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Cohabitation and Premarital Sex Amongst Christian Youth in South Africa Today: a Missional Reflection

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Cohabitation and Premarital Sex Amongst Christian Youth in South Africa Today: a Missional Reflection Page 1 of 7 Original Research Cohabitation and premarital sex amongst Christian youth in South Africa today: A missional reflection Author: This article explored the rising trends of cohabitation and premarital sex amongst Christian 1 Thinandavha D. Mashau and non-Christian youth in South Africa that is becoming more socially acceptable. Moving Affiliation: from a premise of engaging in these practices, which is not biblically justified, to what a 1Department of Missiology, missional Christian church can do, this article sought to bring the numbers of those who North-West University, cohabit and engage in premarital sex down. The thesis of this article was that a missional Potchefstroom Campus, church should view cohabitation and premarital sex as frontiers that need to be crossed to South Africa save the lives of our youth by minimising premarital pregnancies and the spread of sexually Note: transmitted diseases (the Human immunodeficiency virus [HIV] and Acquired immune This article is published deficiency syndrome [AIDS] pandemic included). This will also go a long way in saving in the Section Practical the sinking image of marriage. It is the presupposition of this article that cohabitation and Theology of the Society for Practical Theology in premarital sex are great threats to the institution of marriage. South Africa. Correspondence to: Introduction Derrick Mashau Human culture in the 21st century has been transformed by a revolution in sexual values. Email: Promiscuity is regarded by many as a virtue to pursue. Children who do not engage in premarital [email protected] sex are perceived by their peers as stupid, boring and unsophisticated, with the result that children Postal address: are trying sex at earlier ages than ever before (Mashau 2008:30). This has given birth to a culture PO Box 20004, Noordbrug of cohabitation, where since the 1960s cohabitation and premarital sex have been growing trends 2522, South Africa worldwide (Scherrer & Klepacki 2004:134; cf. Musick 2007:251). Cohabitation and premarital sex as a lifestyle are on the rise throughout the world and South Africa is no exception. They are fast Dates: Received: 22 June 2010 becoming a kind of a norm amongst students and the working youth, who not only choose to Accepted: 24 Mar. 2011 share their lodgings, but also their blankets (see Dolbik-Vorobei 2005; cf. Murray-Swant 2005). Published: 02 Aug. 2011 These growing trends are also creeping into the church and it has become a subject of concern How to cite this article: Mashau, T.D., 2011, for two reasons. Firstly, marriage as an institution, as traditionally and biblically understood, is ‘Cohabitation and under enormous strain because of the growing trends of cohabitation and premarital sex amongst premarital sex amongst both Christian and non-Christian youth. Secondly, the teaching of the church about premarital Christian youth in South abstinence as a norm amongst Christian youth is also under severe attack; this has prompted Africa today: A missional reflection’, HTS Teologiese various responses from the global church regarding the manner in which these trends should Studies/Theological Studies be dealt with. Whilst the Church of England accepts cohabitation as a step towards marriage 67(2), Art. #899, 7 pages. (Thatcher 1999:105), other church traditions differ profoundly from this view. Some of these doi:10.4102/hts.v67i2.899 differences are captured in the following words: The Roman Catholic Church treats cohabitation under the rubric of ‘free unions’, and condemns those, along with adultery, divorce, polygamy and incest as ‘grave offences against the dignity of marriage’. Orthodox churches are authoritatively said to be unprepared even to raise ‘the question of sexual activity outside of marriage’, and the same response is generally made by evangelical churches and their members. (Thatcher 1999:105) It is clear from the foregoing that these different standpoints on the side of different church traditions are doing more harm than good, because it is sending mixed messages to the world. There is need for a missional approach on the side of the church in this regard and only a missional church can succeed in developing a clear biblical message regarding cohabitation and premarital sex amongst the youth in South Africa today. The phrase ‘missional church’ is used in this context to refer to those churches that seek to remain true to the missio Dei [mission of God] by not only identifying cohabitation and premarital sex amongst the youth as missionary frontiers to be crossed, but also by devising practical strategies to help bring down numbers of those who engage in such practices. The overarching question of this article is: What can a © 2011. The Authors. missional church do to bring the numbers of those who cohabit and engage in premarital sex Licensee: AOSIS down in this generation? In order to answer this question, this article will define cohabitation OpenJournals. This work and premarital sex by looking at these concepts within the South Africa context; outlining is licensed under the Creative Commons cohabitation and premarital sex in South Africa, biblical perspectives regarding human sexuality Attribution License. and the implications for cohabitation and premarital sex, as well as practical guidelines regarding http://www.hts.org.za doi:10.4102/hts.v67i2.899 Page 2 of 7 Original Research what a missional church can do to bring down the numbers having sexual intercourse before marriage. This is in line of South African youth who are cohabiting and engaging in with the traditional Christian sexual ethic, which maintains premarital sex. that sexual intercourse is to be reserved for marriage, specifically monogamous marriage. The word premarital sex Towards a working definition of is therefore used in this article to define the act of engaging in sexual intercourse before marriage. The word fornication cohabitation and premarital sex can also be used interchangeably for this act. Having defined Defining cohabitation cohabitation and premarital sex, we now move on to outline Defining the word cohabitation is very complex, but it the two trends within the South African context. is generally used to describe the relationship between unmarried couples who live together as husband and wife Cohabitation and premarital (Parry 1981:1; cf. De Bruyn 1993:156). According to this sex in South Africa definition, cohabitation is more a testing ground for marriage, or a step on the way to marriage, much like dating and The incidence of cohabitation is increasing in South Africa engagement. Schwellnus (1994:1), on the other hand, uses and around the world on a daily basis. It has become more the term cohabitation in a broader sense to denote a situation common and more socially acceptable in South Africa for in which two people live together in a family framework couples to live together without being married. For the analogous to marriage, without actually having gone purpose of this article, we will look closely at the prevalence through a ceremony of marriage. These two definitions differ and dynamics of cohabitation and premarital sex in South profoundly, in that the latter used the phrase ‘two people’ Africa and also reflect on the whole issue from a legal point instead of ‘husband and wife’, which was used in the former. of view. The term cohabitation is used in the latter instance to include people of the same sex living together in a stable, exclusive Prevalence of cohabitation and premarital relationship; however, cohabitation should be distinguished sex in South Africa from the nonsexual relationship of a brother and a sister who In South Africa, it is generally believed that there is an are living together (Schwellnus 1994:1) and occasional sexual increasing trend towards cohabitation, although there is little relationships between men and women living together in a concrete demographic evidence to confirm this. It is difficult commune (De Bruyn 1993:206). to determine the prevalence of cohabitation in South Africa, because statistics do not provide conclusive evidence of The content of a cohabitational relationship entails this trend, given that information relating to the number of consensual premarital sex between the couple and a sense cohabiting couples has been inferred from statistics relating of responsibility towards each other (Schwellnus 1994:1– to marriage, divorce, remarriage and illegitimate births. The 2). Some people use cohabitation as a stepping-stone to essence of this is captured in the following words: marriage, whilst others prefer to cohabit for as long as they For demographics seeking to document trends in marriage and live (Manning et al. 2007:559). In the end, a distinction can be partnering in South Africa, there are surprisingly few sources made between three types of cohabitation, namely (Thatcher of data. In a country where marriage is far from universal, the 1999:104): lack of discrimination between marital states and cohabitation arrangements in the most recent South African censuses limits • ‘temporary or casual cohabitation’, entered into with little the interest of this data. thought or commitment • conscious preparation for marriage or ‘trial marriage’ (Hosegood, McGrath & Moultrie 2009:280) • cohabitation as a substitute for marriage either because the My experience of working with the youth in church and couple is opposed to marriage as an institution, or because at tertiary institutions attests to the fact that cohabitation they live in a society where cohabitation is an institution and premarital sex are common amongst tertiary and already. working youth. Mwaba and Naidoo (2005:651) share the Cohabitation is used in this article to define a consensual same sentiment when they also noted, amongst others, that relationship between a man and a woman who decides to premarital sex amongst South African university students is live together as husband and wife and who are having on the increase. The growing numbers of those who cohabit regular sexual intercourse without having married.
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