completely. And secondly it gets you so focused on your own desires that you are unable to know and love anyone else in an intimate relationship.

C.S. Lewis provides another illustration offering a clear distinction between the brief and counterfeit pleasures of pornography compared with the eternal and abundant promises of intimacy with God. "We are half-hearted creatures," he says, "fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mudpies in the slums because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea." His next line is the clincher: "We are far too easily pleased."

* Not his real name

Related sites
• The false promises of porn
• Pure Intimacy, PureOnline.com and TheSafeSite.com
• Three secrets to x-ceptional sex
• Some obscene statistics
• British porn study reveals destructive effect on relationships



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