Lay groups express support for bishops’ criticism of sex-ed laws in Argentina

Buenos Aires, Argentina, Nov 10, 2005 / 22:00 pm

The Catholic Lawyers Corporation (CLC) and the organization Pro-Vida in Argentina have announced their support of the Argentinean bishops’ call for the government to reject sex-ed laws that do not have the consensus of the people.
Representatives of the CLC called on “those in power” to refrain from approving laws that make sex-ed obligatory in schools because they constitute a “severe attack on the family.”

The group of lawyers specifically mentioned a proposal that has made its way to the national Congress and would make “sexual instruction” obligatory throughout the country, thus jeopardizing the right of parents to determine their children’s education.

Pro-Vida also denounced sex-ed policies, calling such efforts by the state “coercive.”  “The policy of ‘sexually educating’ children on the part of the State without the intervention and consent of parents is an attack on the elemental principles guaranteeing families the right to the moral formation of their children,” the group said in a statement.

By attempting to impose a one-sided approach to the issue—divorcing sexuality from love and responsibility—which has already failed in other parts of the world, proponents are revealing their “ideological intentions” of inciting young people with ideas that go against their family values, the group maintained.

On Wednesday, the bishops of Argentina gathered for their annual meeting said that, with the risk that certain measures, such as a new policy on sex-ed, might be approved before the end of the current legislative session, the nation needs to ask legislators “to submit the proposals to appropriate and ample debate, in an authentic democratic spirit.”