The Importance of Chastity

The EMC Pregnancy Center in the South Bronx can be spotted by the huge sign above its entrance which reads, "Unplanned Pregnancy?" and lists a phone number to call. Bolder and much larger than any sign around it, the eye is instantly drawn to it. Although simple, the sign is actually very clever. Many pregnant women call or come into the center expecting to receive a consultation for an abortion. The first woman I helped counsel at the start of my internship was one of these women. Dead set on having an abortion at the start of our counseling session, she seemed at least more weary of her decision by the end of it.

The next girl I spent a lot of time talking to had a very different mindset. She was a lot younger and more scared, and she realized how horrible abortions were. While trying to explain to us that her mother would kick her out of the house if she had a baby, she broke into tears, and my heart broke for her. Luckily, it turned out that she, at least for the time being, would not have to face a decision of whether or not to have an abortion. The pregnancy test administered to her read negative. However, she was not completely off the hook. Liz, the director of the center, asked the girl to explain how she was going to change her actions in the future. Glowing with relief, she excitedly told us that she was going to use the works as far as birth control is concerned. "Condoms, pills, everything," she said, "I'm not going to take any more chances." Liz would not have this, and, like a mother lecturing her daughter, she explained to her the dangers of STDs and the importance of chastity, which I joined in on. We tried to explain to her that she was a treasure and not a toy to be used by men. And that the proof of how much a man loved her, her as a person, not just her body, would be that he would be willing to date her without having sex with her and marry her. Only the man willing to commit himself exclusively to her in a matrimonial union should have the gift of her body. We told her that sex was something sacred and that God had intended sex to strengthen the bond between a married couple as well as to create babies.

Since I knew a little bit about the culture she came from, I could guess how foreign the idea of abstinence seemed to her and how hard it would seem to a person who was already sexually active. I realized that little I could say would change the ideas of sex she had which had been implanted in her when she was a child and nurtured ever since. The poor girl was merely a product of her culture. Many of the girls I talked to had mothers who slept around and had numerous abortions. One girl said her nickname was "Lucky" because her mother had aborted the baby she was pregnant with before Lucky and the baby she became pregnant with after Lucky was born. Lucky was lucky to be alive. All of their mothers had slept around, and one of the girls had only met her father once. The next day while I was sidewalk counseling I talked to a man about teaching his daughter to abstain from sex. He told me that it was hopeless, and that the schools teach them to have sex. Children and teenagers today, especially those who live in inner city neighborhoods, are surrounded by the message that sex is as simple and inconsequential as taking a ride on a rollar coaster, and that women are to be valued for nothing more than how much sexual pleasure they can give to men. This message is in the music they listen to, the movies they watch, the magazines they read, and the conversations which surround them. Even their own parents, by their actions and words, relay this message to them. The pro-life movement could perhaps make larger strides in stopping abortions in these communties by campainging to change the way women are valued in those cultures and by promoting abstinence.