Argentinean Bishop: Authentic sex-ed based on freedom and not on selfish pleasure

Buenos Aires, Argentina, Sep 14, 2004 / 22:00 pm

Bishop Jorge Luis Lona of San Luis, Argentina, criticized this week the false “sexual education” that has begun to be taught in some areas of the country and which threatens “to spread to the entire school system,” and he argued that authentic formation is based on man’s freedom and not on the self-destructive “insatiable search for pleasure.”

According to Bishop Lona this “false sexual education” promotes experimenting with sex and reduces it to pure selfish pleasure.  “It consists of practical instructions for children and young people on how to use a condom as a way to prevent pregnancy and to avoid catching AIDS,” he said.

However, the bishop clarified, “This has been unsuccessful, as proven by the failures of these campaigns throughout the world.”  “The worst part is that an official ‘recommendation’ in favor of promiscuity and irresponsible sexual activity is being implicitly or directly conveyed, at a time in history when young people are being assaulted like never before by these evils, with terrible consequences for future families,” he underscored.

As an alternative, Bishop Lona proposed “authentic sexual education” that “is founded on the freedom that allows human beings to fully live out their condition as male and female, a work of God sustained by Him through the virtue of chastity.”

According to the Argentinean bishop, in this way one attains the fullness of one’s vocation, whether to married life, priestly celibacy, religious or consecrated life.

“The culture which seeks to dominate us rejects it as impossible, because it also rejects the love of God and His power.  In the face of this challenge, the light of reason guides us—which denounces a society capable of self-destruction in the insatiable search for pleasure—but above all the strength of faith, hope and divine charity sustains us,” he concluded.