ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the ways in which religious young adults negotiate sexuality in diverse spaces and contexts within mainstream society. The exploration will start with a consideration of the participants' views regarding how religion was perceived in wider society, specifically in relation to sexuality, highlighting the dominant religion-is-sex-negative' discourse. Nikunen argues that Contemporary media publicity is characterized by increased interest in sexual behaviour: intimate encounters of politicians, celebrities and ordinary people are reported in explicit detail'. Participants conveyed complex narratives around religion, with religion offering both constraining and enabling potentials for furnishing sexual identities. This chapter outlines the ambivalence or negativity that a number of participants showed towards media images that depicted sexualised content. It has mapped the negotiation of secular culture in relation to sexuality, both how the participants felt they were positioned by others in wider society, and how they themselves navigated certain spaces and contexts.
