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A Japanese study group of Christian educators and doctors has expressed deep concerns about "promiscuous" sexual behaviour among young people, saying that sex education should be promoted from Christian perspectives.
"We have a sense of impending crisis about the rapid growth of infectious sexual diseases among teenagers in recent years," said Kunihiko Tominaga, a Christian obstetrician and gynaecologist, who chairs the Study Group on Christian Sex Education.
On 29 April, the group held an open study meeting on Christian sex education, the first of its kind in the country. The meeting was held at the International Christian University, an interdenominational institution near Tokyo, with its theme, "Personality and Sex: From Christian Perspectives".
"In Japan, sex education that teaches ‘safe sex’ is spread nationwide," said Tominaga at the meeting. "But in such sex education, sex is defined as ‘pleasure’ and ‘a communication tool’ and has no perspective on sex as ‘personal interaction’. We would like to return to the fact of the original blessing that humans were created in ‘God’s image’ and to promote studies on sex education based on ‘the dignity of personality and sex’."
Prior to the meeting, the study group had said, "The problem of sex among the youth today is serious, and the trend is the same within Christian churches and schools based on Christian principles." The keynote presenter at the meeting, Dr Timothy Cole, who is the director of the Family Forum Japan, criticised "comprehensive sex education" that teaches "safer sex", and he stressed the importance of "abstinence education" in Japan for sex within marriage.
During his presentation, he noted that Japanese sex education, once based on Confucianism and feudalism until the Meiji Period from 1868 to 1912, is now "in confusion and conflict" among government and private organizations involved in such learning. His presentation was followed by a symposium focussing on the social impact of excessive sexual behaviour among young people at increasingly lower ages.
Hisakazu Inagaki, professor of public philosophy at Tokyo Christian University, emphasised the necessity of public morality in sex education that develops from within society itself rather than through government action.
Masanori Ohya, a Roman Catholic mathematics teacher at Eiko Gakuen Junior and Senior High School in Kamakura, south of Tokyo, reported that more than half of Japan’s Catholic schools believe that catechism bans on extra-marital sex and abortion should be taught.
"What is behind the distortion of sexual behaviour among young people is that their families are in trouble and are suffering," said Yoshihiko Hoshino, a child psychiatrist and professor at Fukushima Gakuin University in northeastern Japan.
"The dignity of flesh is grounded in that one does not belong to oneself but God," said the Rev. Anri Morimoto, a professor of theology at the International Christian University.
(c) Ecumenical News International
Photo : WORLD NEWS
