The issue of sensuality—the free and easy indulging of an appetite for bodily pleasures— requires a lot more thought than society is currently giving it.

Magazines, films, and advertisements use sensuality as a matter of course to attract audiences. One car manufacturer recently ran a radio sales campaign—funny if it weren't sad—on the basis of a female voice provocatively whispering the name dreamed up for a particular model—SX!

Today many people seem to be taking sensuality increasingly for granted. Many suppose that the body and its pleasures are one sure thing in an otherwise harsh and uncertain world. Sensuality is seen as a healthy, natural right of human beings.

But is it? Or is it an imposition on what is most natural and basic—something that limits and that closes doors of perception and experience which would otherwise be open?

Original Christianity taught that sensuality was a form of servitude. Paul wrote to the Christians living among the dissolute Romans: "Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?"  ^{Rom. 6:16.}

Christianity has always had a burning conviction that it is our spirituality, not the material body, that is the most basic aspect of our lives. And even people who may not think they believe in God have some intuitive sense of this. They find that intangible things like unselfish love, freedom of the spirit, the desire to see good and fulfillment for others, the aspiration for justice, mean far more than any sensual gratification ever could. The realm of spiritual things commands our deepest loyalty.

People often suppose that the moral teachings of Christianity in regard to sensuality are based on outmoded human opinions and no longer really apply. Actually, however, these teachings come out of something very different from prudish personal opinion. They are grounded in a new insight and understanding in regard to man that is as concrete as any scientific discovery. Christ Jesus taught that man isn't what he appears to be—a foolish and finite animal. He taught that man is the son of God. Thus man is directly related to the Principle of the universe, which is infinite good.

In effect the moral teachings of Christianity are saying, "Look, don't get so wrapped up in the usual sensual cycle! It will mislead you. You'll obscure the light that belongs to you, your spiritual sense, your possibility of discovering your genuine identity as sons and daughters of God."

Isn't the practical problem of sensuality that it takes us in the wrong direction, tending to put us to sleep to the reality of our actual spiritual being? Mary Baker Eddy, who founded Christian Science, writes: "A sensual thought, like an atom of dust thrown into the face of spiritual immensity, is dense blindness instead of a scientific eternal consciousness of creation."  ^{Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 263.}

There is in fact an immense universe of spiritual life and meaning to be discerned. This spiritual universe may be invisible to the senses, but the slightest insight into its reality has the feeling of being more tangible and significant than anything else we have ever known.

The trouble with sensuality is that it would blind us to the Christ, or spiritual idea of God, which illumined Jesus and made him the Saviour. As we gain a clearer sense of the spiritual idea, it changes our perception of ourselves and of life. It shows us an unlimited, infinite view. It is a little like opening all the doors and windows on a hot day and letting a wind off the ocean sweep through the house. The spiritual idea is what brings in all the real joy and freedom and richness of life.

Gradually we see more clearly that the reason Christianity and Christian Science warn against immersion in sensuality is that they are devoted to helping us have a freedom and fulfillment beyond anything the gratification of the senses could ever offer. We also see that pleasure in matter and pain in matter are two sides of the same coin. Sooner or later, therefore, we come to the point where we want to break the hypnotism of sensuality.

When we do wake up, even a little, we find we can be freer of the sensual pull than we thought we could. The human, mortal mind can't imagine how such a thing would come about. But our growing spiritual obedience and love show us how it can. The apparent magnetic pull of sensuality—which can be termed animal magnetism—is lessened as we learn we are not animal but spiritual! And so we go forward each day a little more spiritually conscious and awake to our true being and to the infinite universe Christ Jesus was explaining to us.

The mindless sensuality of this—or any—age would try to bury spirituality. Mrs. Eddy makes a thought-provoking comment that relates to this subject. Writing about the disciples after the resurrection of Christ Jesus, she says: "Discerning Christ, Truth, anew on the shore of time, they were enabled to rise somewhat from mortal sensuousness, or the burial of mind in matter, into newness of life as Spirit."  ^{Ibid., p. 35.}

Who doesn't yearn for this great newness, this spiritual immensity? Who could bear to have it obscured by a mere "atom of dust"?

ALLISON W. PHINNEY. JR.