Is it right to have sex with my boyfriend/girlfriend before marriage?

This is a question that is frequently asked by teenagers and young adults from different religious backgrounds and cultures, and therefore, the best way to answer it, will be to take it first from a neutral perspective before factoring in other views.

I will first love to start by throwing a question at you: who determines what is right or wrong? Is it the laws of a country, a God some of us believe in—One who others are yet to know about, or a group of philosophers?

Your question, when looked at through a morality or ethical scope, will lead us down a road of endless debates. Obviously not what you are looking for.

The question "is it right or wrong?", is usually rooted in the internal battle (temptations) we all go through: to do, or not to do.

At the beginning of every temptation, our first reaction is to think of ways to counter it. When this happens, some of us turn to the laws of our religion or country; others, a promise they made to themselves or a loved one; and some also, after fleeing, solicit answers: answers that would either give them the needed strength to fight the temptations, or that would help them to counter the guilt they expect to feel if they ever fall.

Drawing from my past experiences, answers like "it's all a part of life", helped for a while in countering the guilt I felt after indulging in pornography. But afterwards I didn't care whether or not it was all a part of life. All I cared about was the other answer I never got: an answer that would give me the strength to fight my porn addiction before it turned into a sex addiction.

Is that the answer you are looking for? If the second answer is what you seek, then I will love to share a story with you. One that took place more than a thousand years ago: a showdown that occurred in the Judean deserts between the only man known to have looked temptation in the eye and won—Jesus, and the devil.

And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,2 Being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered.3 And the devil said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, command this stone that it be made bread.4 And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. (Luke 4:1-4)

If He existed, and if He indeed fought temptation by using the Word of God, then I believe there is a lot we can learn from Him in the mist of all temptations we encounter...