Healing the whole family

Last Friday, I took part in a discussion programme on a TV station on sex education as part of a campaign, you could say, to discuss the alarming increase in teenage pregnancies and the need for sexual education. One of the points I raised was the rise in the number of broken homes and the effect it had on teenagers.

In fact, from a survey issued by a family organisation in the UK, it resulted that teenagers from broken homes are more likely to have under-age sex.

The bombardment of sexual messages aimed at the young is a form of child cruelty, sexualising them before their time and then leaving them to face the consequences when they are too immature to do so.

It is particularly heartless because the youngsters who are most vulnerable to this form of sexual exploitation are, in the greater percentage of cases, those who have dysfunctional family lives themselves. In many cases, they have no father to care for them during the crucial years. This view was confirmed by the UK organisation dealing with the family.

It shows that the youngsters who have very early experience of sex and pregnancy tend to be those who come from less stable homes, where the parents are divorced or separated or where there has been a history of lone parenting as is the case with single mothers.

Youngsters from families with married parents are more liable to benefit from their influence and interest.

"Teenage sexual activity is dramatically reduced when parents are married, show practical concern for their youngsters, monitor their activities and set behavioral guidelines."

The home environment is a significant influence, determining whether or not young teenagers are sexually active.

The report said parents could improve the chances of their children steering clear of sex by working harder to communicate with them, taking a bigger interest in their leisure activities, discussing moral behaviour with them and checking closely what they read and watch on TV.

Marriage and parental interest in teenagers were key factors in avoiding promiscuity, the report said.

In another survey, 18 out of 22 young women who had been pregnant as young teenagers were abandoned by their fathers through divorce or separation.

The fact that a father was absent had left many of these girls hungry for male attention and sometimes desperate also to recapture their father's attention. The following are some of the comments made by these women:

"'I became pregnant at 15, quite deliberately. I hadn't seen my dad for two years previously... But he had been a big part of my life before. I needed him."

Jilly was 14 when she first became pregnant. She was sexually active at 13 because her parents split up. "I lost my virginity at 13 on purpose."

These and other similar stories had a very familiar pattern. The parents split and, within a couple of years, the child is out of control and pregnant.

It was also found that religious or moral belief played an important role.

"Incidence of under-age sex is further reduced where parents are religious or hold clear standards of morality," the study concluded.

Religious parents appear to have better relationships with their young teenager offspring than non-religious parents.

Clifford Hill, a researcher on family issues, once said that "the family environment and the relationship between the husband and wife can have a very real affect on the children...

"If one or other of the parents is rarely around or has been unfaithful, than that affects the child".

Good sex education should, of course, be available to young people growing up but it is inadequate to suggest that this is all that is necessary. Much more is needed to halt too-early sex and too-early pregnancies.

What is needed is the healing of the family.

What is needed is to teach adults and children that enduring marriage is the best context for the development of the child, even if marriage is not always an easy relationship.

This is not a matter of moralising. It is simply a matter of caring for the young person, offering her protection as she grows up and giving her, wherever possible, the steady guidance of a father presence in the home.

The obvious truth is: Heal the whole family and the teenage pregnancy rate is bound to fall.

The more the family is attacked and undermined, the more the cycle will spiral out of control.

This will lead to generation after generation of fragmented relationships and damaged individuals.