Fertile Heart lessons say gay sex and contraception are wrong
LEARNING materials that say contraception is wrong, gays should abstain from sex, and women are the receiver-receptor in sexual relationships are being used in every Catholic school in Cardiff.
The Relationships and Sex Education resource, called A Fertile Heart, is supported by the Archbishop of Cardiff, George Stack, who agreed to pilot the materials in 56 Catholic schools in his archdiocese. This includes all of south east Wales and Herefordshire.
The programme has been created because RSE is now compulsory in England, and is set to become compulsory in Wales in 2022. The producers say A Fertile Heart aims to deliver this subject in a way that “aligns with our personal belief system”.
Highlights from A Fertile Heart
- “There is no such thing as ‘safe sex’, as every sexual act affects the person chemically, emotionally, psychologically and spiritually.”
- “Many couples find the woman tends to be better at communicating her emotions, whereas the man is sometimes better at knowing when to move on from such analysis.”
- Parenting “cannot easily be achieved by one person”.
- “The female is more prone to STIs than the male, and is especially vulnerable to them as a teenager before her body is fully formed.”
- The Pill stifles a woman’s “growth as a person a preventing young women from “understanding her femininity”.
- “Especially when we are younger, we are tempted to masturbation – as an experiment, or much worse, through simply choosing to use our sexuality for our own pleasure.”
- “A woman tends to find it more difficult to enter uncommitted sexual relationships and is prone to suffer mentally and emotionally if sexual relationships fail.
- “Looking at things biologically, it does appear that man has created to be the initiator in sexual relationships, and woman the receiver-responder”.
- Pupils who experience attraction to the same sex rather than the “complementary sex” should abstain from sex.
Laws in England and Wales allow faith schools to teach RSE in line with the religion of the school, however campaigners believe this may be removed in Wales in the Assessment and Curriculum bill that is currently going through the Senedd.
The Welsh Government says they will set out the mandatory requirements for RSE in all schools.
Abigail, 24, who went to a Catholic school in Wales, said that when she attended the school “we didn’t really have sex education”.
Abigail, who did not want her full name to be used, approves of plans to make sex education mandatory in Welsh schools.
“Safe and healthy sex is important for everyone, regardless of religion. Secrecy doesn’t deter teenagers,” she said.
Abigail said that “scary” abortion videos and the lack of LGBT teaching affected her and her peers.
“A few girls in our schools had abortions, the shame of everyone knowing about the pregnancy was worse for some than the abortion itself. Which if we had been taught about contraception may not have needed to be the case.”
Abigail said she believes the Fertile Heart programme is “dangerous” saying “schools are supposed to be non-biased! This message isn’t scientific, it’s purely theoretical and ideological.”
A Welsh Government spokesperson said: “It’s critical that all partners understand that RSE in Wales is being developed to keep children safe and healthy, and we will ensure learning is developmentally appropriate.”
Laurence Tunnicliffe, from Fertile Heart, said: “Fertile Heart has been professionally designed to help teachers who do not have theological training. The programme seeks to explore the dignity of the human person in the light of Catholic theology.
“Where it has drawn upon a small amount of scientific opinion relating to sexual differences between male and female it is merely to illustrate a theological point.
“There are multiple lessons through the curriculum that embed learning of the absolute importance of tolerance and genuine respect for all persons, whatever their situation or circumstances.”
The Archdiocese of Cardiff and the Catholic Education Service did not respond to our request for comment.
