Originally a youth movement born in U.S. evangelical circles in the early 1990s for promoting sexual restraint before marriage, purity culture has become a trans-denominational subculture and has also reached other countries, gaining an influence, for instance, among German Evangelicals since the early 2000s. Writing in the Zeitschrift für Religion und Weltanschauung (July–August), Claudia Jetter notes that purity culture developed as a reaction against the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and its roots go back to purity campaigns in the nineteenth century. The movement as it took form in the 1990s attempted to answer what its founder saw as a loss of values among young Americans. Sexual abstinence before marriage would be seen as a sign of inner transformation. It soon also drew interest from Catholics and Mormons. Promoters of purity culture have not been averse to using the vocabulary of their opposites, for example, by describing themselves as being at the forefront of the “sexual revolution” (but one of a different kind), or calling the public announcement of a decision to become sexually abstinent until marriage one’s “coming out.”
But the movement has experienced crisis and revisions. In 2017, the author of the 1997 bestseller I Kissed Dating Goodbye, Joshua Harris, issued a sharp criticism of his own work and distanced himself from purity culture before separating from his wife and giving up the Christian faith. Other promoters of purity culture have advocated a more nuanced approach, while leading organizations have rebranded themselves (with True Love Waits becoming Lifeway and Silver Ring Things turning into Unaltered Ministries) and placed an emphasis on courses, such as for parents. Jetter adds that the evolution of online purity culture influencers, or “Christfluencers,” has also played an important role in changing approaches, and she sees the number of posts, videos and podcasts on the topic as proof of the subculture’s continuing influence.
(Zeitschrift für Religion und Weltanschauung, https://www.ezw-berlin.de/publikationen/zeitschrift-fuer-religion-und-weltanschauung/)
