Comprehensive sexuality education can unwittingly promote teenage pregnancies

SENATE Bill No. 1979 titled “Prevention of Adolescent Pregnancy Act,” which is authored by Sen. Risa Hontiveros, seeks to prevent teenage pregnancies. This is a laudable aim, but the bill has problematic provisions and if passed into law can unwittingly promote adolescent pregnancies instead.

From Section 6 we can read: ”The Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) shall be standardized and implemented in all public and private basic education institutions. CSE delivery shall not be dependent upon the discretion of the school administration or on its teachers. It shall be integrated into the school curriculum, guided by the Department of Education (DepEd) and international standards.

“In order to ensure proper compliance, the provision and delivery of CSE in public and private basic education institutions shall be listed as one of the criteria and an accreditation requirement of DepEd’s Philippine Accreditation System for Basic Education (PASBE).”

With this provision, educators will be deprived of academic freedom. Educators are compelled to teach CSE using the curriculum provided by DepEd, which is mandated to use “international standards.” There is no room for disagreement and dissent here. But what if educators do not agree with DepEd “standards” or the “international standards”?

If the DepEd uses “international standards” it will most likely use the standards set by Unesco in their document “International Technical Guidance on Sexuality Education.”

This 139-page document is also problematic. The following are some “standards” set by it:

“Sexuality is a social construct, most easily understood within the variability of beliefs, practices, behaviors and identities. ‘Sexuality is shaped at the level of individual practices and cultural values and norms’.”

This standard is simply false and erroneous. Sexuality is not a social construct. Sexuality is given by nature (God if you wish), male and female. This social construct claim is the idea promoted by gender ideology. This Unesco document is ramming gender ideology down our throats.

Here is another standard: “CSE promotes the right to choose when and with whom a person will have any form of intimate or sexual relationship; the responsibility of these choices; and respecting the choices of others in this regard. This choice includes the right to abstain, to delay, or to engage in sexual relationships. While abstinence is an important method of preventing pregnancy, STIs, and HIV, CSE recognizes that abstinence is not a permanent condition in the lives of many young people and that there is diversity in the way young people manage their sexual expression at various ages. Abstinence-only programs have been found to be ineffective and potentially harmful to young people’s sexual and reproductive health and rights.”

Unesco does not agree with abstinence for adolescents. They think it is not possible and even “potentially harmful.” So, their standard would be to let the teenagers have sex and just provide them with all the contraceptives they need so that they will not get pregnant. CSE programs in countries that have them are rife with information (and misinformation) about contraceptives and contraception.

This is confirmed by the next standard from the Unesco document: “It is essential for young people who plan to have, or are already having sexual intercourse, to receive information about the full range of modern contraception, including the dual protection against pregnancy and STIs provided by condom use.”

The people who are promoting CSE using international standards are utterly naive. They do not know or they ignore human nature. With CSE, the more they will promote teenage pregnancies what with the failure rates of contraceptives.

The Catholic Church has always taught the great dignity and value of human sexuality and its holy and sacred use in rightful marriage. Along with this value, the Church has taught young people about marriage and chastity. St. John Paul II gave 129 lectures on the Theology of the Body between 1979 and 1984 on these topics. I would recommend that our lawmakers learn about these values and see how they can include them in their legislation.

Fr. Cecilio L. Magsino,

cesmagsino@gmail.com