Spiritual Sexuality - Kelly Edmiston

Body and spirit marry in the chapel of the soul. They marry every minute of every day, in all activities and in all inactivity, in all thoughts and in all actions, or they marry not at all. (If) They don’t marry, we do not know sexuality with soul, and therefore our sexuality remains incomplete and insufficiently human. We do not find the soul of sex by spiritualizing the body but by coming to appreciate its mysteries and by daring to enter into its sensuousness. --Thomas Moore

Our episode this week is with Dr. Kelly Edmiston, who erves as the Lead Pastor at the Vineyard Church in Stafford, Texas. She enjoys suburban life with her husband Ben, and their three children. Kelly's passion is the intersection between spirituality and sexuality and providing space for all people to learn to live free from shame.

If you have been harmed by purity culture, don't know what to do with yourself and your own sexuality or if you struggle with receiving pleasure and especially if you don't know how to broach the subject with your kids, this podcast episode is for you.

Some of the topics we explore are these:

• The harm of purity culture and why parents who are "deconstructing their faith" struggle to talk to their kids.
• Contemplative practices for kids of every age when it comes to the intertwining of the body and the soul.
• Why pleasure matters and how it can lead us to God.
• How parents can embody a "sex-positive" message.
• Difficult topics such as hookup culture, masturbation, pornography or sexual identity within the framework of spiritual sexuality.

Our favorite words from this podcast episode were things like "toenails" and "reparent" and "desire" and "practices" and "authority." Find out why when you listen.

You can find Kelly at the following:

Substack: Kelly Edminston

Instagram: @kmedmiston

Facebook: Kelly Michelle Edmiston