SEX EDUCATION IN THE CLASSROOM…MUST WE BE SO HARDHEADED?

Listen to this! "A survey conducted in the UK revealed that teenage pregnancy rates are highest in areas that have been most aggressive in promoting sex education."

Now you want figures? "Official figures reveal that teenage pregnancies rose in Britain by an annual rate of 800 from 38,439 in 2001 to 39,286 in 2002. The pregnancies led to 17,682 of the children being aborted in 2001. The number of cases of sexually transmitted diseases has also risen by an alarming 62 percent between 1997's 25,143 cases and 2002's 40,821 cases."

Now, how could this happen when Britain spent £15million precisely to supposedly counter the situation of having the highest teenage pregnancy rate in Western Europe? (One out of ten babies were being born to teenage mothers.) What they decided to do was to implement a "Teenage Pregnancy Unit in 1999 to reduce teenage pregnancies by 50 percent by 2010, and 15 percent by the end of 2004. The strategy of the Teenage Pregnancy Unit includes explicit sex education by nurses in schools, free condoms, and sending girls a birthday card on their 14th birthday inviting them to a confidential medical examination without consent from their parents.

And what did they get – increase in teenage pregnancies and the number of cases of STDs. Wisely they concluded: "Explicit sex education and providing condoms to young girls simply encourage them to become sexually active and that "it might be wiser to support the majority in abstinence and demonstrate to the minority the physical, emotional and psychological benefits of delaying sex until marriage."

Unfortunately, many countries including the Philippines refuse to learn from Britain's experience. HB 3773, a bill pending in our Congress is pushing for sex education in classrooms, among other things. Must we be so dense and hardheaded as to want this in our country?

It is time to see the wisdom in keeping with the parental role that they are the first and primary educators of their children and what the time calls for is chastity and education in love in the home. "Chastity includes an apprenticeship in self-mastery which is training in human freedom. The alternative is clear: either man governs his passions and finds peace, or he lets himself be dominated by them and becomes unhappy." Teenage pregnancies, abortions, and sexually transmitted diseases make for unhappiness.

Specifically, "the normal and fundamental method" is a "personal dialogue between parents and their children, that is, individual formation within the family circle. In fact there is no substitute for a dialogue of trust and openness between parents and their children, a dialogue which respects not only their stages of development but also the young persons as individuals."

However, there is the reality that there are parents who need help from others in carrying out their responsibility to educate their children. To this, the Pontifical Council for the Family presents different ways of helping out, emphasizing the need to "observe the right order of cooperation and collaboration between parents and those who can help them in their task. It is clear that the assistance of others must be given first and foremost to parents rather than to their children."

In this regard, the ministry of Teodora has a sex education training module for parents and the CFC Pro-Life Pillar has the 100% Pure Program for the youth. Both programs adhere to the four working principles regarding education in love, which are:

First Principle: Human sexuality is a sacred mystery and must be presented according to the doctrinal and moral teaching of the Church, always bearing in mind the effects of original sin.

Second Principle: Only information proportionate to each phase of their individual development should be presented to children and young people.

Third Principle: No material of an erotic nature should be presented to children or young people of any age, individually or in a group.

Fourth Principle: No one should ever be invited, let alone obliged, to act in any way that could objectively offend against modesty or which could subjectively offend against his or her own delicacy or sense of privacy.

Contributed by:

TEODORA: IN DEFENSE OF THE AUTHENTIC WOMAN INC.