Archive for the 'Chastity' Category

This past week-end, my brother Eric and I spoke to a group of close to 100 teens on the topic of chastity. The retreat, which was based on the famous Steubenville Retreats, separated the guys from the girls. Even though almost all of my chastity talks are to a co-ed audience, I have to say that there is something sort of neat in speaking to just the girls. I’m sure any woman reading this can relate. I can talk about certain things or not even talk just give the look and they know exactly what I mean. Not that I’m saying anything bad about guys, that wouldn’t be very conducive to the quest for chastity, but there’s just a different feel in a room full of women. It was a nice change anyway. (more…)

I enjoyed this post on Modestly Yours. I have taken to calling Victoria’s Secrect, Victoria’s Brothel. I really liked the final comment (at least it was the final comment last I looked). It nicely summed it all up.

In conjuction with today’s official release date for Dawn Eden’s long-awaited The Thrill of the Chaste: Finding Fulfillment While Keeping Your Clothes On, she and The Raving Atheist bring us “Chastening Thoughts”, the first installment in a new video series.

I just finished reading Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte. In order to not ruin the story for any readers who have not yet read this classic, I will continue this entry . . . (more…)

I was really annoyed with a particular article from last Sunday’s Chicago Tribune. I have to wonder if Ross Werland is stuck in the 60’s? Doesn’t he realize that there are dozens of STDs because people choose to sleep around? And that most of these STDs wreak havoc on women – possibly rendering them infertile? But why should he care about that? He’s more concerned about whether or not people think he’s a freak.

As an aside, I happened to really like being part of a “small crowd” and so do most people I know from large families.

I suggest you write to our dear friend and enlighten the poor soul: (rwerland@tribune.com).

…comes “Chastity Rome-Chick Blues”!

An excerpt from Dawn’s forthcoming book, The Thrill of the Chaste: Finding Fulfillment While Keeping Your Clothes On, is available here.

Watching this video, I couldn’t help but make the connection with the abstinence educators’ symposium I attended yesterday. The symposium included an excellent talk on the importance of effective communication of the abstinence message by David Mahan — probably the most dynamic abstinence speaker I’ve ever heard — of Frontline Communications as well as a performance by a group of high school and college kids from the Chicago chapter of BreakDown.

The kids in BreakDown, David Mahan, Dawn Eden — none of them is anything like the tired old stereotype of the abstinence movement: the homely, puritanical, sex-hating, finger-wagging, “You’re going to hell if you have sex!”-preaching old biddy.

The new pro-life, pro-chastity generation is here. And it’s here to stay.

There’s a story—actually several months old at this point—that’s lately been making the rounds at various radical feminist and other leftist websites and even the mainstream media. It’s about the alleged abject failure of abstinence only programs at one Timken High School in Canton, OH, resulting in an epidemic of teen pregnancies, and how the school administration jettisoned such programs in favor of “comprehensive” programs that include birth control instruction.

Tim at Random Observations looked into this report and offers a thorough debunking. The most outrageous bit is the case of one Timken student whose parents claimed to have talk to her “45 times a week” about sex, and yet—somehow—blame the school for their daughter’s pregnancy! As Tim concludes: “In short, we appear to have been conned yet again.”

Read the whole thing.

“Condoms Found to Block a Virus Harmful to Women,” headlines the New York Times article about a study on condoms and HPV (human papilloma virus) published today in the New England Journal of Medicine.

In many circles, the study is being touted as a boon for proponents of condom-based sex education and a setback for abstinence education supporters.

A closer look at the study, however, reveals that the tired old message of “Use condoms” is hardly an advisable strategy for HPV prevention.

Among the study’s findings:

The incidence of genital HPV infection was 37.8 per 100 patient-years at risk among women whose partners used condoms for all instances of intercourse during the eight months before testing, as compared with 89.3 per 100 patient-years at risk in women whose partners used condoms less than 5 percent of the time (adjusted hazard ratio, 0.3; 95 percent confidence interval, 0.1 to 0.6, adjusted for the number of new partners and the number of previous partners of the male partner).

Read that alarmingly high 100% condom use failure rate again in light of the New York Times headline. The study itself uses considerably less stronger language: (more…)

From the heart of our nation, Project Reality gives us yet more evidence that the supporters of “comprehensive” sex education have no interest in entering into open-minded debate with those who oppose their agenda:

ABSTINENT TEENS KICKED OUT OF CAPITOL BY COMPREHENSIVE SEX EDUCATION ADVOCATES

POSTED: JUN 14, 2006

Advocates for Youth, the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (SIECUS), and the Society for Adolescent Medicine (SAM) not interested in listening to abstinent teens

Yesterday, opponents of abstinence education, the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States and Advocates for Youth, hosted a Congressional Briefing entitled “The Ethics of Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Programs.” The briefing featured an analysis of a case study on the “ethics” of teaching abstinence education to teens, arguing that abstinence education violates adolescents’ fundamental human rights.

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I imagine our resident curmudgeon Lauren will be jubilant about this, but it’s worth bringing up anyway. Sam and Bethany Torode, the Protestant couple who in 2002 published the book Open Embrace: A Protestant Couple Rethinks Contraception have recently recanted their opposition to contraception. In an “Open Letter” on thier website, they say that after five years of practicing Natural Family Planning (NFP) they’ve decided it’s too difficult and that barrier methods of contraception are okay.

I’ve practiced NFP for a little longer than five years—just over nine years, in fact—and on top of that I have nine-plus years prior experience with contraception. If you figure I’ve been married for fourteen years you can do the math and see that my experience spans both side of the marriage bond.

Based on that experience I can testify to two things: (1) Contraception is bad for relationships and especially poisonous for marriage and (2) NFP, though at times very difficult, is extremely benificial to marriage. If you’re interested in further elaboration on these topics, I invite you to visit my personal blog, Square Zero, where I’ve been addressing these issues at length in recent days.

Cassandra at Modestly Yours has a thought-provoking post today titled Age Restrictions dealing with the subject of dating:

I would like to pose to you all a question that came up after my spring break. With other friends and I returning to school after vacations at home, where we saw young siblings and neighbors who are suddenly growing up so fast, the question of “what age is appropriate to start dating” came up…

While I definitely think that waiting until the late teenage years is preferable for dating, I am still questioning this topic, what my experience has been, and how I would like to approach the subject with my future children. I am curious what others think, as well as if their thoughts are motivated by an understanding of dating as preparation for marriage.

I have my own thoughts on the matter, and have posted a comment. I urge you to weigh in as well.

A new study confirms what common sense already told us:

Sexually charged music, magazines, TV and movies push youngsters into intercourse at an earlier age, perhaps by acting as kind of virtual peer that tells them everyone else is doing it, a study said Monday.

Blogger Mark Shea’s razor-sharp analytical skills don’t disappoint in his 26-word post on the study:

Science Discovers that a Culture Which Despises Virginity Despises Children

In other news, science figures out that water is wet and the sun is quite bright.

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Michelle McCusker was interviewed on ABC News last week to talk about losing her job last fall as a preschool teacher at a Catholic school in Queens, NY.

Shortly after she was hired, the 26-year old McCusker, who is single, told school officials that she was pregnant. Abortion was out of the question for her — she was going to keep her baby. Two days later, the school fired her for violating the school’s policy that its teachers are required to “convey the faith, to convey the gospel values and Christian traditions of the Catholic faith.”

Should the school have fired her? (more…)

Regarding the comment I made in my last post about the explosive rise in the number of STD cases as the rate of using condoms has increased, reader Nikolia made the following comments:

Do people wonder why this happens? Isn’t it obvious? If condoms aren’t completely protective against STDs, but more people are being fooled into believing that they are, then more people will use them, thus causing STDs to be more rampant. Why are people unable to work through this clearly logical chain of thought?

In fact, I find the fact that no one bothers to teach teens about abstinence fairly insulting. It implies that teens are wild animals who are unable to keep their desires in check.

Nikolia is right.

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It’s here.

Yesterday, a “health” clinic in Wausau, WI, held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for its new drive-up birth control window. The window, clinic staff say, will make it easier for them to get birth control into the hands of girls as young as 15 — and their parents never have to know.

When will these clinics learn?

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