SPEAKING OF PHALLIC WORSHIP

Back in toga times, though, the public prick was held in rather more esteem than it is today. The fertility god Priapus was represented by a grotesque guy with a humongous whanger. His dad, Dionysus, was honoured by processions bearing aloft statues of divine dick. And yet another Greek god, Hermes, was often represented by a tapered stone column bearing his sculpted head and, a bit further down, a rock-hard stiffy.

It's not just a matter of ancient Athens; even now, the great Hindu god Shiva is represented by a stone phallus, somewhat abstractly shaped in India, but more anatomically correct in other Hindu cultures.

Theology graduates will patiently explain that phallic worship honours the Great Generative Power, the primal bringer of life. To which a gay guy might well reply, "Dude, I've been getting down on my knees to worship it for years."

Most queer men have venerated the veiny beast in one way or another. Many sucking scenes contain at least an overtone of adoration, and sometimes the religious impulse becomes fairly explicit, as a man pays his homage to the one-eyed god. Says another fellow, "One of the hottest scenes I've done lately was when a sex buddy got down on his knees and just stared at my erection, stroking it like it was holy."

Many hidebound fundamentalists may throw hissy fits, but in these post-Freudian times, it's no longer heresy to suggest that many of the world's great religions have an erotic component; some rather familiar ones worship the creative power of a divine father figure (though feminists debate just how dandy a divine Daddy really is). There are, heaven knows, any number of symbolic woodies standing erect in many of the World's Great Religions. And then there are what Westerners condescendingly call "primitive faiths" - lots of "idols" are quite explicitly endowed.

OK, one might rationally respond that the concept of a cosmic phallus is not precisely the same as the down-to-earth dicks between guys' legs, but the rigorous antisex repression of some fundamentalist faiths might be pushing way too hard in the other direction. (And outright homophobia is, alas, one prominent feature of that sort of push.) Organized religion often strikes an uneasy balance between celebration of the physical world and the repression of sexual desire. Many gay men have a slightly different take on things: If all Creation is sacred, then shouldn't we celebrate one of its most upstanding features?

So next time you run across a fabulous phallus, why not approach is as something more than a piece of flesh to be gotten hard and gotten off? Why not get in tune with the cosmic overtones of cock? Nobody's asking you to build a little shrine in your bedroom, complete with dildos and incense (though that might be cute). But hey, Greece is known as the "cradle of Western civilization," so why not partake of the faith of our foregoers? Thank Dionysus for dick, then get on with the service.

Simon Sheppard

San Francisco artist and activist Simon Sheppard is best known for his contributions to the erotic literary scene. He wrote hundreds of stories that appeared in S/M magazines; erotic anthologies; and over twenty editions of Best Gay Erotica and Best American Erotica. His Sextalk column has appeared on OutUK for more than 20 years. You can find out more about Simon Sheppard in this OutUK feature and tribute, or take a look at some of his many books that are still available:

       

Looking for something very sexy and just as smart? Man on Man collects the best and hottest gay sex writing by Simon, who is also co-editor of Rough Stuff: Tales of Gay Men, Sex, and Power as well as a collection of gay erotica called Hotter Than Hell.

In KINKORAMA : Dispatches from the Front Lines of Perversion he takes readers behind the unmarked doors and black vinyl curtains that lead to the sometimes shocking, often hilarious, relentlessly arousing scenarios of extreme sex. There are also stories of bears in Tales from the Bear Cult: Beat Bear Stories from the Best Magazines.