Christian law firm promoting stand for purity in public schools
by Allie Martin and Jody Brown
February 14, 2007
(OneNewsNow.com) - - For the fourth straight year, Liberty Counsel is helping public school students take a stand for purity this Valentine's Day. The "Day of Purity" is designed to help those students educate their peers on the value of remaining sexually pure -- one benefit being the avoidance of contracting an incurable, sexually-transmitted disease. For the annual Day of Purity, Liberty Counsel provides flyers, shirts, and wristbands students can take to their public schools. The project began in response to the promotion of sexually charged movies, television shows, and music produced by the entertainment industry.
Liberty Counsel founder Mat Staver says the Day of Purity gives Christian students a chance to counter pop-culture messages that exalt promiscuous sexual behavior and attempt to convince teens that they should give up traditional values and explore their sexuality early and often. But as Staver points out, there is a devastating price for those who choose to go down that path.
"Sex outside of marriage or sexual promiscuity or [extra-marital] sexual activity ... breaks up marriage [and] damages children," says Staver, noting that it also results in disease. "There's now thousands of young people every day who are infected with incurable, sexually-transmitted disease -- 8,000 teens will be infected every day in America."
According to Rena Lindevaldsen, who is international coordinator for the Day of Purity, more than three million American teenagers are infected with sexually transmitted diseases each year. Combine that with the teen pregnancy rate (highest among developed countries) and the quarter-million abortions performed every year on American teens, she says, and one sees the consequences of sexual promiscuity among youth.
"These problems result directly from the failure of our society to offer clear moral guidance," Lindevaldsen says in a press release. In contrast, she explains, the Day of Purity encourages students to opt for sexual purity instead of giving in to what she calls the entertainment industry's "persistent message of sexual promiscuity."
The Day of Purity is also for adults, says Staver. "Sexually purity is not just for youth, and it's not just for unmarried youth -- it's for all of us," says the Christian attorney, noting that the increased availability of Internet pornography makes sexual purity "extremely important" for everyone.
