Newspaper Page Text
Supplement To The Georgia Bulletin, May 30, 1985
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A parent's role is not like that
of a teacher who gives instruction
in long division, expecting the
task to be completed at a certain
point. Instead, I suspect that most
“education” at home is ongoing.
This education is stimulated
when children bring their ques
tions and problems home. Parents
are likely to experience genuine
frustration if their children’s big
questions are kept from them.
In a spring 1985 message to the
world's priests. Pope John Paul II
asked them to be accessible to
young people, to foster relation
ships that encourage young people
to bring important matters to
them. As a parent I relate to that
message too.
1 want my children to feel they
can come home with questions
and problems, expecting to be
greeted with love, maturity and a
willingness to spend time helping
them find answers to their ques
tions — the kinds of qualities the
pope encouraged.
That atmosphere at home is
needed — for the sake of ongoing
education in sexuality, as well as
other matters.
Like' all parents, of course, I
realize this is much easier said
than done.
(Gibson is editor of Faith
Today.)
As children near the teen years,
parents often find themselves
wanting to caution them, protect
them, help them evaluate scenes
in movies and on television or the
words in some song. I think that
is only natural.
The risk here for parents, it
seems to me, is in allowing their
role to become too narrow,
restricted to reactions against
events in their children’s lives.
When it comes to education in
sexuality, the broader-based ap
proach that began in the child’s
early years — an ongoing explora
tion of values drawing attention
to the meaning of human love,
the value of commitments, the
complexities and rewards of
lasting relationships, human
worth, the purpose of emotions,
the body's dignity — risks getting
short-circuited.
At our house, we the parents
had to take a step back — to talk
about the full scope of the educa
tion in sexuality that we hoped to
offer an older child.
O' iso
A supplement to Catholic newspapers,
published with grant assistance from Cath
olic Church Extension Society, by the Na
tional Catholic News Service, 1312 Massa
chusetts Ave. N.W., Washington, D.C.
20005. All contents copyright ® 1985 by
NC News Service.
39
By David Gibson
NC News Service
Children ask the darndest ques
tions. In fact, they begin asking
them at an early age, when their
parents’ attention still is focused
on keeping them from risking life
and limb by running into the
street or by swallowing a
dangerous substance.
But I doubt that children’s
education in sexuality starts with
the answers they receive from
parents to probing questions about
where babies come from or why
their bodies are shaped as they
are.
Children absorb impressions and
attitudes about sexuality from
their first days through the rela
tionships and love expressed
around them. And parents actual
ly are imparting education in sex
uality when they help to convey a
sense of self-esteem in children,
along with a respect for the digni
ty of others.
For “sexuality” is a term with
fuller meaning than sometimes is
ascribed it. What it means to be
either male or female and to have
one’s personality and relationships
somehow shaped by that fact —
all that is encompassed by the
word “sexuality.”
So education in sexuality begins
early. And it likely takes a step
forward when a child asks a
pointed question or two — at the
dinner table or driving home from
a movie. (One of our children ask
ed where babies come from while
we were driving home from Walt
Disney’s “Sleeping Beauty.”)
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When children approach their
teen years, life becomes more
complicated — for them and you.
It is now that peer pressure
begins in earnest. Now is when
children may place a special
premium on acting older than
their years. And now many
children develop more of a life
away from home.
Parents sometimes feel forced to
compete for their children's time
and attention, even with 11- or
12-year-olds.
A parent doesn't have to be a
prude to think that teens will be
told by someone that sexuality
and sexual activity can be treated
casually.
And you don’t have to be a full
time worrier to realize that
children are sometimes vulnerable
and impressionable. Have you met
a parent yet who is comfortable
with the thought that their child
might be exploited or manipulated
by another person?
I can barely imagine a parent
who could experience a child’s
teen world without finding
something there to react against.
A
Contrary to the beliefs of some,
children learn about sexuality from the
time they're born, writes David Gibson.
<^Y And t ^ Qt education doesn't end at a certain
point, it is an ongoing venture that represents
a demanding challenge for today's parents.
□ Faith Toda