By Anne DiBernardo - Florida Catholic
Photographer: ANNE DIBERNARDO | FC
Chastity educator and counselor Pam Stenzel brought her entertaining, straightforward message, "Sex Has A Price Tag", to teens and their parents gathered at Our Lady of the Lakes Church in Miami Lakes.
World-renowned abstinence educator Pam Stenzel spoke at Our Lady of the Lakes Jan. 10, and in a presentation entitled, �Sex Still has a Price Tag,� addressed the physical, spiritual and emotional costs of sex outside of marriage.
Many in the crowd of teens � and their parents � walked away stunned by her sobering message.
Stenzel�s tagline � �I don�t ever want to hear anyone say, nobody told me� � is based on years of experience as a pregnancy counselor, having teenagers walk into her office suffering from the consequences of sexually transmitted diseases, teen pregnancies, and the heartache of broken relationships.
�Pam, I didn�t know,� they tell her. �If somebody would have told me this would happen I would have made a different choice. Nobody told me.�
Stenzel reminds teens that neither she nor their parents can make the right choice for them. �All I can do is love them, tell them the truth and hope they make the right choice.�
Stenzel holds a master�s in counseling psychology and lives in Minneapolis. She travels both nationally and internationally, speaking to more than 500,000 teens annually.
With her unique blend of sarcastic wit and candor, she explained that God created sex with a boundary: when it happens inside that boundary it is awesome, when it happens outside that boundary it is horribly destructive. She uses the metaphor of fire to illustrate that all of God�s gifts are great within the context of his design. Fire can help keep people warm when it is cold, but fire can also be destructive when it is not used within God�s purpose.
Stenzel contrasted how teens having sex are more afraid of getting pregnant than contracting a sexually transmitted disease (STD). �I�ve got a newsflash for you,� she said. �Pregnancy is not a disease. It�s survivable.�
She described the look of relief on a teen�s face when she discovers she is not pregnant. Then Stenzel asks if the teen has been tested for syphilis, gonorrhea, herpes, Chlamydia, hepatitis B, HPV, HIV or any other sexually transmitted disease.
Stenzel said teens have a four times greater risk of contracting a disease today than they have of getting pregnant. Pregnant teens in the state of Florida are carrying 2.3 sexually transmitted diseases, but �they were not worried about getting a disease, were they?�
According to Stenzel, many teens� moms put their daughters on the pill when they find out they are having sex. Stenzel said that makes the teens 10 times more likely to contract a disease.
Stenzel urged anyone who has had any type of sex, including other types of foreplay that involve genital to genital contact, to get tested for an STD. Chlamydia is one of the few STDs that is bacterial so it can be cured with a string of antibiotics, but because there are no symptoms, many women suffer lifelong consequences such as infertility and even death � risks that increase with each exposure.
During the course of Stenzel�s career, she has had to tell a lot of young girls that their pregnancy test was positive. Immediately, they wanted an easy, painless way out of it, but Stenzel said the choices at that point are bad, terrible and worse.
�You had a good choice; that was before you had sex,� Stenzel said. �Now all the choices you have will carry lifelong consequences. There is no easy way out of a pregnancy you didn�t plan.�
�Abortion is painful,� said Stenzel, reciting a litany of symptoms associated with post abortion syndrome including alcoholism, drug addiction, anorexia and suicidal thoughts. �It is not like going to the dentist and getting a tooth pulled, there are consequences forever with that choice.�
Parenting is not an easy choice either.
�Eight percent of teens that choose to parent their children will live below the poverty level for at least 10 years, most of them for the rest of their life; and that�s just not the girl, that�s her child, too. Ninety percent of teen girls that choose to parent will never finish college.�
Addressing the boys, Stenzel advised, �If you get a girl pregnant in this country that you are not legally married to you have absolutely no legal rights over the choices she makes. She can do whatever she wants. You have no say. If, however, the girl decides to parent your child, you now have legal responsibility.�
The next choice is adoption. Stenzel said this is one of the most loving choices but it is also not without pain. �It takes the courage of a young mother to say I love you and I want what�s best for you, even if it�s not me.�
Perhaps one of Stenzel�s most poignant moments is when she tells the story of a 15 year-old girl who was raped 47 years ago but decided to give her child up for adoption.
�That child was me,� Stenzel said. �My biological father is a rapist. I don�t even know my nationality, but I didn�t deserve the death penalty because of the crime of my father.�
After hearing Stenzel�s message, 14 year-old Sophia Martinez said she is even more committed to remain a proud virgin until marriage. Sophia lamented that there many girls her age who have already lost their virginity but she said girls need to tell boys they want to be respected and that they should honor that.
Stenzel�s new book, �Nobody Told Me,� is a compilation of 17 years worth of e-mails and letters written to her by students around the world. �I wanted to write a book so they could hear their peers speak and not just me,� she said.
She said teens also need to hear from kids who took a vow of purity and waited to get married and the joy they experienced as a result. �Those are the stories that kids need to hear too; they need to know that it can be done.�
This is the second time Stenzel has spoken at Our Lady of the Lakes, according to Anita Brown, director of religious education. Four years ago, Stenzel�s talk inspired a few sexually active teens to reclaim their virginity. Brown said those young men took a vow of chastity that night and have remained chaste ever since.
�Having that option of hope that Pam offers teens who may have made that choice is amazing,� said Brown.
Stenzel can be reached via e-mail by visiting her website: www.pamstenzel.com.
