by Sandy » Mon Dec 20, 2004 12:56 am
Well, I've spent a career working with teenagers, 15 years in youth ministry and at least that long in education, both private Christian and public secular. I have a few suggestions for what might be effective with regard to postponing pre-marital sex for most teenagers, and perhaps even preventing it in a few.
1. Parents must be parents to their children, instead of their best buddy. They need to know what is going on in their life, who their friends are and what their friends' values and beliefs are. They need to set boundaries for their dependent children who are living under their roof and enforce those boundaries. They must hold their children accountable for the places they go and the people with whom they go when they leave the house.
2. Divorced parents need to work together to parent their children, instead of compete with each other for the child's affection.
3. Parents need to teach their children about their sexuality progressively, so that there are no surprises and the kids know what to expect and when to expect it. Kids who understand their own sexuality and who are informed correctly about sex are much less likely to have it before they are married than kids who are only taught to fear the consequences of it.
4. Parents need to be consistent in their adherence to their own religious beliefs and values, and not abandon them in front of their children for convenience sake. Teenagers are very, very good at discerning hypocrisy.
5. Giving a kid their own car at 16 puts an added burden of temptation on them.
6. Parents who hide or deny their own sexual conduct aren't doing their kids any favors, either.
I really do wish I had the answers, or that someone did. Even after all of these years, I still spend more time counseling heartbroken, guilt-ridden teenagers about their sexual behavior than any other single issue.