It was my privilege to serve as an evangelical pastor in the Chicago area for nine years. While I thoroughly enjoyed pastoral ministry, I was often troubled by the serious conflicts that our families were experiencing. Into my office came families explaining their problems: Teen pregnancy, abusive relationships, abortion, cohabitation, divorce, and overall family breakdown. Isn’t there some way to prevent any of this, I wondered. Isn’t there a way to move up the river and help people before it gets to this?
In 2004, I founded the Abstinence & Marriage Education Partnership for the purpose of providing quality abstinence and marriage education programs for teachers to use in public, private, and Christian schools.
Teaching abstinence provides teens with a road map to the future. Abstinence programs help teens understand that the choices they make now will have an impact on their life down the road. Teens involved in sexual activity are especially at risk for physical, emotional, and spiritual consequences which can compromise their future marriage. As one teacher at our training wrote:
“If I had this program when I was a teen, I would have been empowered to wait until marriage. Instead, I compromised what I believed, became bonded to my boyfriend and married him as the result. Now four marriages later, three abortions later, and two children by different fathers, I want to say ‘thank you.’ You are changing lives and your message would have changed my life.”
Our mission is to help save today’s teens from going down this painful path. Ours are the stories that will not be told.
According to research over three decades from the University of Michigan, approximately 90% of high school seniors say that having a good marriage and family is very important to them. While the institution of marriage in America is in trouble, we believe that the best way to strengthen this institution is to help young people avoid sexual activity and prepare for marriage. Since we know young people want a healthy future marriage, we seek to provide support and encouragement to help them achieve this goal.
And while it is easy to focus on the negative implications of sexual activity, it is our conviction that the best way to help teens avoid the negative is to teach the positive – to emphasize teens’ future goals and dreams – especially marriage.
To this end, A&M offers curricula that help teachers communicate these principles to teens. Aspire (public and private high schools), and Excel (churches and Christian high schools), help educators teach these concepts to teens. Aspire, originally published in 2006 and updated in 2008, is one of the most commonly used abstinence education programs in the country.
These programs each contain eight chapters written in a user-friendly, objective, question and answer format that actively engage teens in conversation and help them conclude for themselves that abstinence is the best choice they can make to protect their future dreams. Each program also includes a section entitled Making a Fresh Start, which helps teens who have already been sexually active understand that abstinence is still the best option for their future regardless of their past.
The Abstinence & Marriage Education Partnership provides training seminars around the country as well as workbooks for students with teacher’s guides for educators. Topics include goal setting, resisting peer pressure, media, character, building healthy relationships, and the importance of marriage. Visit www.ampartnership.org for more information about trainings and curriculum or call toll free 877-290-9248.
Scott Phelps is Executive Director of the Abstinence & Marriage Education Partnership located near Chicago.