November 3, 2004

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - Debate about a Project to include a course on integral sexual education in schools in Buenos Aires divides Evangelical opinion

Claudia Lombardo, president of the Methodist Educational Institutions Commission (CIEM) published a statement supporting Methodist Bishop Nelly Ritchie, in favor of including the Integral Sexual Education as an obligatory course in schools in the capital.

This statement, said Lombardo, is in line with our daily practice. She added that their perspective tries to "be as inclusive and in solidarity as possible, taking into account all the elements of reality to address the needs and interests of our students."

The CIEM brings together all Evangelical Methodist Church educational establishments Argentina, from early education to universities and maintains close ties with similar organizations in Latin America and around the world.

We are aware that some responsibilities that belonged to determined social settings have been displaced toward the school, she said. She underscored, however, that this is work that should be carried out with the committed participation of the family.

School should be a space to value the human being, to develop respect for oneself and ones peers, to strengthen self esteem, the relationships we have with each other, awareness and care for our bodies, responsible sexuality and everything implied in an integral perspective.

On the other hand, Ricardo M. Bedrossian, lawyer, teacher and pastor, specialist in issues of sexuality, shares the strong opposition that the Christian Alliance of Evangelical Churches Federation of the Argentine Republic (FACIERA) has voiced regarding the mentioned legal Project.

Bedrossian was one of the people who expressed his opposition to the Project during a public audience held last month in Congress in Buenos Aires.

FACIERA maintains that children's sexual education corresponds to the family, and must be based on the family's own convictions. It also believes that establishing an obligatory sexual education course in school will make it possible to present homosexuality as a valid option and Christian schools will be obligated to impart this teaching by law.

Behind this Project there is an ideology that is attempting to incorporate a "gender" perspective as a guiding principle. As a result, children will be taught to choose their gender, regardless of their biological sex as the "gender" ideology affirms that male and female behavior is imposed by parents and culture, according to FACIERA.

This ideology is contrary to Christian doctrine. While each individual has freedom of thought, an imposition of an ideology in education harks back to totalitarian regimes like communism, fascism and Nazism, said Bedrossian.

Moreover, the law also seeks to make the value of the family relative, as the basic cell of our society. Parents, not schools or the media, are the first educators of our children, he said.

Bedrossian admitted, however, that sexual education is necessary - but in the appropriate framework, mainly the family. This education must not be used to impose ideologies or to undermine the cement of society. It is absurd to reduce sexual education to the use of condoms to avoid AIDS or to stop teenage pregnancies.

The experience in other countries is clear, he said. In the United States sexual educators struck fear in the hearts of legislators with statistics about rising teenage pregnancy.

They said that better information about birth control would solve the problem. However, after several years of this limited sexual education, the number of people with AIDs and teenage pregnancies continues to rise, according to Bedrossian.

Let us not be mistaken, he said. There is a need for education in values. People must be taught that love and respect are the foundation of human relationships. That sex without love is a mere physiological act and nothing else, that the family has been created by God to give its members a place to develop in a healthy fashion.

Latin American Caribbean Communication Agency (ALC)