Paul Ramsey

A Christian Approach to the Question of Sexual Relations outside of Marriage

N ACT of sexual intercourse is an act of love. It is also an act of procreation. Whether or not an existing relation between the man and the woman is actually nourished and strengthened by their sexual intercourse, the act itself is an act of love which had this power. Whether or not a child is engendered, the act is in itself procreative. This means that sexual intercourse tends, of its own nature, toward the expression and strengthening of love and toward the engendering of children. Let us call these two goods, or intrinsic ends, of sexual intercourse its relational or unitive and its procreative purpose. These are chief among the goods of marriage. Consider first-because it is most obvious-the sex act as a procreative act. Procreation means creation for or on behalf of (pro-) the creator of all things. God has chosen to create new human beings-each with a life and a destiny he keeps between himself and God-by means of human procreators like him. To us has been given this great commission, that in the act of sexual intercourse we are to be present as codeterminers with God there at the beginning of a human life which henceforth transcends all human determination.

Existenz and the Existence of God: A Study of Kierkegaard and Hegel

lF_ROM the existentialist point of view it is time now to raise serious question about the current vogue of existentialism. Although the movement began with Kierkegaards protest against the reduction of an individuals relationship to God, and other decisive moments in human life, to the waltz-stepping ein zwei drei kokolorum of the Hegelian system, existentialism in Martin Heidegger and Jean Paul Sartre has now deprived itself of belief in God. Extreme care must be exercised, how-