NEWS STORY: Adults urged to keep sending the message on teen sex

c. 1999 Religion News Service NEW ORLEANS _ Amid falling teen pregnancy rates, a national advocacy group is telling religious organizations to stick with their message on teen sexuality, whether it’s condoms or abstinence _ because against all expectations, teens seem to be listening. Parents and pastors may feel overwhelmed by the celebration of early […]

c. 1999 Religion News Service

NEW ORLEANS _ Amid falling teen pregnancy rates, a national advocacy group is telling religious organizations to stick with their message on teen sexuality, whether it’s condoms or abstinence _ because against all expectations, teens seem to be listening.

Parents and pastors may feel overwhelmed by the celebration of early or casual sex in youth-oriented music, television and movies.”I think parents sometimes feel it’s a lost cause. Like, `What influence do I have over my 15-year-old son? He and his friends listen to MTV and their peers, not me,'”said Bill Albert of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.


But a review of 20 years of sexuality studies finds that young people look first to parents and friends or leaders in their churches or synagogues for guidance on moral behavior, including sexual issues, said Tamara Kreinin, another staff member.”The message to parents is real clear,”she said.”When it comes to talking about sex, it’s come to the party early and stay late.” The campaign began in 1996, shortly after President Clinton in his 1995 State of the Union address challenged private groups to coordinate efforts to fight teen pregnancy.

The private, nonprofit organization, based in Washington, D.C., does much of its work through faith communities of all denominations, while steering clear of the contentious condoms vs. abstinence battles that have polarized the debate on how to lower the rate of teen pregnancy.

“While the adults are arguing, the teens are getting pregnant,” said Albert, quoting a touchstone of the campaign’s mission.

Instead, the group collects research data and acts as a clearinghouse for information on successful local public-health and church-based programs that can be mined for techniques, whatever an inquirer’s theology of sex, Albert said.

“We’re saying there’s plenty of room for agreement. We don’t have to change each others’ minds.”

With five co-sponsoring church and state institutions, the campaign ran a daylong conversation with pastors in New Orleans this week, seeking stories about what works and what doesn’t.

As the first of several meetings around the country, the findings will be gathered into a national report next year, Kreinin said.


“We just need some help,” said state Sen. Paulette Irons, D-New Orleans, who for years has organized efforts to discourage girls from becoming pregnant in their teen years, as she did. In April of last year, the Irons-led Louisiana Initiative on Teen Pregnancy Prevention launched a six-month billboard campaign encouraging parents to communicate the importance of sexual abstinence.

Predictably, the panels divided over whether to preach sexual abstinence until marriage or merely to encourage it while also teaching condom use to lower the risk of pregnancy and disease.

“A condom does not protect you against a broken heart,” said the Rev. Jerrode Keys of Bogalusa, La., adding he believes most teen girls having sex, often with older men, do so because they want to be loved.

“If parents give them love, they may not go looking for love in someone’s bedroom,” he said.

Others deemed abstinence the best choice, but said condom use must be encouraged among young people who have rejected abstinence.

Nonetheless, some common themes became clear: the value of mentors in providing role models for youthful behavior; the need by churches to forgive and accept those who fail; the need for church leaders to live out the sexual values they preach; and the need for churches to provide teens with a hopefulness about the future that pregnancy would threaten.


Together they seem to have an effect, Kreinin said.

The rate of teen pregnancy fell 17 percent between 1990 and 1996, according to data published by the Alan Guttmacher Institute.

The largest part of that decrease seems to be the more effective use of contraceptives, although recent data also suggest a slight decline in overall sexual activity among teens, Kreinin said.

DEA END NOLAN

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