Letter: Sex mad

I MUST DISSENT with Joan Smith's assertion (9 August) that the church "hates sex and uses that ancient device, scapegoating women, to allay the terrors it arouses". It does not just hate sex, it is obsessed with this function of a healthy body to the point where it ignores, or mildly chides when provoked, other issues of moral choice. Arms dealing, warfare and exploitation of children all fade into a blurred periphery. The church shrugs off Christ's recommendations to "judge not that ye be not judged" and to "love one's neighbour as oneself", and flees skittishly into the arms of St Paul.

The Gospels are surely the only books that Christians should observe. I will be convinced that the Carey camp has Christ on its side when it can quote evidence from the Gospels that clearly demarcates any sexual behaviour outside marriage as iniquitous.

L M JAKES

Gazeley, Suffolk