Satan’s Reveal

I could have been a smoker. Although my folks didn’t smoke, other pieces were in place that gave me a positive attitude toward the habit as a child. Both my grandfathers, one grandmother, and a favorite uncle all smoked from my earliest remembrance. Additionally, they seemed to like it. I liked the smell of a newly lit cigarette and used to stack unopened packs like building blocks on Granny’s dining table.

Then the other shoe fell. Before I was old enough to have an opinion of my own, Grandad got sick. He retired on full disability in his mid-40s because of emphysema. Granny and my uncle quit smoking partly to make it easier on Grandad. My other grandfather developed a long list of health problems mostly traceable to his own tobacco addiction. My attitude changed as the truth about smoking played out in my extended family. I’ve always considered this a good illustration of the deceit of things only partially true.

A lot of other things are like that. We misunderstand the responsibilities or consequences of adult decisions when we’re young. That’s a big reason God invented parents.

I was reminded of this while listening to a discussion of sex education. It is considered sophisticated today to ridicule abstinence-based education?regardless of the facts. Also scorned are the old fogies who fear that values-free sex education may encourage extramarital sex, compounding the problems the instruction is intended to curb.

The appeal for kids is a little like smoking. Sexual behavior is grown up and sophisticated. A child doesn’t have to be very old to understand that there is fun and pleasure associated with the way men and women interact. Curiosity and some degree of desire appears pretty early as a child approaches adolescence. Then some genius decides to add some instruction on technique, anatomy, and ways of preventing outward consequences of extramarital sex. “It’s fun, it’s grown up, and you won’t get caught,” the kids are told. “A final caution, though.” The kids roll their eyes as they await the inevitable moralizing. “You need to wait until you feel you’re ready before starting on this wonderful journey.” That’s it. A whole roomful of kids who feel ready have just now been set free to do what they think best.

There is something more, though. Something only a nagging moralizer would tell you. Sexual behavior has consequences a condom or an abortion cannot erase. A sexual relationship is a relationship between two spiritual beings. Meaning is attached to behavior in a relationship that cannot be just shrugged off. We are more than biology.

Some don’t agree with that. For them, let’s reframe the discussion. Let’s talk about driving. Kids want to drive long before they are legally able. It’s fun, grown up?desirable to make one wise. So let’s teach them how to drive, wrap them in bubble pack, give them a little body and fender training and, after handing out licenses, tell them to not drive until they “feel like they are ready.” That’ll work.

Without moralizing about judgment, safety, responsibility and consequences, the job is not complete to anyone’s satisfaction. The driver’s manual is chock full of moralizing. Policemen and judges likewise have a lot of moral opinions about how you exercise your right to drive.

I’d argue that driving a car is easier, less dangerous, and generally less important than the way men and women behave toward one another. Institutionally, we use a lot more care in preparing young drivers than we do preparing young moral decision-makers. Even the care we take in this area is one dimensional?based on the assumption that avoiding disease and full-term pregnancy adequately covers the subject.

In fact, a message that acknowledges the moral aspect of sexuality is more likely to head off even these merely overt consequences of extramarital sexual behavior. The Heritage Foundation study by Robert Rector and Kirk Johnson (cited on page 11 of this issue) notes that teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases are significantly impacted by abstinence pledges and programs like True Love Waits. Even years after the pledge, young adults are more likely to be sexually pure for having pledged to be so as teenagers.

Why then the ridicule of moral teaching? Why do government programs for minor children spend more on values-free sex education than on abstinence teaching by a ratio of more than four to one? Why are researchers and media spokesmen so eager to believe that a moral message is a detriment to young people rather than a benefit? I think it’s a blinding prejudice. These well-meaning people have been conditioned to think that anything believed by religious people is false and backward. Their research begins with this assumption and then sets out to prove the assumption.

It is a rare adult who believes that extramarital sex, certainly among teenagers, benefits an individual or society. It is a rare adult that considers the matter merely neutral. We know better. We’ve lived with our own mistakes and we’ve seen families and individuals wrecked by immoral behavior. Those rare adults who think otherwise have influence disproportionate to their numbers.