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Christians or Secularists?
America today is populated with 87 percent of the population that claim to be Christian. The remaining 13 percent claim to be anything other than Christian. Religion and Secularism are the two main objectives that shape sex education in public schools. According to advocatesforyouth.org, teenage pregnancy has decreased by 30 percent in the years between 1991 and 2002 among all ages of teenage girls. Aegis.com estimates that almost half of the eighteen point nine million cases of sexually transmitted diseases occur in young adults from the ages of fifteen to twenty four. Although the percentage of Christians in our nation is so high, does not mean the remaining percentage is nonexistent.
Sexual abstinence is a choice to refrain from sexual intercourse in order to prevent pregnancy and/or sexually transmitted diseases. Abstinence is most practiced by those who are religious because, according to the Bible, one should remain a virgin until marriage. Since 87 percent of the nation claim to be Christians one can conclude that abstinence is the dominant solution to the prevention of pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. According to adherents.com, 79.60 percent of the people in the state of Utah are Christians. Because there are so many Christians in Utah, abstinence is stressed in most public schools and prohibits the support for the use of contraceptive methods or devices to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Desertnews.com discusses, Nebo, a school district in Utah and its law on sex education. The school district prohibits any discussion over the topics of homosexuality, contraception, or perversion. Abortion may be discussed with students, but only if negative elements are the only elements provided to the students. Findarticles.com stresses that Utah’s teen pregnancy rate has decreased since the year 2005, the rate is thirty eight births per every one thousand females. Although the article states a positive outlook on teen pregnancy rate, the rate of spreading sexually transmitted diseases is increasing instead of decreasing. Utah’s plan to keep teenage pregnancy down, and invert the rate of sexually transmitted diseases is to keep stressing abstinence. Therefore, if a teen does not practice sexual intercourse she cannot get pregnant, and both the boys and girls will be safe from any worries of getting a sexually transmitted disease.
Safe sex means to take precaution during sexual intercourse to prevent pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases. This definition is most practiced by those who are secularist. To be secularist is to separate practicality from religion. A secularist decision is based upon fact rather than by a religious influence. Apatheticvoter.com discusses the policy of the Los Angeles city seal. The seal was made to focus on the separation of church and state in California. Abstinence is practiced because of religious influences, while safe sex is practiced by those who separate the effects of sexual intercourse from religion. According to the information provided by aclunc.org, California is the only state that has never accepted abstinence only money. Nonewmoney.com provides information about abstinence only money. The history of abstinence only money is tax payer money that has been used for decades to pay for abstinent programs for public schools. California only educates public schools with safe sex education. Aclunc.org provides that the schools safe sex programs cover every method of preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Teenhealth.com states, “California had one of the biggest changes in teen pregnancy rates. There was a 21 percent decrease in teen pregnancies from the years 1992 to 1996.” Dhs.cd.gov reports that sexually transmitted diseases are by far the most common diseases in California. Although safe sex allows sexual intercourse before marriage, it educates one to be more aware of the risks of being sexually active.
Regardless of the year the statistics were estimated at, both abstinence and safe sex education have a decreasing amount of teenage pregnancy rates and an increasing amount of sexually transmitted diseases. In general both abstinence and safe sex educations are sexually active. Therefore, even though birth rates are going down with the teaching of only abstinence, it is easy for one to conclude that the abstinent teens are taking some kind of precaution to prevent pregnancy, but not well enough to prevent sexually transmitted diseases. Even more so, our Christian nation that dominantly practices abstinence can be seemingly wrong. If the rate of teenage pregnancy is decreasing and the rate sexually transmitted diseases are increasing, maybe safe sex does apply to most people who are “abstinent” because of God’s word, if so, is the nation as Christian as it claims to be?