Bible Study: What does the Bible say about anal sex?

A Pastoral Reflection on Intimacy and the Word of God

The questions you bring about the most intimate parts of your lives are not trivial; they are sacred. They come from a heart that desires to love well and to live in the light of God’s truth. When we ask, “What does the Bible say about this act or that act?”, we are really asking a deeper question: “How do we love each other in a way that honors God and honors the powerful gift of our bodies and our marriage?” This is not a journey for simple rules for deep, prayerful understanding.

Does the Bible Say Anything Directly About Anal Sex?

To begin with the simplest truth, we must be honest: the specific words “anal sex” do not appear anywhere in the Holy Scriptures.⁸ This silence is important. It tells us that we cannot simply turn to a single verse for a quick and easy answer. God, in His wisdom, did not give us a detailed list of what is allowed or disallowed sexually between a husband and wife.⁹ The Bible is not a technical manual for the bedroom; it is the story of God’s love for humanity.

This absence of a direct command or prohibition is not a void an invitation. It is an invitation from God to move beyond a simple, legalistic faith that only asks, “What is the rule?” and toward a more mature faith that asks, “What is the loving and God-honoring thing to do?”.¹⁰ This silence calls us to become detectives of the heart, prayerfully examining the broader principles of Scripture to understand God’s beautiful and challenging plan for human love. We must look at the stories, the laws, and the wisdom of the apostles to piece together a picture of what it means to love in a way that is holy, pure, and true.¹¹

Therefore, our task is one of discernment. We must be careful not to declare something a sin if the Bible does not explicitly do so, nor should we declare something is not a sin if the Bible’s overarching principles clearly lead us to that conclusion.¹⁰ This path requires humility, prayer, and a deep desire to understand the heart of God, who is Love itself.

What Can We Learn from the Story of Sodom and Gomorrah?

Often, when this question is asked, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah from Genesis 19 is the first one that comes to mind.⁸ The very word “sodomy” comes from this story, and for centuries, it has been associated with certain sexual acts, particularly those between men.¹⁰ In the story, a crowd of men from the town surrounds Lot’s house and makes a terrifying demand. They shout to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, that we may know them” (Genesis 19:5).

In this context, the Hebrew word for “know” (yada) clearly means a sexual act.⁹ But this is not an act of love or mutual affection. The men’s intention is violent and coercive; it is an attempted gang rape.¹⁶ This is a brutal act of domination and humiliation directed at strangers, a powerful violation of the sacred duty of hospitality. The horror of this intended violence is the central drama of the story, revealing the depths of the city’s wickedness.

But the Bible itself gives us other ways to understand the sin of Sodom. We must listen to the whole of Scripture. The prophet Ezekiel, speaking for the Lord, says something that should make us pause and reflect: “Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen” (Ezekiel 16:49–50). Here, the sin is identified not as a specific sexual act as a sickness of the soul: pride, arrogance, and a cold-hearted indifference to the suffering of the poor and vulnerable.¹³ The “detestable things” they did flowed from this rotten spiritual core.

Later, in the New Testament, the Letter of Jude speaks of Sodom and Gomorrah “giving themselves over to sexual immorality and perversion” (Jude 1:7, NIV), or pursuing “strange flesh” (KJV).¹³ This points to a sexual dimension of their sin. Yet, there is a debate among wise scholars about what “strange flesh” means. Does it refer to men pursuing men, or does it refer to human beings trying to have relations with angels, who were their guests?.²⁰

So, what can we take from this powerful and disturbing story? The sin of Sodom was a complex web of evil. It included violent, lustful desires it was rooted in a deeper spiritual illness. It was a culture of exclusion, pride, cruelty, and a complete lack of love for the stranger, the poor, and the vulnerable.¹³ The story is a powerful warning against any person or society that closes its heart to the outsider and whose passions are not ordered to love to violence and self-gratification. It cautions us against a culture of use and dehumanization. For a married couple, the lesson from Sodom is not a narrow sexual prohibition a powerful call to ensure their relationship is a haven of hospitality, tenderness, and welcome, in stark contrast to the city’s culture of violent exclusion. The story does not offer a clear rule about a specific, consensual act between a husband and wife who are committed to loving and honoring one another.

What Do the Laws in Leviticus Mean for Us Today?

In the heart of the Old Testament, in the book of Leviticus, we find laws that were given to the people of Israel to help them live as a holy people, set apart for God. Two verses are often mentioned in this discussion: “You shall not lie with a male as with a woman; it is an abomination” (Leviticus 18:22) and a similar prohibition in Leviticus 20:13, which carries the death penalty.²³

For many centuries, these verses have been understood as a clear and universal prohibition of all homosexual acts.¹⁴ The word “abomination” (

toevah in Hebrew) suggests something that is deeply offensive to God and contrary to His created order. Often, this term was used for practices associated with the idolatrous worship of the pagan nations surrounding Israel.

But good and faithful scholars, in their love for God’s word, have studied these texts very closely in their original language and historical setting. Their work invites us to a deeper, more nuanced understanding. Some suggest that these laws may have been directed at very specific situations that were a danger to Israel at that time.²³ For example, some scholars believe the prohibition was aimed at the pagan temple prostitution that was common in the ancient world, where sexual acts were part of idolatrous rituals. This would mean the primary sin was not the sexual act itself the idolatry it was connected to.

Others, looking at the surrounding verses in Leviticus 18 which deal almost entirely with incest, believe this law is also about forbidding incestuous relationships specifically between male relatives.²³ Still others point to complex grammatical details in the Hebrew text and suggest it may be a prohibition against a form of adultery—a man having a sexual relationship with another man who is married, thus violating the sacred bond of that man’s marriage.²⁷

We must be humble when we approach these ancient texts. We are not always sure of the exact cultural situation they were addressing. What is clear is that these laws were part of what scholars call the “Holiness Code” (Leviticus 17-26).²⁴ This code was designed to create distinction—to protect the people of Israel from adopting practices that would dishonor God and break their special covenant with Him. The concern was about covenantal holiness, not just sexual mechanics. For us, as Christians, these laws call us to reflect on what it means to honor God with our bodies and to live in a way that is set apart from practices that are selfish, exploitative, or idolatrous. They challenge us to ask if our actions strengthen our covenantal bonds with God and with each other. They do not directly address the question of anal sex within a loving, heterosexual marriage.

How Should We Understand Paul’s Words About “Unnatural Relations” in Romans?

The Apostle Paul, in his powerful letter to the Romans, paints a sobering picture of a world that has turned away from God. He explains that when people refuse to honor God as Creator, “their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened” (Romans 1:21). As a consequence of this fundamental spiritual error, Paul writes, “God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another” (Romans 1:26-27).

These are strong words, and they have been the source of much pain and misunderstanding. The key to understanding them is to ask what Paul meant by “natural” (physis in Greek) and “unnatural” (para physin). For many, “natural” simply means “biological” or “procreative”.¹² From this viewpoint, any sexual act that is not inherently open to procreation could be seen as “unnatural.” This has led some to conclude that anal sex, even within marriage, falls into this category.¹⁰

But scholars who have studied the ancient Greco-Roman world in which Paul lived tell us that the idea of “nature” was often about culture and social order, not just biology.³¹ In that society, which was deeply patriarchal, there were rigid ideas about honor and shame. It was considered “natural” for a freeborn man to be the dominant, active, penetrating partner in any sexual encounter. For a man to take the “passive” or “penetrated” role was seen as “unnatural” because he was behaving like a woman, which was considered shameful and a humiliating loss of honor and social status.³¹ Paul may be drawing on this shared cultural understanding to make his point to his Roman audience.

The context of Paul’s argument is crucial. He is not primarily writing a manual on sexual ethics. He is making a larger theological point about the consequences of idolatry. The root sin, the source of the problem, is turning away from the Creator to worship creation (Romans 1:25). The disordered passions and shameful acts he describes are the result of this primary spiritual error.³² The problem is not desire itself, which is a gift from God desire that has become “inflamed with lust”—a self-seeking, excessive, and disordered passion that dishonors the body, which is meant to be a temple of the Holy Spirit.³²

Therefore, when we read this passage, we must ask if Paul is condemning a whole category of people, or if he is condemning a specific kind of action: abandoning the relational context of God’s design to pursue excessive, idolatrous lust that was common in the pagan world around him. The primary diagnostic question for a Christian couple is not “Is this act anatomically ‘natural’?” but “What is the state of our hearts? Is this act flowing from a place of mutual, self-giving love that worships God, or from a place of selfish, excessive lust that idolizes pleasure and uses the other person as an object for gratification?” This is the true test of whether an act is “natural” in the sense of conforming to God’s loving design.

What Are the Guiding Principles for Intimacy Within Christian Marriage?

After exploring what Scripture says about forbidden acts, it is much more fruitful and hopeful to turn to the beautiful vision it presents for love within marriage. The Bible gives us guiding lights to help us navigate the sacred space of marital intimacy. Although It does not provide a detailed map of every path, it gives us a compass that always points toward love. The Letter to the Hebrews tells us, “Let marriage be held in honor by all, and the marriage bed undefiled” (Hebrews 13:4). What makes the marriage bed “undefiled”? It is not a list of rules a posture of the heart, guided by the following principles.

A Sincere Gift of Self

Our beloved Saint John Paul II, in his powerful “Theology of the Body,” taught us that our bodies have a “nuptial meaning.” This means they are made for love, for a sincere gift of ourselves to another.³⁵ In the marital act, a husband and wife speak a language with their bodies. This language must always speak the truth. The truth it must speak is, “I give myself to you completely, without reservation, and I receive you as a precious gift”.³⁵ Any act that turns the other person into an object for my own pleasure, rather than a person to be loved and cherished, speaks a lie with the body. It goes against the very meaning of the body as a sign of the person.

Mutual Love and Consent

True love, the love that St. Paul describes so beautifully in 1 Corinthians 13, “is patient, love is kind… It does not insist on its own way.” This is the golden rule of the marriage bed. No spouse should ever be pressured, manipulated, or coerced into an act that makes them feel uncomfortable, used, or dishonored.⁹ Mutual agreement, born of loving conversation and tender sensitivity, is essential.¹¹ One spouse’s conscience, fears, or discomfort must always be respected by the other as a sacred boundary.¹⁰ Love can never be forced; it can only be freely given.

Unity and Exclusivity

The sexual act is designed by God to be a powerful bonding agent, solidifying the “one flesh” union of husband and wife that is spoken of in Genesis (Genesis 2:24) and affirmed by St. Paul (1 Corinthians 7:5). It is a sacred seal of an exclusive covenant. This is why it must never include other people, whether in person through acts like “swinging,” or through the cold and dehumanizing world of pornography, which introduces a third party into the intimacy of the marriage bed and reduces people to objects of lust.¹¹

Openness to Life (Fruitfulness)

The in her great wisdom, has always taught that the marital act has two beautiful purposes that cannot be separated: the unitive (bringing the couple together in love) and the procreative (being open to the gift of new life).⁴⁴ This is why the Church teaches that deliberately frustrating the act’s natural power to create life, for example through contraception, is contrary to God’s design.⁴⁹ This teaching does not mean every act must result in a child. It means that the couple’s love, in its essence, should be a fruitful love, a love that is generous and life-giving, mirroring God’s own creative love for the world.⁶ An act that is by its very nature non-procreative, like anal sex, thus exists in tension with this principle, a point a couple must prayerfully consider.

Honoring God with Our Bodies

Finally, we must always remember St. Paul’s powerful words: “Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God? You are not your own, for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body” (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). This call to glorify God applies to every part of our lives, including our sexuality. An act within marriage is God-honoring when it is an act of true, mutual, respectful, and life-giving love.

What Has the Church Taught Through History?

The Church is a family that journeys through time, and our understanding of God’s mysteries deepens with each generation, guided by the Holy Spirit. To understand where we are on this question, it helps to know where we have been. The early teachers of our faith, the Church Fathers, thought deeply about marriage and sexuality, and their wisdom continues to guide us.

Men like St. Augustine of Hippo and St. John Chrysostom lived in a world very different from ours. Their thinking was shaped by the philosophical currents of their time, like Stoicism, and by the urgent need to defend the faith against heresies. They often saw sexual desire, which they called concupiscence, as a powerful and dangerous force, a consequence of the Fall of Adam and Eve that needed to be channeled very carefully.⁵³ For them, the primary good and justification for the sexual act within marriage was procreation—the begetting of children to fill the earth and the Church.⁵⁰ Other purposes, like pleasure or even the unity of the couple, were often seen as secondary, or as a concession to human weakness to prevent the greater sin of fornication outside of marriage.⁶¹

Because of this strong focus on procreation, the Fathers taught that any sexual act that was deliberately non-procreative by its nature was sinful.⁵⁰ Their world did not have the same understanding of psychology, biology, or the relational nature of the human person that we have been blessed with today. Their views were also shaped by the need to defend the goodness of marriage against heresies like Manichaeism, which taught that the body and all physical procreation were evil.⁵⁵ In this context, affirming procreation was a way of affirming the goodness of God’s creation.

In more recent times, the Church has been blessed with a deeper appreciation for the unitive meaning of marital love. The Second Vatican Council and especially Saint John Paul II, with his revolutionary Theology of the Body, helped us see the marital act not just as a biological function but as a powerful personal communion, a “language of the body” that expresses the total gift of self.³⁵ This did not change the Church’s teaching deepened it, shifting the emphasis from a “procreation-centered” view to a “person-centered” one. Although the Church’s teaching that the unitive and procreative dimensions of marriage are inseparable remains constant 44, there is a greater pastoral emphasis today on the beauty of the couple’s loving union as a path to holiness in itself.⁴⁷ This development helps us understand why a modern pastoral document might sound different from an ancient homily, even while being part of the same living Tradition.

A Summary of Biblical Interpretations

It is important to be honest and acknowledge that faithful Christians, reading the same Scriptures with prayerful hearts, can arrive at different understandings. This table summarizes some of the main interpretations of the key passages we have discussed. It shows that the conversation is complex and requires humility.

How Do We Navigate Disagreements and Personal Conscience?

We are not just minds seeking information; we are hearts living in real relationships, with all their joys and struggles. The online discussions of believers show the real-world pain and confusion this topic can cause. We hear the voices of wives who feel pressured, violated, or degraded by a spouse’s request.³⁹ We hear the confusion of husbands who have a desire they do not understand, sometimes influenced by the distorted images of pornography.³⁹ This is where theology must become tender pastoral care.

The most important principle here is the sacredness of conscience. St. Paul teaches us that “whatever does not proceed from faith is sin” (Romans 14:23). This is a powerful truth. If a husband or wife feels in their heart, after prayer and reflection, that a particular act is wrong, demeaning, or dishonoring to God or to their own body, then for them, it is wrong. To pressure them to violate their conscience is a grave failure of love; it is a sin against them and against the unity of the marriage.¹⁰

Love does not demand its own way (1 Corinthians 13:5). A husband’s love for his wife, modeled on Christ’s sacrificial love for the is a love of total self-gift (Ephesians 5:25). It is a love that cherishes and protects, not one that uses or demands. As St. John Chrysostom taught, a husband should be willing to be “cut into pieces ten thousand times” for his wife, not chain her down with fear and menaces.⁷⁰ If his wife feels that a certain act would harm her spirit or her body, a loving husband will not insist. He will lay down his preference out of love for her.

This calls for open, honest, and vulnerable communication. Couples must create a safe space where they can talk about their desires, their fears, and their convictions without judgment or shame.⁴³ This journey of discovery, of learning to love each other more deeply and sensitively, is part of the great adventure of marriage. In situations of ambiguity, the guiding law is always the law of love and the sacred duty to respect the conscience of the other.

Are There Other Important Considerations for a Couple?

Our faith is not disembodied; it is incarnate. We are body and soul, a beautiful unity created by God. Therefore, our decisions about intimacy must also consider the reality of our physical bodies. We must be good stewards of the bodies God has given us and our spouse.

We must be honest that our bodies are designed in a particular way. The marital act is naturally suited for the union of man and woman in a way that is both unitive and procreative. Some acts, from a purely medical and physiological standpoint, carry greater risks.⁹ The tissues involved in anal sex are more delicate and vulnerable to damage and infection than those designed for vaginal intercourse.¹⁰ This is a simple reality of our bodies.

This medical fact is not, in itself, a theological prohibition. But it is a serious consideration for a couple committed to love. To love your spouse is to cherish their body, to protect it from harm, and to desire their total well-being—physical, emotional, and spiritual. St. Paul reminds husbands to love their wives “as their own bodies,” to nourish and cherish them (Ephesians 5:28-29). A couple should lovingly and honestly discuss these realities as part of their discernment. Seeing the care for each other’s bodies as a holy responsibility is a vital part of honoring God with the body. An act may not be intrinsically sinful it could be unwise or unloving if it poses a major, unnecessary risk to the spouse’s health. This is a matter of prudence and charity.

Conclusion: A Path of Love, Discernment, and Mercy

we have walked a long path through Scripture and tradition. We have seen that there is no simple “yes” or “no” written in the Bible. Instead, there is a beautiful and challenging call to a love that is a total gift of self, a love that is unifying, a love that is fruitful, and a love that honors the sacredness of the body.

For a married couple, the question of any intimate act must be filtered through the great principles of love. Is this act a true and sincere gift of myself to my beloved? Does it build our unity and express our exclusive covenant? Is it born of mutual desire and respect for each other’s conscience? Does it honor and cherish the body of my spouse as a temple of the Holy Spirit? Is our love, in its totality, a generous, life-giving love?

The final discernment belongs to the couple, in the sanctuary of their own prayerful conscience before God. The Church can offer principles and guidance it cannot replace the conscience of the faithful.⁷⁶ Let your journey be one of open communication, powerful respect, and endless patience. Let it be guided always by mercy, for we are all imperfect people journeying toward the Lord, in need of His grace and forgiveness.⁴ May the Holy Family bless your marriage, and may you find in your love for one another a true and living icon of Christ’s love for His Church.

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