Sex Education in the Korean Catholic Church

 

How can families with adolescent children form a culture of love and life? In the Catholic Times, an article introduces the readers to the place of education on sexuality for adolescents and the ways to nurture this culture.

"Sex education that awakens the dignity of life should be conducted at home first." The Bishops' Conference of Korea in its Home of Love and Life message states the Family is the first school to cultivate richer humanity, meaning "sex and life education is up to parents."

In this regard, Pope John Paul II also said in paragraph 37 of the Apostolic Exhortation on the Role of Christian Families: "Since sex education is a fundamental right and duty of parents, it should always be conducted at home or in educational institutions chosen and controlled by parents."

Regarding the indispensable role of parents, the Bishops make clear that what is most important in the sex and life education of families is the example and values of the parents. This means that in a family that is a community of love, parents should practice love through self-gift and set an example of sharing, consistency, service, cooperation, and sacrifice for their children through loyalty and dedication between couples.

 

"Parents should recognize the importance of chastity and understand the dignity and meaning of life, not just the body and selfish pleasures." It is difficult to expect sound sex ethics for children by dealing with sex issues as taboo and ignoring them. Parents should acknowledge that their children live in a different world from their generation's values, and need to understand their children's culture.

Then how should sex education be conducted in families with adolescent children? The Vatican Family Council explains in its guidance on family education: "Human sex, its true character, and true meaning." Personal dialogue between parents and children, and education within the family. This means that it is more important than anything else to consider the reliable open dialogue between parents and children, which means to consider their stage of growth and to respect them as individuals.

In this regard, the director of the Korean Teen Star program, also said, "Parents and children should be able to talk openly about their bodies and fertility." This means that parents should not unilaterally force their children to think or oppose their children's ideas unconditionally, but parents should keep asking questions so that they can find answers and be the mentors to their children on what is right or wrong.

 

"It is important for parents to listen to their children's emotional changes and interests, look at their children as independent human beings. Sex education is not only a time to teach, but showing love, the love received in the family enables the child to see fully the value of his life and to go out into society to share that love with others.

Pope Francis in his Apostolic Exhortation Joy of Love, in paragraphs 280-286: "It is not easy to approach the issue of sex education in an age when sexuality tends to be trivialized and impoverished..." Pope Francis emphasizes the importance of positive and prudent sex education according to age, to develop critical thinking against excessive stimuli that can undermine the truth of sex, and to help men and women respect and understand differences and accept their bodies as they are.

 Teen STAR (Sexuality Teaching in the context of Adult Responsibility) means "natural sex education in the context of adult responsibility" and is currently used in 39 countries around the world, including Korea. It is sex education that helps people realize their sexual characteristics and reproductive abilities and have self-determination skills to establish mutual personal relationships with others. The purpose is to understand gender not only physically but also emotionally, socially, intellectually, and spiritually.

A New Way of Reading The Imitation of Christ

The Imitation of Christ by Thomas a Kempis is criticized by many as not Gospel, breeding a hatred of the world and a do-it-yourself kind of spirituality. It is a devotional book that has helped many of our ancestors in the faith. It was written for clergy and despite its minuses which are always present in what is humanly made, we can discern easily  the great help that it contains for the believers.

 

Entering the Easter Season a pastor writing in the Eyes of the Believer column of the Catholic Times describes his project of getting The Imitation of Christ read and transcribed by the parishioners of his parish. He bought 500 hundred of the books, sold them within two weeks, didn't have enough, and went to the other booksellers in the country to buy the last 100. He did wonder whether the Corona 19 would dampen the interest but that all proved to be baseless. 

 

Perhaps many wanted to read this devotional Catholic classic but never found the time but since the parish allowed them to read and write with other believers this became an attractive challenge to many in the community. It is a four-month project, so if you read and write only one chapter a day, you can finish it without any great burden.

Reading is the act of receiving information from reading aloud or by silent reading. Along with reading, writing has the advantage of not only seeing it with the eyes but also learning information by stimulation of hands helping what's written to become fixed and definite in the mind. 

 

Believers have also long realized the value of writing by hand, nurturing their faith life and gaining peace of mind by transcribing the Bible. Believers who have transcribed the Bible speak in unison: "The more I write, the more I want to write, the happier I am while writing." Recently, more and more cases of transcribing not only the Bible but also spiritual books are seen.

 

Originally written for monks, it has been read by many people over the years and has had a great influence after the Bible on believers. "The Imitation of Christ" was loved by St. Ignatius of Loyola and St. Teresa the Little Flower both kept the book close to them.

At the end of the Middle Ages, this book at the beginning of the Renaissance and humanistic thinking, represented a rejection of speculative and mystical spirituality with a focus on prayer and spiritual training. It played a key role in developing into a spiritual life movement to meditate on Christ's person and emulate Jesus' holy virtues, rather than using the intellect it concentrated on the will.

He hopes that the project of reading and writing The Imitation of Christ in the parish will be successfully completed. It is not easy to read and transcribe one page every day, so I hope the conditions will be followed. 

 

First of all, you have to read the section assigned properly. Writing without reading can be said to be like eating uncooked food. It is wise to read the portion of the day, meditate enough on making it your own, and then move on to transcribing. 

 

Secondly, you have to do the portion assigned for that day otherwise when postponed to the next day the burden will become too much. 

 

Thirdly, to read and write, one must have a quiet environment and be at peace that will allow time to meditate. It is difficult to read, meditate, and focus on writing in a noisy state with music, TV, or other disturbances. If there is a space or study that is not used by anyone, you have the ideal situation.

 

Devotional books such as "The Imitation of Christ" ultimately give rise to prayer, so they need careful internal preparation and the help of the Holy Spirit to lead the faithful in the direction that God desires. He strongly recommends the challenge of reading and transcribing "The Imitation of Christ".

Things Do Change With Hope

 

 

In the Catholic Times' Light of the World column, the priest examines the virtue of hope and its demands.

He often sees children arguing. They usually argue over trivial things, and that is the way they will grow up. We as adults go about fighting just as children, rather, adult fights are often more childish and disastrous. There are various causes and aspects; we talk about traditions, logic, and philosophy but the essence of the problem is a quarrel over the relationship between reality and one's interest. Like children, adults can't stand it when challenged or insulted.

Still, many conflicts between generations, classes, and regions in society were not helped by Corona 19: the downtrend in economy and employment, and a sense of crisis caused by population decline. There may be people who are not having a hard time but the public still considers employment difficulties, living difficulties, and social isolation of young people as major difficulties.
 
There are also conflicts of interest that exist within the young, but on the outside, they see the unfairness of society, disappointment with the older generation, and wrong-headed political forces and social atmosphere, which dismiss them as a generation without passion and recognize them as "one vote" without empathy and affection.

To solve problems beyond conflict and confrontation, to embrace different views, and pursue harmony, efforts and discourse to improve structured injustice and pursue fairness are urgent. Also, we need to be adults, rather than confrontation, to reflect on our responsibilities along with finding alternatives. We are now talking about the right kind of hope needed. The right hope should be responsible.  Hope sympathizes and helps, and makes someone desire to do something.
 
Adults should work hard for that right hope. Both adults and children can fight and argue, but wouldn't the weight of responsibility for society and neighbors be different? To do this, a wise role of an adult is needed. Ayako Sono of Japan suggests ways to grow old beautifully in "Kairo-roku" (a record of being wary of old age), one of which is giving up. We should never take the help that is given to us as something natural if it is to benefit the other. Through the great virtues of Christianity: "Humbling and emptying ourselves, giving, and laboring," we reflect deeper on what is required of us.

In the Compendium of the Social Gospel of the Church: "By his work and industriousness, man — who has a share in the divine art and wisdom — makes the creation, the cosmos already ordered by the Father, more beautiful. He summons the social and community energies that increase the common good, above all to the benefit of those who are neediest" (#266).
 
It's a place to change and heal society and share the spiritual and social legacy. Come to think of it, it's really hard to become an adult. But through such adults, children and the world will learn the path of love, joy, and trust, and above all, true hope will be obtained.
 

"Human society must primarily be considered something pertaining to the spiritual. Through it, in the bright light of truth men should share their knowledge, be able to exercise their rights and fulfill their obligations, be inspired to seek spiritual values, mutually derive genuine pleasure from beauty of whatever order it be, always be readily disposed to pass on to others the best of their own cultural heritage and eagerly strive to make their own the spiritual achievements of others" (#386).

 

 

 

Ways to Reduce our Greediness

In the Catholic Peace Weekly column Believer's Platform, the writer working as a counselor meets a lot of people having a hard time and tries to help them be less harassed dealing with their problems. 

Most people deal with different problems but in his experience, one of the most common issues is excessive covetousness. 

A rich man repeatedly raised a finger desperately on his death bed. "If he made just a little bit more he would have made 10 billion." The death of a rich man who couldn't give up his greed for money caused his listeners to feel more than sadness but rather a sense of shame.

As a result, he often wondered if there was a way to reduce excessive greed. Greed is the desire to have more than one has. Many people try to get closer to what they want by increasing what they have. But there is no end to what you want, so you want more when you get to the level you want. The first way to reduce greed is to reduce what you want. The way to reduce it is simple: Is this really necessary? When you want to buy something, you can reduce your greed by making a habit of asking if it is necessary now. The next question is: Is there anything more important than this? Finding something really valuable to be greedy for is good medicine to reduce one's greed.

While teaching counseling to religious workers this semester, they had time to share how they became a member of their community. They went to a good university, got a good job, but, Is this really everything? "Isn't there anything more important in life?" The message that he heard was to have greed for what was more important than money, honor, and status. These values disappeared naturally as they looked for something more important in life.

One religious sister's motivation was special. The nun said that the reason she became a nun was "only to live." No matter what conditions or positions living is the most important thing, and she learned that God wants life to vibrate with energy. She was called to live fully, not only rightly. She is learning the wisdom of seeing the sky, and the earth and seeing all with a penetrating eye.

 

Through Sister, he realized we really need to be covetous for all of life. He realized that being alive as a person is the most precious thing, not a life that becomes something and has something, and that I should be happy and help others to enjoy life. 

 

When we know that what we need is a need to live life fully: a mysterious inner experience in which neither our excessive greed for our children's success nor our desire for excessive change in our spouse will continue to bother us greatly. A life with less greed is the happiest life.

 

How to Pray

In the eyes of the believer column of the Catholic Times, a lawyer gives his opinion on how to pray.

Even on his way to work today, his mother in her nineties comes out to the front gate and doesn't take her eyes off the car until it turns on to the alley. She draws a small cross on her heart prays that her son keeps his health, and drinks less. In the old days, she would draw a bowl of water where the crocks of soy sauce were on the terrace to pray for her son
 

God must be having a hard time with all the requests: asking for health, success in the exams, fulfilling our desires, and take care of those bad guys—petitions made during the hundreds of thousands of years since Homo sapiens was created on this planet. Countless numbers of people have asked You for this and that, and if You don't listen properly, many blame the heavens for being indifferent? Even those who gave up their personal greed and only look to you: "Let me be a good person. "Please help me be a saint." They also are concerned only for themselves. Even though You gave yourself for us by dying on the cross.
 
Actually, it's hard for us. I need to distance myself from You to be an individual so that I can go about living in the way I am used to, competing with others in survival for life. We all have different thoughts and interests, so we can't help but fight with each other.

Nevertheless, you ask me to live in harmony with others going beyond my own thoughts and interests. This road, which I have entered to follow Jesus no matter how much I think about it, is an open path to suffering.

He read a book written by a scholar priest named Karl Rahner, who played an important role in the Second Vatican Council. It's a book called Introduction to the Christian Faith, and it was embarrassingly difficult. He bought it 20 years ago and left it in the corner of the bookshelf while reading the front part, but now he has read it. As the years go by, family members have died, and friends have passed away one by one. It's comforting to see that the understanding of the world seems to be increasing a little bit, even though the sad things are increasing one way or another. This is how he understood Father Rahner's words.

We are born as individuals and have clear limitations. We compete with other people and eat plants and animals to live and raise children to continue the line. But within this finite object is a transcendent personality that goes beyond the object to You. Father Rahner's German expression is 'Sichselbstgeben Sein', which translates directly into 'self facing self'. Animals such as apes and elephants are known to vaguely recognize themselves, but humans can objectify and reflect on themselves. Another 'me' who looks at oneself objectively. Buddhist monks enter into meditation, cut themselves off from the outside world, and search to find another 'me' looking at themselves, saying: "What is this?"

Animals that can't distinguish me from others, eat other animals by instinct and give birth to their offspring continuing their kind. There is no good and no evil here. But by looking at myself objectively, we can go beyond the 'I' without being bound by instinct, unlike animals. From this freedom comes responsibility, good and evil.

Transcendence to the eternal, through introspection, since we are the Image of God. Yes, we are trapped in our finite natures, but on the other hand, we look beyond this 'me' to the other: 'neighbor' and the "Eternal You".
 

Meister Eckhart told us not to pray for what to be, have, or for ourselves. But rather: "God, give me nothing but what You want and what You intend."

A Church Always Reforming

  To be a church means to walk the journey of life with the Lord and with people, and to share not only sadness but also joy. The Catholic Times in its column: 'Reading the Times with Theology' gives the reader a look at Church and what it should be in the words of a director of a Catholic Culture and Theological Research Center.

■ Sad memories of the word church

He confesses the word 'church' is often remembered for its cold, authoritative feel rather than warmth. As a seminary student, he felt uncomfortable when he heard church as a holy place was ultimately a church choice and felt a slight resistance to the idea. In seminary life, the word church was often related to the act of judging and disciplining. Perhaps that's why, sadly, the word church came easily nuanced as negative. 

Even as a priest, the word church did not have an attractive connotation. Or maybe, the people who used the word church used the word in a way that made you feel its negativity. They were usually powerful or authoritative people in the church. Rather than being used in the context of loving, forgiving, and embracing the word was mainly used in the context of defining, judging, and excluding. It was hoped that more people would use the words 'evangelical' and 'faithful' than the word 'church'. Of course, the adjectives evangelical, religious, ecclesiastical, and doctrinal are closely connected and may mean the same thing.

■ We live in a church

The core concepts of modern theological explanations of the church are 'God's people and 'fellowship'. The church is made up of God's people, and the purpose and principle of operation is friendship. The church, which aims for friendship with God and friendship between people, is naturally a community of equal people in the presence of God. 

 

Of course, the core of the church is a visible religious system. We live with institutions and laws in this world and they need to be respected. But institutions and laws must aim for higher ideals that are invisible. The religious system exists not for itself but for the sake of God's people and friendship. The community of God's people is always a relationship of love and equality. The church's friendship is a trinity. The Trinity is not the order of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, but the diversity of roles and relationships. It is a mystery of diversity that shows the breadth and depth of the Lord's love for man.

 

The church exists in the journey to the Lord. The church always means 'becoming church'. We are on a long pilgrimage to the Lord. In the journey, we should always ask and reflect on what it means to be a church, to live as a church. In a world where gratitude and contrition are culturally worn out and disappearing, I must ask what it means to live as a church?

■ Warm and intimate church

We live in a relationship with others. Today's world has changed from a modernist world that emphasized individual freedom, autonomy, and reason to a postmodern world that emphasizes emotions, desires, and a sense of community belonging. Movement from an interest in subjects to interest in others. (Michel Maffesoli "The Age of Tribes") We live in a world where belonging, intimacy, emotions are more important, than concepts and intellectualizing.

From a sociological point of view, there are three reasons why people belong to a religious community: existential comfort, security, self-confirmation, and recognition. In an uneasy world where all values and ideologies are shaken, belonging to a religious community gives psychological stability. In a world where fierce competition and inequality are intensified, religious communities can provide social connections, social power and religion can work as a kind of social safety net. In a world where one is judged and discriminated against by one's abilities, status, and property, the healthy recognition system of the religious community provides a place to breathe.

Today's church should be able to provide a healthy sense of belonging and warm intimacy. It should be able to share the right religious orientation and give a healthy sense of belonging that comes from sharing religious practices. In the church, believers should be able to feel the true intimacy that comes from honest and equal solidarity, not the order of rank and difference. 

■ Church of sorrow and joy

We are already a church, and always becoming a church. To be a church means to walk the journey of life with the Lord and with the people. In an individualistic and selfish age, it is not easy to walk through this life with someone. Being a church is training on how to live together.

Living together means sharing sorrow and joy. At first glance, it seems easy to sympathize and unite with other people's pain and sorrow. We don't find it difficult to sympathize with other people's grief. Not many people are cynical and mock others for their pain and sorrow. It is a beautiful act of a human being to grieve together. In fact, what is more difficult is sharing joy. It is very difficult to share the joy of others with my joy. It is always hard to overcome feelings of envy and jealousy in the struggle for recognition. Being a church is not only about sadness but also joy.

Isn't the person who becomes a church to someone probably a person who is always wishing and praying for the best for the other? (Benevolent). Do we live a life of being 'church' to others?

War and Human Rights

The Column on Reconciliation on the Peninsula of the Korean Times examines the issue of war and human rights.
 
Todd D. Whitmore of Notre Dame University in the U.S. believes that a theologian's mission to serve the underprivileged is more important than writing a book. Whitmore, who values life as it is lived, and deals with theological issues using the ethnographic methodology, (relating to the scientific description of peoples and cultures with their customs, habits, and mutual differences).
 
He was active especially in northern Uganda and South Sudan from 2005 to 2013. And such activities in the disputed area led him, a "Catholic peace activist", to reflect more deeply on the relationship between justice and peace.

In his paper: "On the Actual Spot", Whitmore introduces an original report published by the 'Refugee Law Project at Makerere University in Uganda called "Peace First, Justice Later". The report contains interviews in several cities in northern Uganda in 2005 from various classes of people, different cultures, and religious backgrounds, impressive in their arguments for justice and peace at the scene of devastating violence.
 
The people interviewed showed surprising agreement on the order in which things should be done. In other words, the war must end first, and only then can it be determined what kind of justice mechanism should be implemented. Unless the situation changes, when people's safety cannot be guaranteed, people living amid conflict do not have the time or inclination to focus on rebuilding after the conflict.

Whitmore, who explains that in sub-Saharan Africa, with its poverty, the Catholic social teaching as seen in Europe cannot be applied as it is. He emphasizes the need to carefully consider the special environment and specific situations, particularly in discussing the 'strategic priorities' of justice and peace. In the long-term context, it is natural to pursue active peace when justice is achieved, but in some cases, in situations where conflicts have continued for decades, passive peace, which immediately stops violence and threats, can be prioritized.

Recently, the media made known the "2020 Human Rights Report by Country" released by the U.S. State Department which pointed out not only North Korea and China but also South Korea's human rights situation. The U.S. State Department does not directly criticize individual countries but makes it clear that it is interested in improving their human rights, which in fact raises controversial issues for both progressives and conservatives in our society, not just 'anti-North Korean leaflets' and scandals of politicians. Admitting that wars, where violence is justified, have always been disastrous abuses of human rights, we should urge the Korean authorities to make careful and serious efforts to improve the human rights of those living in the land where the war is still ongoing.