A group that "celebrate[s] the inherent goodness of adolescent sexuality" and calls for clergy to "speak out against... coercive parental notification and consent for reproductive health services" has just released a study that concludes by calling on American theological seminaries to go over the birds and bees with their students.
Yet in reporting on the study by the Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice and Healing, Chicago Tribune's Manya Brachear failed to label the group as liberal or to find conservative theologians to dispute its arguments. [Click here for our archive on Brachear]
What's more, Brachear practically said "Amen" to the Institute's viewpoint in the opening lines of her January 8 "The Seeker" blog post:
Story Continues Below Ad ↓Virginity pledges shut down healthy conversations about sexuality in churches and synagogues, according to the author of a landmark study unveiled in Chicago on Thursday. But what else can you expect when seminaries don’t teach sex ed?
Kate Ott, associate director of the Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice and Healing, said another ballyhooed study published last week that looked at the effectiveness of "virginity pledges" did not necessarily indict abstinence education programs. Rather, it indicted seminaries for not preparing their graduates to talk honestly and openly with their congregations about sex, she said.
Granted, many houses of worship could stand to improve the way they way they communicate the virtues of chastity while remaining faithful to their respective, conservative religious doctrines of sexual ethics and marriage.
But as Brachear must surely know from doing basic research, the Religious Institute is not concerned with fidelity to religious orthodoxy or conservatism but rather in liberalizing American houses of worship. Indeed, the Institute's chief document, the "Religous Declaration on Sexual Morality, Justice and Healing," laments "unsustainable population growth" and insists on the "[f]ull inclusion of women and sexual minorities in congregational life, including their ordination and the blessing of same sex unions."
Although there's no way in Hades that conservative Protestant and Catholic theologians would agree with the Institute's views, Brachear failed to consult any dissenting voices for a critique. Instead Brachear quoted two officers from the Religious Institute before asking readers:
What do you think? Should clergy take sex ed in seminaries?
—Ken Shepherd is Managing Editor of NewsBusters
Editor at Large
Comments Policy
A child needs parental
January 9, 2009 - 14:13 ET by mattmA child needs parental consent for every non-emergency medical procedure accept having an abortion. That's all these lefties care about. "Reproductive health services" my ass...
Notice the subtlety.
January 9, 2009 - 14:40 ET by Mike BrattonIt's a "religious institute," not a Christian institute.
There's a difference.
Oh, and check out their advisory board. Among its members is a shill for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, a rep for People for the American Way, and Carlton Veazey of the euphemistically-named Religious Coalition for Reproductive Choice. Oh, and some professor from Yale Divinity.
Christianity isn't exactly at the top of this organization's list. Poor Manya needs to try again.
--Mike
www.thebrattonreport...
Kate Ott, associate
January 9, 2009 - 14:57 ET by moderncommentaries83But studies do indicate that teens who have deep, conservative religious beliefs DO abstain from sex – regardless of whether or not they make “virginity pledges.”
I’m all for clergy talking openly with their congregations about sex. Indeed, there is not enough preaching on the topic from the pulpits. Heck, I’d even be willing to write a homily for Catholic priests on the subject, because Catholic teaching is pretty clear:
We are created in God’s image and likeness. God created the sexual act to be a loving, life-giving, self-giving reflection of the powerful love He has for us and the ultimate act of loving expression between a husband and a wife.
Because we are created by God, and in His image, we have an obligation to treat our bodies and the bodies of others with the utmost respect. Nowadays, people have sex as frequently as they shake hands. Sex outside a loving, life-giving, sacramental marriage is a sin.
Moreover, using contraception contributes to the deterioration of our sexuality, cultural morality, rising divorce rates, and mistreatment of women. It pollutes our environment and causes infertility in men and women who don’t want to take contraception. It removes God as the creator of life and is also a gravely sinful act.
Abstain from sex until you are married. After marriage, don’t use contraception afterward.
For some reason, methinks clergy being THAT honest and open about sex will not be popular. I’m guessing their call for “sex ed” is to require clergy to take the liberal bent: Have sex with whomever, whatever you please whenever and wherever. Use lots of contraception and go to Planned Parenthood to abort and children created in the process!
Catholic teaching is also very big on the traditional family and parental rights. My kid wouldn’t be able to take a Midol for her menstrual cramps without signing reams of legal documents, but if she were pregnant, the school “nurse” would take her, without my knowledge, to an abortion clinic.
Then, when my daughter suffers mental/emotional and physical problems, it’s up to me to figure out why. And if she dies from complications of the abortion, well, the school’s not to blame.
Good priests won’t tolerate this. Any clergy who truly believes in God and His teachings won’t tolerate this blather.
This is a joke.
Aut viam inveniam aut faciam
I testify from my own experience.
January 9, 2009 - 16:31 ET by KC MulvilleWhen I was a Jesuit, I took a vow of chastity. In preparation for taking the vow, we had to take classes, because it's a church law. The church demands that anyone who takes a vow must be instructed about what's expected in the vow (which is why they demand marriage classes). Of course, all of the Jesuit scholastics had graduated college, and about half had gone through grad school. Even though we were all blessed with extensive education - and all of us had gone through the normal sex education long before we got near the Jesuits - we all had to sit through a number of classes on basic sex education.
What's really going on here is obvious: these people are working on the principle that anyone who disagrees with them must not understand the truth. The allegation that anyone who vows chastity must not understand sexuality is simply a myth. Instead, there's something deeper going on here. They can't respect a different opinion, so they assume that opponents are ill-informed or simply stupid. That's why they blame an imagined "lack of education."
The irony is that in misunderstanding their critics, they prove their own ignorance.
BINGO!
January 9, 2009 - 17:00 ET by moderncommentaries83You have no idea how many people have said to me that my priest (any priest) is "unfit" to provide marriage counseling or advice on sexual morality because they don't have sex.
It's not only insulting, but wrong. As I believe Catholic teaching is 100% correct on those issues and that a priest who grasps Catholic teaching is more suited than all the marriage counselors in the world.
For liberals, it always comes back to the pelvis. They have no problem with Catholic "social justice" teaching - just with anything related to sex. Yet they say we're obsessed.
Riiiiiight.
As I said above, I wholeheartedly agree that clergy need to preach more about sex. But I'm guessing conservative, wait-until-marriage, heterosexual, don't use contraception, and monogamous teaching won't be appreciated or allowed.
Aut viam inveniam aut faciam
And to be clear
January 9, 2009 - 23:29 ET by KC MulvilleSpeaking as someone who has been on both sides of that fence (in the Jesuits with a vow of chastity, and now as a happily married father of four), I have first-hand experience on this question.
The psychology of a marriage is clearly a form of spirituality. Anyone who doesn't think so simply has a poor understanding of what spirituality really is. Sex is the ultimate human experience of spirituality. It may not always be a spirituality that acknowledges God, but it's a spirituality nevertheless.
Priests are trained in the spiritual. Let's face it, if you go to a marriage counselor and they only talk about sex, and say nothing about the spirituality in a relationship, then you're at the wrong counselor.
Wise words beautifully
January 9, 2009 - 23:40 ET by JerWise words beautifully written, KC.
Jer
KC
January 10, 2009 - 03:49 ET by thebutlerdiditThanks for that post. Some of the people here might already have known that, but I didn't, and found it very interesting.
This poor misguided woman
January 9, 2009 - 16:46 ET by Delsawas obvioulsy never taught that when on a date with the opposite sex, she had to remember to pertend she had an asprin between her knees and hold tight. Don't let it drop.
Dimwitted woman. I feel sorry for her daughters, if she has any or is contimplating having any.
Who the heck does she think she is.
My teaching was NOT to have SEX before marriage. There was NO grey area. NO SEX STOPS UNWANTED PREGNANCIES!
PERIOD!
My Priest knew more about NOT getting PREGNANT than this poor misguided dimwitted broad will ever know.
And anlther thing
January 9, 2009 - 23:55 ET by DelsaWhen I was growing up, there was a saying and it went something like this..
"Bad girls don't get pregnant"
Translation, Bad girls knew how NOT to get pregnant.
Good girls were naive, inexperienced, and most often fell for the old, "I love you line" and .....baby!
I am so sick of women like this.
She and others like her spend so much time pushing and teaching social feel good crap and hands on instruction deatailing how to use various sex products, no wonder kids can't explain the 3 R's.
Do something to Save your young men and women.
Delsa... I have a treat
January 9, 2009 - 23:59 ET by Clear thinkerDelsa...
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We are amused
January 10, 2009 - 00:14 ET by neripowellTrust me when I say: no serious Catholic takes this junk seriously, especially formattors in seminaries. In fact, we can look to these wingnut groups for examples of how not to think theologically and believe faithfully.
Their "urgent reports" and "crisis headlines" amuse us. No more.
Fr. Philip, OP http://www.hancaquam...