I haven’t fully figured out how to articulate this idea yet, but (probably fitting best under point 6?) I’m think I’m also increasingly persuaded that another reason for the division of the human race into biological sexes has to do with the fact that God just… well, loves diversity, in a really deep sense (and especially unity within diversity!), and consequently really wants us to learn how to accept and rejoice in it, when confronted by others who actually are the same as us but appear different. A species propagated via asexual reproduction just doesn’t have access to the same sort of genetic variation, even if there could still be very gradual adaptation accumulated over time. Obviously this is still also bound up with the other reasons (knitting even broader webs of bonds between people), and it also links out to some much much broader concepts (such as the plasticity and natural evolution of species), but… I think there’s something to this, and if so, then insofar as this diversity entails an array of strange minorities that might challenge us, it’s actually a feature, not a bug. Lastly, I don’t have this citation handy at the moment, but I recently stumbled across an Aquinas article where his opinion was that the male and female sexes WOULD be present in the resurrection; but actually, I think that does fit intuitively with the idea of a God who just loves natural diversity. So I think your speculative idea of sexual differences being preserved but somehow unexpectedly transformed is where I would put my money!
Can verify Aquinas says that! And I think this is spot-on. It’s the classic both/and at work—both unity and diversity, mutually completing and complementing.
I haven’t fully figured out how to articulate this idea yet, but (probably fitting best under point 6?) I’m think I’m also increasingly persuaded that another reason for the division of the human race into biological sexes has to do with the fact that God just… well, loves diversity, in a really deep sense (and especially unity within diversity!), and consequently really wants us to learn how to accept and rejoice in it, when confronted by others who actually are the same as us but appear different. A species propagated via asexual reproduction just doesn’t have access to the same sort of genetic variation, even if there could still be very gradual adaptation accumulated over time. Obviously this is still also bound up with the other reasons (knitting even broader webs of bonds between people), and it also links out to some much much broader concepts (such as the plasticity and natural evolution of species), but… I think there’s something to this, and if so, then insofar as this diversity entails an array of strange minorities that might challenge us, it’s actually a feature, not a bug. Lastly, I don’t have this citation handy at the moment, but I recently stumbled across an Aquinas article where his opinion was that the male and female sexes WOULD be present in the resurrection; but actually, I think that does fit intuitively with the idea of a God who just loves natural diversity. So I think your speculative idea of sexual differences being preserved but somehow unexpectedly transformed is where I would put my money!
Can verify Aquinas says that! And I think this is spot-on. It’s the classic both/and at work—both unity and diversity, mutually completing and complementing.
So many good lines here...
"...marriage and sexual activity—as good as they can be—are not essential to what it means to be human" -- preach it again for the people in the back!
"Friendship is more essential to human nature than marriage, sexual activity, and procreation." -- yesssss.
Thanks for this post!
Very easy for a guy who is asexual to say to those who are not.