When a military chaplain was on ABC news saying how pornography use is becoming a problem for troops overseas, I listened. When the chaplain talked about how real women at home couldn't measure up to the impossible pictures, I thought of this woman I had seen years ago in a bookstore on base in Japan.

I shouldn't remember her. The woman was not one of those people you even notice, much less remember. She had no particular hair color, no charm of face. She reminded me of wide egg noodles, cream of mushroom soup and Minute Rice.

But I noticed her when her sailor husband handed her a stack of magazines maybe 5 inches thick. Penthouse. Playboy. Hustler. Worse. He must have picked up every single “porno mag” the bookstore offered.

While I watched and the people behind me watched, the wife took the stack from him. She held it in hands that had probably stroked his face, patted his back, clutched his thighs. She handed the stack to a clerk. Then, in front of a line of 10 people, with her husband waiting impatiently by the door, she slowly signed her name to the bottom of her personal check. She did it as if pornography was something you brought home weekly, like milk. Like eggs. Like Minute Rice.

Until that moment, I'd always thought pornography was no big deal, a boys-will-be-boys kind of thing. Seeing her in person shook me -- her pasty face, her terrible resignation.

So I paid attention to the news segment about these 11,000 sexual purity kits that are going to military members in Iraq. Following the popular “Every Man's Battle” series from New Life Ministries, the kits promote Bible-based abstinence for men and women: no pornography, adultery, non-marital sex or masturbation.

I heard that and kind of winced. It seemed too old fashioned of a solution for a time when pornography is as available as a paper-wrapped burger. It made me think of some of those goofy venereal disease movies from WWII. Still I can think of two couples I know who have divorced over pornography addiction. I read every week about how it's getting to be more and more of a problem for every age group.

But a religious text? I just didn't know. I picked up a copy of one of the books at a Christian bookstore. At first I was uncomfortable reading it. I'm Christian. I practice my faith. But this book was written by men who are far more zealous in their faith than I am in mine.

These authors wrote about sexual purity and a man's relationship to God. Their recommendations seemed a little extreme to me -- suggesting that men avoid not only pornography, but magazine advertisements and movies with a rating over PG-13.

But the more I read it, the more I understood why the chaplains had ordered the book. The whole second half of the book is about setting up the defenses of the marriage. They went over how to handle it when you find yourself attracted to someone else. They had a strategy for how to behave when someone is attracted to you.

They didn't say if. They said when. They didn't write as though men were idiots or slaves of passion. They reminded their male readers to honor and cherish the women they married. To remember what the wife gave up in order to be married to them. In what way can I object to that?

Yes, I am a little leery when it comes to mixing faith matters with big organizations like the military. Still I can't stop thinking about that poor woman. I can't stop thinking about her husband.