Intimacy in Marriage

Readings in the Student Manual:

Readings in this Page:

The Prophet Joseph Smith
Populating the Eternal Worlds
The Words of Joseph Smith, p.232 [brackets added]

The earthly [being] the image of the Heavenly [cf. D&C 77:2] shows that is by the multiplication of lives that the eternal worlds are created and occupied ...

Pres. Spencer W. Kimball
Sexual Drives are Good and Necessary Within Marriage
My Beloved Sisters, p. 8;  President Kimball Speaks Out, pp. 6,9-10

The sexual drives that bind men and women together as one are good and necessary. They make it possible for a couple to leave their parents and cleave unto one another. But here, more than almost any other place, we must exercise self-control. These drives, which are the fountainhead of human life, are to be allowed expression only in the sanctity of marriage.

In the context of lawful marriage, the intimacy of sexual relations is right and divinely approved. There is nothing unholy or degrading about sexuality in itself, for by that means men and women join in a process of creation and in an expression of love.  ...  The sexual relationship that is wrong before marriage is right and beautiful as part of the union encouraged by God.

But there are false teachers everywhere, using speech and pornographic literature, magazines, radio, TV, street talk-- spreading damnable heresies which break down moral standards, and this to gratify the lust of the flesh.

Elder Parley P. Pratt
Purposes of Intimacy in Marriage
Key to the Science of Theology, Ch.17, pp.169-170

The object of the Union of the sexes is the propagation of their species, or procreation; also for mutual affection, and the cultivation of those eternal principles of never ending charity and benevolence, which are inspired by the Eternal Spirit; also for mutual comfort and assistance in this world of toil and sorrow, and for mutual duties toward their offspring.

Marriage, and its duties, are therefore, not a mere matter of choice or convenience, or of pleasure to the parties; but to marry and multiply is a positive command of Almighty God, binding on all persons of both sexes who are circumstanced and conditioned to fulfill the same. To marry, propagate our species, do our duty to them, and to educate them in the light of truth, are among the chief objects of our existence on the earth.

President Hugh B. Brown
No Need for Fear nor Shame
You and Your Marriage, pp. 73, 76

Thousands of young people come to the marriage altar almost illiterate insofar as this basic and fundamental function is concerned. The sex instinct is not something which we need to fear or be ashamed of. It is God-given and has a high and holy purpose.

Sex is not an unmentionable human misfortune, and certainly it should not be regarded as a sordid but necessary part of marriage. There is no excuse for approaching this most intimate relationship in life without true knowledge of its meaning and its high purpose. This is an urge which more insistently than others calls for self-control and intelligence.

Pres. Harold B. Lee
Limits on Intimacy Even After Marriage
Ye Are the Light of the World, Chapter 8

I suppose it would be a shock ... if I were to say to you that even after your marriage you are not to consider your wife as a mere plaything for the gratification of your lustful appetites.  One who has that concept of marriage is doomed to an unhappy union.  No pure Latter-day Saint woman with an understanding of the great mission of wifehood and motherhood could ever be happy with a man who thinks of her as a mere convenience because he happens to have been legally married to her.

... I say to you with all the conviction of my soul that unless you change your thinking and correct your bad habits and walk a course directed by the teachings of the gospel of Jesus Christ, you are doomed to disappointment and to bitterness in the future years of your life.  ... [From] now on, when you are in the presence of a pure young woman, you will safeguard her with the realization that even a man married does not own the woman he marries.  She is to be as the Lord said in the beginning: "a help meet."  She is to be your companion, your partner, your equal.  Any man who thinks of his wife as less than that, in my judgment, has proved himself unworthy of a pure, sweet Latter-day Saint girl. ...