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Fr. Pavone believes that, as clergy and as parents, our goal is to encourage chastity, not punish pregnancy.
Pregnancy is not a sin. Premarital sexual intimacy is. Yet ask yourself for a moment what evokes a more negative reaction most of the time in families; the knowledge that a teen is sexually active, or the knowledge that a teen has become pregnant?
If, in one way or another the message is communicated that teen pregnancy will cause more of a problem than teen sex, then we are inadvertently creating an incentive for abortion. After all, if one can abort the pregnancy without the family’s knowledge, why endure the trouble that will result by revealing it?
Clergy in the pulpit and parents in the home need to fearlessly bear witness to God’s plan for human sexuality. We need to make it clear that our goal is to encourage chastity, not punish pregnancy.
