Teens face risk as permissive sex yields STDs
- Apr 16, 2008 - 1
Teenage girls particularly are at risk amid the permissive sex attitudes American culture has propagated for decades, leading to an epidemic of sexually transmitted diseases (STD), according to a Southern Baptist physician.
Don Buckley, a family physician in Pensacola, Fla., said a study released March 11 by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) “confirms the tragic stories that we in primary care hear virtually every day.”
The study found that at least one in four girls between the ages of 14 and 19 nationwide is infected with an STD, amounting to 3.2 million youth.
Richard Ross, co-founder of True Love Waits, said churches are “getting lazy” in promoting abstinence as the only safe method in preventing the spread of STDs, teen pregnancy and a myriad of challenges that can stem from premature sex.
“Teen sexual activity rose for 20 straight years, from 1973 to 1993,” Ross said. “True Love Waits started in 1993. Since then, teen sexual activity has dropped for 14 unbroken years. But in 2008, there has been a slight uptick. If the church is not vigilant, we will go right back where we were.”
As evidence that some churches have become lax in their efforts at curbing teen sex, Ross said he has spoken with numerous pastors who have said their churches present the True Love Waits abstinence challenge only once every three or four years.
“We need a red alert to jar pastors and youth ministers out of their complacency,” said Ross, a professor of student ministry at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. “They think the stats will just continue to drop on their own, and 2008 proves that is not the case.”
Daniel Heimbach, a professor of Christian ethics at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Wake Forest, N.C., said his main concern with the CDC statistics on STD rates is “the indication of the lack of any sense of personal responsibility, the cheapening of sex and relationships and the implication that has not only for individuals but for the culture as a whole,”
Heimbach, like Buckley and Ross, said the solution to the alarming statistics is an increased emphasis on sexual abstinence among the nation’s youth.
“It shows the erosion of the moral foundations of our society and culture, which is by God’s grace protected by sexual standards that God gives in terms of saving sex for marriage,” said Heimbach, author of True Sexual Morality: Recovering Biblical Standards for a Culture in Crisis.
“This is obviously an indicator of the huge number of people—in this case, girls, but it obviously takes boys as well—that are engaging in sexual activity in very immoral and unprotected ways, unprotected morally and unprotected health-wise,” Heimbach said. “This is a disaster in the making, and the only answer is to respect and uphold God’s standards and be kind to others in the process but say, ‘You’re heading on a road toward destruction.’”
Ross said one of the most effective ways for churches to lead in efforts to save youth from the harmful consequences of premarital sex is to introduce them to the abstinence message through an emphasis like a True Love Waits dedication ceremony. Such services, he said, need to be held on a yearly basis in order to reach as many youth as possible.
“Perhaps church leaders shy away from an annual promise ceremony because they don’t want to ask a student to sign six cards while young,” Ross said, referring to the pledge cards that students sign promising to abstain from sexual activity until marriage. “They have missed the point. We never ask teenagers to make multiple promises.
“In fact, it offends Christian students when they are asked to promise again,” Ross said. “In their minds, their original promise was a promise to God and that promise stands to their wedding day and beyond.”
The annual invitation to participate in a True Love Waits promise ceremony, Ross said, should be made to middle school students recently promoted into the student ministry department, to all students who have committed their lives to Christ during the past year, and to students who have joined the church and have no background with the abstinence movement.
“Students who have made promises in previous years participate in Bible teaching on purity, and they attend the ceremony to support the first-timers, but no one places yet another card in their hands,” Ross said.
The idea that promoting abstinence through a commitment service every year is enough must be corrected, he said.
“Few churches highlight international missions only once every few years. Few would decide to offer vacation Bible school only once every few years. Churches give annual attention to those initiatives because they have Kingdom importance,” Ross said. “Those initiatives matter in people’s lives in the same way that a lifestyle of absolute purity matters.
“If we are vigilant, the statistics will continue to improve,” he added “If we are not, all the tragedies that attend teen sex will increasingly be part of our families, churches and nation.”
Buckley, from a physician’s perspective, said abstinence needs to be the major message for youth, especially given that teenage girls’ bodies are particularly susceptible to STDs because of factors accompanying their physical development. He said one Chlamydia infection gives a woman a 25 percent chance of infertility.
“About 30 percent of infertility is due to scarring of the fallopian tubes, and about half of those cases are due to Chlamydia,” Buckley said. “Chlamydia is often a silent sexually transmitted disease. You may not even recognize an infection sometimes.”
Buckley also said it’s a myth to say that condoms are an effective prevention method against certain STDs.
“There is no fool-proof safe sex practice outside of a monogamous marital relationship,” Buckley said. “It’s kind of ridiculous to think that condoms are the answer when condoms have a 25 percent failure rate for preventing pregnancy.”
For more information on True Love Waits, a ministry of LifeWay Christian Resources, visit www.lifeway.com/tlw.
Further Learning
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comments
1 On Apr 16th, 2008, at 10:57am, ontay jones wrote:
Good article. I have to say I agree with everything EXCEPT the rate of condom failure. Where did that number come from?
This is the problem with these abstinence articles/pieces. They convey information that is 99% useful, then undermine the entire piece by attempting to throw condoms under the bus for STDs and pregnancy.
It’s rather obvious that in both scenerios a condom is probably not used. A person has to use a condom for it to be effective. You can promote abstinence without trying to discredit condoms. Last statistic I heard was that condoms have a 99% success rate, but my point is why talk about that at all?
If you believe and wish to push abstinence, then do so minus the bashing of other alternatives. Well, that’s my 2 cents.
God bless,
Ontay