Birmingham Rep will be the venue for Fertility Fest – the first event of its kind in the UK.  Produced by Jessica Hepburn and Gabby Vautier, it will bring together 20 writers, visual artists, theatre-makers, film-directors and composers alongside some of the country’s foremost fertility experts.

We will be talking about, and sharing art around, the diagnosis of infertility, IVF, donation, surrogacy, the male experience, egg freezing, involuntary childlessness and alternative routes to parenthood.

I will be crying

I will be there (speaking at 11.30am).  I think it’s highly unlikely I will manage to be there without crying. (I say that to prepare myself as much as anybody else.)

Other people might want to talk about the effects of fertility science on future generations and how far as a society are we prepared to go in our pursuit of parenthood. I want to be there because I want to stand in the same space as people whose deep longing to have children remains unfulfilled.   Grieving is inevitable.  There is no escaping that. But whatever else we feel, we do not need to feel alone.

• Book tickets for Birmingham’s Fertility Fest, which includes a performance of The Quiet House by Gareth Farr.
• Book tickets for London’s Fertility Fest on Saturday, 11 June 2016.

Day 26

One day I shall look back at this time

At the waiting

And the counting

And the bleeding

And the longing

The trying

And the not-trying

The loving

And forgiving

And I will say that it made sense.

I know the time will come again

When my womb will be holding

The secret hope,

The possibility of miracle;

Origins so awesome

That only God can know.

But today my vulva

Is tender-lipped

Heralding blood.

And today is the day

I have to live

Right now

Learning to embrace

My own body and grieving dreams

With the fierce

Unconditional

Over-whelming

Mother’s love

That is present

That is ready

That is now.

Jo Ind

Dr Susannah Cornwall, who wrote the theology section of the book, is a woman after my heart and mind on sexuality.

She says the church tends to think that sexuality issues are about homosexuality because it constructs homosexuality as “other”.

One things that follows from that is that heterosexuality is often unmarked, it’s just something in the water that people barely notice or comment on because they take it for granted.

“Sexuality isn’t just to do with orientation it’s broader than that,” she says.

I do so agree.  Much of my own work, has been around finding a way of conceptualising sexuality so that we can all sit down and listen and weave our theology together.

I hope some of us will be doing that at the Birmingham launch of the book. Everyone is welcome on Tuesday, 24 February 2015 at 7.30pm at Balsall Heath Church Centre, 100 Mary Street, Balsall Heath B12 9JU

The event is hosted by the Birmingham branch of Changing Attitude.

The book is part of a series published by Darton Longmann and Todd which aims to make the church more inclusive on matters such as mental health, disability, sexuality, poverty, gender and ethnicity.

Inclusive Church is an organisation founded in 2003, initially because of concern at the resignation of Revd Dr Jeffrey John as Bishop of Reading, but thereafter because it wanted to work towards a church that is welcoming and open to all.

In preparing my talk, I’ve noticed that I have felt in a very quiet place around sexuality issues in recent years and found it almost unbearable listening to debates about the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill currently going through Parliament.

It’s not that I’m not political.  Sexuality is a very political issue affected by the laws of the land that need changing, so some people have got to argue about it. There was a time when I would have been quite happy to be one of those people. Indeed I would have wanted it.

But now when those same arguments are being rehearsed over and over again in the The Mail,  The Sun, on Newsnight, on the Today programme, I find myself wincing and covering my ears (or eyes, depending…)

I don’t want to shout about it.  I don’t want to argue about it – though I CAN. I just want to metaphorically take off my shoes and recognise that when we are talking about sexuality, we are indeed on holy ground.

It seems Anglicans and Catholics have spent the summer speaking about gay marriage while millions, on the underground, in book clubs and online have been discussing Anastasia Steele and her relationship with the sadomasochist Christian Grey.

Can they get together despite their incompatible sexualities?

The central issue of the easy-read book which has topped the UK best-sellers list for the past six months, is of a 22-year-old virgin who falls in love with a multi-billionaire who wants to tie her up and spank her and make her ask for more. Anastasia is looking for romance. Christian can‘t get turned on when sex is vanilla.  Can they find a way of getting it together despite their seemingly incompatible sexualities?

It’s an interesting question and one that raises questions for us all about compromise within sex, going outside our comfort zones, working out what we really don’t like and what we could develop a taste for.

Confusing sadomasochism with domestic violence

Last month the discussion took a darker turn.  Clare Phillipson, director of Wearside Women in Need, a charity for victims of domestic violence, called for women to burn their copies on 5 November along with an effigy of Christian Grey, on the grounds that it is “an instruction manual for an abusive individual to sexually torture a vulnerable young woman.”

Phillipson claims the story is about a domestic violence perpetrator who takes someone who is less experienced and powerful, spins her a yarn, starts doing horrific sexual things to her and makes it seem normal.  She worries that teenagers will be picking the book up and thinking: “This is alright.”

The church needs a foothold in Fifty Shades debates

I think it’s important for the church to get a foothold in the discussion at this point, but it’s difficult for it to do so because historically its understanding of sexual ethics has been focussed on procreative acts – heterosexual vaginal intercourse in the context of marriage and so on. This way of thinking has nothing to offer when exploring Fifty Shades of Grey-type dilemmas.

The first thing that I would say to Phillipson is that I can understand why women who have been beaten by their partners are highly-sensitised to beatings in erotic fantasies. I have sympathy with those who are reminded, through reading Fifty Shades of Grey, of being stalked and abused and traumatised.

But I would also say that it is very important to draw a distinction between a scenario in which a woman consents to being spanked because it turns her on and in which there is an agreed safe word for her say when she wants it to stop, and one in which a chap simply beats the Hell out of her.

Christian Grey is a role-model

I think Christian Grey goes far further than your average bloke in ensuring that Anastasia really is consenting to what they do in sex. On that count, he is a role-model.

Having said that, I agree that “consent” is slippery. There is an argument that women have been socialised to be submissive to men and that the submissive/dominant dynamic has been eroticised. A woman’s desire to be submissive could be seen as evidence of her oppression rather than her liberation, even if she does consent to it.

I agree with that. Besides, we all know we can “consent” to things because we’re vulnerable, because our options are limited, because we think everybody else is doing it, because we feel we want something but when we actually do it we realise that we don’t.

Consent is tricksy

Consent is dynamic, it’s tricksy and it can take considerable skill and experience to discern when it is deep and authentic and when it is half-baked and mistaken.

This is where the church has a great deal to offer. It has a very handy tool up its sleeve for assessing the quality of consent – the teachings of Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Jesuit Order.

Ignatius’ discernment can be used in sex

Ignatius taught about consolation and desolation. When we are consoled, he said, new energy is released and we feel closer to others. When we are desolate, we turn in on ourselves and feel drained. With practice we can evaluate our experiences according to how desolate or consoled they made us and we can choose to live more in consolation.

I think this practice is invaluable in discerning whether our sexual experiences are truly what we want or whether we are being manipulated and compromising where we shouldn’t be. If Anastasia came to me for help in her dilemma with Christian, I would offer her St Ignatius.  “When you are playing with Christian, listen very carefully to your feelings, both as it’s happening and afterwards.  How is it making you feel?  Is it making you feel peaceful and fully alive? Is it making you withdraw and contract inside?”

In all my readings of sex manuals and feminist literature, I have found nothing as useful as this tool for improving sex.  The church has so much to offer in making better lovers of us all. Come on. Let’s give it.

• This article was first published in The Church Times, 14 September 2012