Q: What do you call the father of a daughter who has had abstinence-only education?
A: Grandfather.

Here's what I told my teenage daughter:
- Getting pregnant or an STD will screw up her life and her chances of getting into a good college, so if she decides to have sex she needs to act responsibly.
- I wouldn't marry someone I hadn't had sex with because withholding that intimacy, at least to me, is a troubling sign in someone you are considering spending the rest of your life with.
- (I mean, I don't know ANYONE who did not have sex with their fiance before they were married, so this is simply relating a practical truth -- as opposed to wishful thinking and a double standard.)

The bottom line is that trying to live your life by first century Judean morality is going to lead to problems, as we see with the SKY HIGH teenage pregnancy and abortion rate here in this bible-belt state.

"...But as a church, we are not called to reduce abortions by any and every means available to us....[the second part to be dealt with further in]"

We, the Church, are about grace, Mr Anderson (and yes, I am affecting the voice of Hugo Weaving from the Matrix now)
And that sound you hear, Mr. Anderson, that sound is the sound of inevitability that is going to run over your opinion about your mythological church that seems to exist only in your head.

We are not holy, Mr. Anderson, we are a foul, willfully corrupt pile of rebellious cells being held together by the grace and mercy of an all powerful G-d, and you Mr. Anderson seem to have forgotten that in your pontifications.

You see, anything we do from our corrupted state, regardless of intent is already corrupted because of the starting material...which is us, Mr. Anderson, that pile of aforementioned cells.
But the one thing we can do, the one thing our glorious G-d, and savior has granted us is to show mercy and grace to one another...something you, Mr. Anderson, seem to have lost somewhere on your meandering road trip to whatever holiness you seem to think exists in us.
I, being the heartless bastard that I am, could care less about your road-trip to nowhere, and would rather address this part of your quote...
Sin is compounding: error has a long train, and abortion is near the end of it. It is easy to turn to contraception in order to prevent abortions. But in doing so, we have not done what only the church can do: call people to repentance for our sins and exhort us toward the holiness that ought to mark us off as the people of God."

DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU ARE WRITING ABOUT?

In one brilliant statement about our condition which is "sin is compounding" and then completely and totally undo it all with this "But in doing so, we have not done what only the church can do: call people to repentance for our sins and exhort us toward the holiness that ought to mark us off as the people of God."?

What happened between those two statements?

Do you think the church is the only one who can tell people to behave?
Do you think the Church is the only one who can act moral, or even be outraged by abortion?
No...and yet you think we're it, we're the sum total of all there is to be in morality?
Sunshine, I've met Atheists who hold a higher standard of morality than a lot of the pretend Christians do.
Dude, this...this right here, these quotes are what makes the world laugh at us!
You willingly confuse people about Y'shua, and their relationship with G-d.
How?
Where is the mercy in your statement?
Where is the grace in your statement?
NO WHERE, that's where, there is no mercy, there is no grace, there is no compassion, you're just another moralist spouting out christian buzzwords.

So, Mr. Anderson, this is what set the Christian sect apart...they were merciful, they were full of grace, and the early church was populated not by beautifical faces of piety that shone with halos that glowed like neon beer signs in a dark rainy alley way.
No, they were sailors, they were prostitutes, thieves, beggars, homeless money scroungers, corporate thieves, murderous thugs, and pitiless priests and scribes...that was the early church, Mr. Anderson, and holy...holy is not a word I would use to describe them.
Human, yes, that is the word I would use, and perhaps, you should allow a bit of grace and mercy in your view of the humans in our church and around you.

Becoming more like Christ is a process, it doesn't happen at conversion, and sometimes that process takes years, decades, even a life time...and in-between that all are the mistakes.

A whole trail of chained mistakes that follow us...and just a small dash of grace and mercy can shake a few of those chains and allow somebody to avoid the lifetime consequences of a one time mistake.

Hi Jag,

Let me introduce myself. My name is Richard, I'm about to turn 31, and last year I got married to the love of my life. At that time neither of us had with each other or with anyone else.

So now you know one person.

- Richard

Hi Jag:
I got married a few years ago at age 29, and my wedding night was an unforgettable, life-defining moment. For many reasons, but one of them was because it was my first time to have intercourse with the woman I already loved. A priceless moment I will treasure always. And it's something I shared exclusively with my lover.

I guess the new motto of the Modern Evangelical Movement is "If you can't beat sin, gleefully join in!"

All things are wearisome,
more than one can say.
What has been will be again,
What has been done will be done again,
Nothing new under the sun.
Is there anything of which one can say,
"Look here is something new!"
It was here already long ago,
it was here before our time.

It's kind of sad to see that Grace and Mercy is a wearisome burden to those who have no need for either.

The most troubling thing about this whole conversation is that it is BY men ABOUT women. Women, not men, bear the consequences of unplanned pregnancy, the risks of abortion, and the social stigma of being pregnant and not married (or married and not pregnant, while we're at it).

I think the wrong people are talking.

As a mother who came of age during the 70s & 80s and whose sex ed. basically considered of reproductive biology (in school) and warnings against immorality (home), I and my husband wanted to do something better for our kids. (BTW, for Jag, one of us was a virgin when we married, and the other had been abstinent for several years!)

We started at the point of reference suggested in this article: providing our kids from very early on with a vision of God's goodness in His intent for sexuality and marriage (using a Christian book series that starts with a book for 5-8 year olds). We had neighbors who became parents out of wedlock around the same time I gave birth to my second child. They have both provided our kids with an example of why you purpose to avoid sex before marriage and also a positive example of what good things can happen even if you fail in that purpose: They have had to battle the difficulties of parenthood without the support of a spouse, their children do not have the kind of relationship with both their parents that my kids enjoy with both of us a living together in our intact family, both parents have battled stigma and shame. But these were also raised in church, and had the moral courage not to abort (family support was a critical factor here--please parents and grandparents, if you consider yourselves Christians, take note!), they have both proved to be excellent parents to their kids, and their kids are growing up to be wonderful, considerate, well-adjusted kids. We are raising our kids to understand that all people have dignity and are worthy of kindness and respect, but that not all choices and actions are morally equivalent or are worthy of emulation.

I wholeheartedly agree with the article. My kids know what God's desire for them is (the goodness and security of sex within marriage as a picture of God's relationship with us as our faithful Bridegroom). They also know that God provides grace and mercy, and so good can result even when you fail (in this and other areas). Their comfort with talking to us about their bodies and sexuality and their relative comfort in their own skins (compared to where my husband and I were at their ages) gives me hope that they will continue to feel they can draw on our support as they mature and be equipped to face all the temptations that maturation brings.

That first sentence should have read: " . . . whose sex ed. basically consisted of . . ."

BTW, Lamb, I couldn't disagree more. The truth of the substance of what someone is saying isn't dependent upon their gender and is far more important than what their gender is. It is dependent upon its relationship to Christ. I speak as a person made in the image of God and a follower of Christ before I speak as a woman. In fact, unless I understand what it means to be a person created in the image and likeness of God, I don't understand the real meaning of being a man or a woman either. I disagree with making anything other than Christ the matrix through which we view anything in this world. That means both machismo and feminism will render us blind or partially blind to things as they truly are.

Lamb, I both agree and disagree with you at the same time.

I agree that the consequences of unmarried pregnancy and childless marriage are heavier on women than on men, and so we need to hear more of their voices on the topic. So I agree that it is sad that we aren't hearing from more women here.

On the other hand, I disagree that we are talking about women (or more accurately, women exclusively). Sexuality, sexual mores, and the consequences of sexual activity should be the concern of all for two reasons.

Firstly, our shared humanity means that men should be allies of women, that "women's issues" be as great of a concern to men as they are to women, this is what "loving your neighbor as yourself" means.

Secondly, sex is not consequence-free (for both good and bad) for men, and part of the problem is that we as a society tends to treat it that way. Thus the message we send is that boys will be boys, but girls need to be careful. That's a very problematic message.

No. The Church of Jesus Christ, His Bride, should not tell anyone who is unmarried to use contraceptives. The Church's job is to preach Christ and Him crucified. The Church's job is to teach the Word of God faithfully. We are to represent Jesus and to flesh Him out to the World. Would He tell an unmarried person to have sex outside of marriage? No. When we urge the use of contraceptives there is an unspoken assent to sin--to have sex when single. The church should be urging singles to marry if they want to have sex. The church should be teaching how to marry not how to have sex and not bear the consequences. What the church has stopped doing is teaching young people the joys of marriage and that it is a GOOD thing. We should not stop teaching that marriage is good out of fear of divorce. WE should start and continue to teach how to be happily married. How to love your spouse and support your spouse. Marriage is a good thing. The act of marriage outside of God's intention and boundaries is not a good thing and the consequences are harsh. Teach this but ALSO teach marriage, teach our kids how to marry. That marriage is desirable and good. Independence breeds selfishness and self-centered narcissism. We DO need each other...man and women. Male and female he created. Because it is a good plan and marriage is GOOD. TEACH this.

The way the church can prevent abortions in its midst is not by selling the idea of contraceptives but by showing grace and mercy to those who find themselves in an untenable situation rather than punishing them.

7 out of 10 voted "pragmatic," which actually reveals how many supposed "evangelicals" today know zero about the keeping power of God, the power and experience of the Holy Spirit, God Himself come to baptize and fill us after we become saved, the power of godliness to keep us just like Joseph was kept, way back in Genesis. According to these "pragmatic evangelicals", apparently Joseph's stand was in vain, there is no power, all we have now is a polite Christian "ethic" of life. This only shows how backslidden and far from God's presence the American church has become. I weep when I see how far we have fallen from faith in a present, inhabiting, wonderful, keeping God who said "you shall receive power." These so-called "spokespersons" don't rely on it, so why would their kids? If the blind lead the blind . . . .

How said that preaching about sin and calling things as they are is the same as punishing? And who says that calling sin sin is not showing mercy? Mercy is a gift of God to forgive our sin after it was committed, but it is NOT a license to sin more. Remember what Jesus said after he forgave sinners? "Go and sin no more."