Why Abstinence?

I just received an email from United Families International. Some of the pro-family groups out there I find to be overbearing and even hateful. I don’t know a whole lot about this organization, but I thought this information was relevant and helpful:

The number of people walking around with STD’s is shocking. In fact, research presented last month showed that one in four teen-age girls in the United States (3.2 million) have a sexually transmitted infection (STI) – That means 25 percent of all girls ages 14-19 have an STI! at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National STD Prevention Conference

Common sense tells us that sexual abstinence until marriage is the only 100-percent proven way to prevent STD’s; yet more than 75 percent of all sexual education courses taught in our public schools are based on the active promotion of condoms, other forms of contraception and “safer sex.” The following facts are proof of why there is an epidemic of sexual transmitted diseases:

• Condoms failed to prevent the transmission of the HIV virus between 15 and 31 percent of the time;
• According to the National Survey of Family Growth, one in every five teens using condoms becomes pregnant within one year;
• Sexual activity prior to marriage leads to elevated risks of suicide, depression, substance abuse, anxiety and dating violence.

Parents must be teachers about many things in life, and sexual abstinence until marriage should be high on that list.

Here are some tips for you:

• Stay close to your children. Fewer teen pregnancies and STD’s result when fathers maintain good relationships with their daughters ;
• Support abstinence-only education and its funding;
• Monitor the “sex education” programs in your children’s schools;
• If you believe any of your children are sexually active, have them tested and treated;
• Encourage your children to think consequentially and to remain abstinent. Re-enforce this theme on a regular basis. Children respond to clearly communicated and high levels of expectation from their parents;
• Positive peer pressure on teens can work. Teens in religious youth groups will receive positive instruction from a youth leader and peer pressure from fellow teens to remain sexually pure until marriage.

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April Fools!

Rob set up this joke for the kids’ breakfast. We never have these “sugar” cereals in our house, so everyone was very excited to have breakfast today. The kids busted in a little early, and Hunter came into our room holding the white slip of paper reading, “April Fools” and said, “Emma wants to know where the real Cookie Crisp is!” I have a feeling she wasn’t the only one wondering. We were amazed when Hunter barely flinched at getting tomato clam juice instead of what he thought was ruby grapefruit. Emma took a nice big swig though and gave us a great reaction, “I don’t like this! What is it??” So fun for Mom and Dad, not sure if we’ve been forgiven yet though…

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