By Sara Lenz, Deseret News

KANSAS CITY — It’s a Friday evening in Kansas City, and inside a crowded auditorium full of about 22,000 teenagers, a man named Jason Evert is walking back and forth across a blue-lit stage.

Evert is in his mid-30s, but he has the youthful, energetic manner of a college student. Tonight, he looks like a college student too: black necklace, spiked blonde hair, sleeves rolled up.

Sometimes, at moments like this, Evert feels like he’s in the middle of a Justin Bieber concert. And by the time he’s done, the entire auditorium will be on their feet, clapping and cheering.

Evert’s topic: sex. But what makes his message unique in today’s media landscape is what he’s saying: kids should remain pure and chaste until marriage.

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As a young child, I loved the primary song, “Oh What Do You Do in the Summertime?” As I sang each verse to the energetic but relaxed tempo of the music, the lyrics fired my imagination with the possibilities for summer fun. Inspired by the words, I was sure I would use the lazy days of summer to dream on the banks as I watched the clouds go by, swim in a pool to keep myself cool, drink lemonades and count all the stars in the sky.  And, as it turns out, I did all of those things and more.

I cannot recall any sense of being bored in my childhood when, after I finished my chores on a summer morning, there were perhaps hours of unscheduled time stretched before me. There was no question of what on earth I would do with my day. Rather, the question I faced on a given day was which fun thing to do first. And, as a result, most of my memories of childhood summers are composed of unstructured and unhurried fun, something I want my children to enjoy as well.

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A young mother living in Scotland, Amy King, had growing concerns about the questionable covers of newspapers and magazines to which her two children were being exposed.

One particular day, those concerns came to a head when Amy walked into the lobby of a service station garage. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. There, in full display for her children and others to see, was a copy of the Daily Sport, a magazine with a cover photo that was not only inappropriate, but in Amy’s estimation, was pornographic.

She immediately spoke to the manager, who told her that the head office dictated where the newspapers were to be put. Amy next contacted the head office. She was assured that their newsstands would be replaced with stands that had frost-fronted covers so the offending magazine and newspaper covers would not be visible.

Sexually explicit magazine covers displayed at a child’s eye level. (We blacked one out)

However, the stands were never replaced, and when Amy asked about it, there was no response. Amy knew this wasn’t an isolated incident. With other concerned individuals, Amy began investigating the placement and content of sexually graphic publications and found that measures to protect children were woefully inadequate.

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I’m raising three future mothers. That simple fact has an enormous effect on how I mother them. I’m not raising girls. I’m teaching and nurturing the mothers of my grandchildren. Click to read entire article.

• Sexually active people face odds four times higher for contracting a sexually transmitted disease than for getting pregnant. (Condoms may reduce the risk but do not stop it.)

• Three million teenagers contract STDs annually. (Finding True Love, Pro-life.com)

• As many as 43 million Americans may have acquired sexually transmitted viral infections, such as HIV (Neal A. Maxwell, New Era June 1992, p. 4)

• Oral sex is rampant in Jr high and high school age children.
“Although there are only limited national data about how often adolescents engage in oral sex, some data suggest that many adolescents who engage in oral sex do not consider it to be sex; therefore they may use oral sex as an option to experience sex while still, in their minds, remaining abstinent. Moreover, many consider oral sex to be a safe or no risk sexual practice. . . . several co-factors can increase the risk of HIV transmission through oral sex, including: oral ulcers, bleeding gums, genital sores, and the presence of other STDs.” (Center for Disease Control)

• Human Papillomavirus (HPV) infection. Approximately 20 million Americans are currently infected with HPV, and another 6.2 million people become newly infected each year. At least 50% of sexually active men and women acquire genital HPV infection at some point in their lives. (Center for Disease Control)

• HPV infection is a cause of nearly all cases of cervical cancer.

• Birth control pills do not protect against STDs

The facts: pre-marital sex and marriage.

• Couples who engage in sex before marriage are more likely to break up than couples who save sex for marriage.

• Cohabiting unions are much less stable than [unions] that begin as marriages.

• Those who engage in sex before marriage are more likely to commit adultery than those who had no premarital sexual experience.

( Journal of Marriage and the Family Vol. 53, 1991, pp 913-927 and Christianity Today Marriage and Divorce Survey Report, July 1992)

Barbara Graham’s 7 Laws of Grandparenting
by Barbara Graham

On the one hand, it was so simple. There was a new baby, Isabelle Eva, and there was nothing to do except love her. That was the one hand. The other hand, belonging to her parents, held all the cards. I soon learned that I could love my granddaughter fiercely, but I had no say — in anything. She was mine, but not mine. Although this is perfectly natural and should not have shocked me, it did. (Okay, I admit that on occasion the word bossy has been used to describe my behavior. Still.) For many parents used to being in charge, deferring to the rules and wishes of our adult children and their partners is humbling. I ended up editing a book on the subject to help me get a handle on my new role. Here are a few guidelines that — so far — have kept me out of hot water.

1. Seal your lips. Even if you’re an expert who has written 13 bestsellers on parenthood, your adult sons and daughters will assume you know nothing about childrearing. Your advice and opinions will not be welcome, unless directly solicited. (Even then, it’s iffy as to whether the new parents really want to hear your answer.) Tread lightly. As Anne Roiphe laments in Eye of My Heart, “Ah, my poor tongue is sore from being bitten.”

2. You may love thy grandchild as thine own — but never forget that he or she is not thine own. I was confused about this in the beginning. I was at the hospital when Isabelle was born and I thought we were all one big happy family. Not. I had to win over her parents. They loved me — I knew that — but did they trust me? In the early days I felt as if I were auditioning for the part of grandparent. Did I hold Isabelle properly? Didn’t I know that you never put a newborn down on her stomach? It took me a few blunders to secure their trust — which must be renewed every so often, like a driver’s license.

3. Abide by the rules of the new parents. The dos and don’ts of childrearing change with every generation. If I had listened to my mother, I would have held my son only while feeding him (every four hours) — and not one second longer, lest he turn into a “mama’s boy.” These days, with the crush of childrearing information online, most new parents are up to speed — and beyond — but we grandparents most definitely are not. Baby slings? The Mutsy Slider Stroller? Who knows what these things are, or how to operate them?

4. Accept your role. If you’re the mother of the new father, you may not have the same access to your grandchild as the maternal grandmother, at least in the beginning. In most families, new mothers are the primary caretakers of babies and they tend to lean on their mothers for support. This is not a problem — unless you think it is. Your grandchild will love you too. Anyhow, all grandparents — whether on the maternal or paternal side — are at risk of being shut out if they fail to observe any of these commandments. Try to think of yourself as a relief pitcher in a baseball game: You’re on the bench until your adult children call you up — and then you must do as they say if you want to stay in the game. (We’ve already covered this, but I think it’s key.)

5. Don’t be surprised if old issues get triggered when your child has a child. For many people, feelings of competition with their grandchild’s other grandparents provoke traumatic flashbacks to junior high school. This is especially true now, given the proliferation of divorce and stepfamilies. Not only that, some grandparents are able to lavish the kids with expensive gifts, while others live much closer to the children than their counterparts. Still, a little goodwill goes a long way. The heart is a generous muscle capable of loving many people at once, and most of us are able to get past the initial rush of jealousy to find our special place in the new order. (Yes, of course we still secretly hope that our grandchildren will love us more than those other people. We are, after all, human.)

6. Get a life. Sometimes I’ve become overly embroiled in my concern for my son and his family; at other times my desire to be an integral part of their lives has taken precedence over things I needed to do to maintain my own sense of well-being — and I’ve paid the price. Hence, my mantra: “I have my life, they have theirs.” We are close and connected, yet separate. Boundaries, boundaries, boundaries.

7. Let go of all expectations. When Isabelle Eva was born she was living around the corner from us, but when she was two months old her parents moved her overseas. Not only was I heartbroken, my expectations about my involvement in her life were turned upside down. Yet, once I was able to let go of my agenda — which took some doing — I found that I still felt deeply connected to Isabelle and vice-versa. Now my husband and I visit her as often as we can and, in between visits, we Skype and talk on the phone. There are bound to be unpredictable plot twists in every family narrative, but, unless you are raising your grandchildren, your adult children are writing their own story. (See No. 4: Relief pitcher, on the bench.) Who knew that grandparenthood would offer so many new opportunities for personal growth?

Ultimately, the good news about becoming a grandparent, and not being in charge anymore, is that nothing is your fault, either. As Roxana Robinson writes in Eye of My Heart, “It’s like being told you no longer have to eat vegetables, only dessert — and really only the icing.”

As found on Grandparents.com

[Barbara Graham, a Grandparents.com columnist, is the editor of the anthology, Eye of My Heart: 27 Writers Reveal the Hidden Pleasures and Perils of Being a Grandmother (Harper, 2009), which tells "the whole crazy, complicated truth about being a grandmother in today's world."]