Consent matters, and it settles less than most people assume. It tells you whether two people agreed. It cannot tell you whether what they agreed to was good for them, faithful to anyone, or true to what sex is. This guide takes the familiar claim that mutual consent is all that matters, sets it out as an argument, and tests each step. Use it alone in about an hour, or with a group over one or two sessions. You will map an argument, look for a counterexample, read one passage of Scripture closely, and say honestly what would change your mind.
The material comes from the sexual ethics chapter of Faith That Makes Sense, a Jude 3 Project curriculum. The curriculum states its thesis in one line: “The chapter argues that consent may prevent harm, but it does not define holiness.” The rest of this guide asks whether that claim holds up and what it would take to show it.
If you lead a group, decide one thing before you start. Sharing is optional at every point. Nobody has to describe their history, their desires, or their relationships to take part. Never assume anyone’s orientation, past, or level of struggle. The exercises work just as well on paper as out loud.
Start with the strongest version of the consent view
An argument is only worth testing in its best form. The Faith That Makes Sense curriculum states the cultural question fairly: “If it is consensual and harmless, how is it wrong?” That question rests on a short chain of reasoning, which can be stated like this:
- An action is wrong only if it harms someone who has not agreed to it.
- When two adults freely consent, neither is harmed against their will.
- So consensual sex between adults is not wrong.
This argument has real strength. Its first premise protects people. It is the reason we can call coercion, manipulation, and assault what they are. The curriculum does not wave this away. It insists, “We must affirm that consent is vital; it prevents abuse, protects autonomy, and ensures that no one is exploited.” A Christian account of sex that treated consent lightly would be worse than the consent view, not better.
Exercise one: map the argument. Write the three lines above on a sheet of paper, leaving space under each. Under each premise, write whether you accept it, reject it, or are unsure. Then circle the single word in premise 1 that carries the most weight. Most people circle “harm” or “only.” Keep the sheet. You will come back to it.
The premise people overlook
The weak point is not where most critics look. Critics usually attack premise 2 by arguing that consensual sex does cause harm. That fight can go on forever, because people disagree about what counts as harm.
The deeper issue is the word “only” in premise 1. It quietly claims that agreement plus the absence of visible harm is all goodness can mean. That is a large claim. It assumes three things:
- That an act is good simply because it was chosen, rather than merely permitted.
- That the only harms that count are the ones the people involved can see at the moment they agree.
- That my body belongs to me alone, so nobody else has a claim on what I do with it.
The second assumption deserves attention. Consent is a snapshot. It records what two people wanted at one moment. It says nothing about next month. The curriculum’s own practice question names the gap: does consent protect your heart when feelings change, and what happens when yes for now becomes regret later? A standard that only looks at one moment cannot judge something whose effects unfold over time.
The curriculum makes the general point this way: “Consent tells us that an action was chosen; Covenant tells us whether that action aligns with God’s design for our good.” Notice the logic of that sentence. It does not say consent is wrong. It says consent answers a different question than the one we actually care about.
Testing it with a counterexample
A good way to test any claim that X is sufficient for Y is to look for a case with X and without Y. If you find one, the claim fails. Faith That Makes Sense offers exactly this kind of case: “Imagine two friends who consistently hurt one another verbally or emotionally.” Both choose to stay. The curriculum observes that both consent, “yet anyone observing can see it is destructive.”
Walk through the reasoning. If consent were enough to make a relationship good, we could not call this friendship destructive. But we can, and we do, without hesitation. So consent is not enough. The curriculum applies the same point to sex and romance: “Two people can fully consent to a relationship that is toxic, codependent, or spiritually damaging.” Its conclusion follows: “Evaluating moral goodness requires a standard deeper than personal preference.”
Be careful about what this proves. It shows that some further standard is needed. It does not yet show which standard that is. A person could accept the counterexample and still reject the Christian answer. Holding that line keeps the argument honest.
Exercise two: try to rescue the consent view. On your sheet, write a revised version of premise 1 that handles the two-friends case. You might try informed consent, or consent with no long-term damage, or consent between equals. Now look at what each repair added. Every one brings in something agreement cannot supply on its own: a view of what damages a person, or what a healthy relationship looks like, or what people owe each other. That is the discovery worth noticing. Once you repair the consent view, you are no longer using consent alone. You are already appealing to a picture of the good. The real question becomes which picture is true.
Reading 1 Corinthians 6:12-20 closely
Paul wrote this passage to a church in a city with its own slogans about freedom. It opens: “All things are lawful unto me, but all things are not expedient: all things are lawful for me, but I will not be brought under the power of any” (1 Corinthians 6:12). A common reading holds that the first phrase is a saying the Corinthians used, which Paul repeats and then qualifies. Either way, his answer is instructive. He does not reply that they lacked permission. He asks two other questions: is it beneficial (“expedient” in older English), and will it master you?
Observation task. Read verses 12-20 slowly, ideally twice. List every reason Paul gives for avoiding sexual immorality. You should find several: the body is for the Lord (verse 13), God will raise our bodies as he raised Jesus (verse 14), believers’ bodies are members of Christ (verse 15), sexual union makes two “one flesh” (verse 16), the one who sins sexually sins against his own body (verse 18), and the body is a temple (verse 19). Then ask: how many of these reasons are about harming a partner who did not agree? Almost none. Paul argues from what the body is and whom it belongs to.
That puts his argument directly against the third hidden assumption. Paul writes: “What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own? For ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God’s” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). If I am not my own, then my agreement cannot be the last word on what my body is for.
Paul’s phrase “one flesh” in verse 16 reaches back to Genesis 2:24: “Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.” The verse describes a sequence across time: leaving, holding fast, becoming one. That is a covenant shape. The Faith That Makes Sense curriculum defines the term simply: “A covenant is simply a binding promise of love, loyalty, and security.” It then sets the two standards side by side:
Consent asks “Did we agree?” Covenant asks “What are we building?”
The second question looks forward. It can judge things that a snapshot cannot. Jude 3 Project holds the historic Christian ethic that sexual intimacy belongs within marriage, understood as a covenant union between one man and one woman. It teaches that plainly, and it teaches it with grace rather than shame.
The strongest objection
A thoughtful skeptic will push back here. You have replaced one preference with another, they might say. Consent is my standard; covenant is yours, and yours happens to be religious.
Part of the reply is already on the table. The two-friends case works without any religion at all. Anyone who calls that friendship destructive is already appealing to a standard beyond agreement. So the real choice is not between consent and some arbitrary rule. It is between rival accounts of what is good for people. The Christian account claims that the standard comes from God’s design, which Jesus affirmed when he pointed back to Genesis 2. That is a claim one can weigh, not just a feeling one has.
The other part of the reply is a limit. Logic alone will not carry a person all the way to covenant. The curriculum says as much when it calls Christian sexual ethics “an invitation to trust that the Architect of the universe knows more about human flourishing than our current cultural moment does.” The argument clears the ground. Trust in God’s design is a further step, and it should be named as one.
A second objection is more painful. Covenant language has been used to shame people, and sometimes to excuse harm inside marriage. Here the image the curriculum uses, consent as the floor and covenant as the ceiling, matters. A ceiling does not remove a floor. Marriage never cancels the need for consent. Coercion within marriage is still coercion. The curriculum is direct about those who have been harmed: “being sinned against is not the same as sinning.” It also says, “If you have been abused, you are not guilty. You are wounded.” If you are being hurt by a partner now, the National Domestic Violence Hotline is available at 1-800-799-7233.
What follows, and what does not
What follows from this argument: consent is necessary for sex to be right, and it is not sufficient. A further standard is needed, and the Christian claim is that covenant supplies it.
What does not follow is just as important. It does not follow that a person with a sexual history is damaged goods; the curriculum calls that idea a lie. It does not follow that having desires is itself wrong. The curriculum is clear: “Temptation is not sin. Experiencing an unchosen desire is not the same as agreeing with it.” And it does not follow that anyone has been talked into the Christian view merely by losing an argument about consent.
Exercise three: what would change your mind? Write two honest sentences. For the first, begin with I would believe consent is enough if and finish the thought. For the second, begin with I would believe covenant is the better standard if and finish that one too. Compare them. If you cannot finish one of the sentences, that tells you where your view rests on something other than evidence. Groups can share these only if people want to.
A practice for the week
The curriculum suggests a simple test. Over the next week, pay attention to the shows, music, and feeds you already take in. Count how often the message amounts to this: as long as you both want it, it is fine. Each time, ask which of the hidden assumptions the scene depends on. Is it treating choice as proof of goodness? Is it ignoring what happens after the moment? Is it assuming the body belongs to the self alone?
Then have one conversation with someone who holds the consent view. Before you respond to them, restate their position until they say, yes, that is what I mean. Only then ask your question about time, or about the two friends. The aim is to understand, not to win.
Questions for discussion
- In your argument map, which premise did you find hardest to judge, and why?
- When you tried to repair the consent view, what did you have to add? Where did that added standard come from?
- Paul’s reasons in 1 Corinthians 6 are mostly about the body and who it belongs to. Does that kind of reason persuade you, trouble you, or leave you unsure?
- Consent looks at one moment, while covenant looks across time. Where else in life do you judge choices by what they build rather than by whether you wanted them?
- What is the strongest point the skeptic in the objection section makes? Can you answer it without overstating your case?
- How would you explain to a friend that consent remains required inside marriage, and why that matters?
If someone discloses abuse during discussion, stop the debate at once. Move to private, gentle care and to trusted pastoral or clinical support, and follow mandatory reporting laws where they apply.
What remains hard
An argument can show that consent is incomplete. It cannot make the covenant standard easy to live. The curriculum admits this: “We must be honest about how difficult this teaching is.” For people whose desires do not fit within marriage, or who are single and lonely, the cost is real, and no logical step erases it. The curriculum’s answer is not more willpower but Christ, who lived a fully human life and offers presence rather than shame.
The question to carry out of this study is a simple one. When you weigh a choice, notice which question you are actually asking. Is it only whether you agreed, or also what you are building?