Harmful to Children

The Coalition of Concerned Catholic Families, is requesting signatures for a petition to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, protesting the mandated "safe environment" training for children that will be selected and approved by the bishop and taught by diocesan/parish employees.

Children as young as 5 years old will be exposed to information about sexual abuse and how to protect themselves against perverts. These programs have been opposed by Catholic parents throughout the country. The principal complaint is that they do not conform to the teaching of the church.

Th Pontifical Council for the Family issued a document entitled Truth and Meaning of Human Sexuality in 1995 to provide guidelines to the Universal Church for teaching subjects about human sexuality to children. Unfortunately, most American Catholics have never heard of it and the USCCB has chosen to bypass the document altogether. (my emphasis)

The Most Reverend Robert J. Hermann, Bishop, Vicar for Education, Archdiocese of St. Louis responded in a letter at the request of Archbishop Burke stating: "I too believe we need to take seriously 'The Truth an Meaning of Human Sexuality' and I also question the wisdom of doing this in the classroom.

Archbishop Burke has moved away from sex education in the schools to chastity formation. Bishop Herman stated, "I believe that, if we do a good job of teaching chastity throughout all of our grades, in an age appropriate way, we could then work with parents in guiding them in their efforts to teaching their children appropriate ways to protect themselves from abusers."

Bishop Robert F. Vasa, Bishop of Baker, Oregon has also weighted in on the debate: "While the debate about what is or is not appropriate in our Churches and Schools relative to sex-education has been going on for a number of years, it appears to me that this latest initiative of 'save environment'programs is a veiled backdoor attempt to invade the delicate lives of our young children. . . "

"While the proponents of the programs will argue that they are NOT sex-education, the reality is that they still touch on the very personal and private area of sexuality at an age when it is not proper to do so."

The Coalition of Concerned Catholic Families is urging Catholic Parents to unite in this effort and to become 'one voice' with other concerned parents to stop these dangerous programs from harming our children and families. You can access the National Petition Registry on the internet. Contact Stephen J. Marino at
concernedcatholicfamilies@kettleriverusa.com.

Source.