Church Plans Textbook On Positive Sex Education By SAR NEWS
KOCHI, Kerala (SAR NEWS) -- The Catholic Church in Kerala plans to introduce a textbook, with a view to promoting "abstinence, sexual purity and spirituality" among school students. Secretary of the Kerala Catholic Bishops' Council's Commission for Family, Laity and Women, Father Jose Kottayil, told SAR News March 24 that the main objective of the proposed programme was to help students view sexuality as an integral part of human life, by highlighting the significance of chastity and abstinence. "There is no healthy discussion on sexuality in the State," he added. The textbook would be introduced in schools from the coming academic year, beginning in June. The 150-page book would be free from the controversial sections of the Union government's Adolescent Education Programme, which led to a hue and cry in the State last year on the grounds that it would create "sexual anarchy". Father Kottayil heads an expert panel consisting of theologians, doctors, lawyers, teachers, psychologists and social activists that will prepare the book for high school students of standards VIII to X. The book, however, is not intended as a replacement of the Central programme. "We have no plans at all for any confrontation with the government by launching a book on sexuality," Kottayil said. He said the prescribed text of the government programme gave more "stress to the biological and physiological need of sex". "It lacked values and accorded scant respect for them. Hence the government textbook is not acceptable for the Church and the institutions run by it." The government initiative is a "very secular way of presenting sex" promoting contraceptives for safe sex, he said adding this would have certain undesirable effects on teenagers. Hence the Church wanted to impart "positive sex education" giving a proper place for "moral, spiritual and integral vision of sex". Kottayil said the proposed book on sex education would be followed in "moral classes" in the institutions run by the Church and catechism classes conducted after the official teaching hours. "The book is based on the realisation that children today are exposed to a lot of moral elasticity through media. By emphasising the message of love as the most important human value within Catholic teaching, we will talk about the moral dimensions of sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS," he said. "The Church is not against sexual education but we are against advocating the consumption of contraceptives for promotion of safe sex," Father Kottayil said. The proposed module would be introduced in the form of seminars or study circles with the assistance of the Kerala Catholic Students League, the students' wing of the Church. Training would be provided to teachers to teach the programme at the school-level. "We may also come up with a separate module for teachers," he said. A total of 700 educational institutions are managed by 31 Catholic dioceses in Kerala, providing education to over 700,000 students.
