Raising Kids In a Secular Age: Discussing Sexuality 

Written by Sammie Gallo, Creator of Abundant Life: You Were Made for More

Raising Kids In a Secular Age: Discussing Sexuality 

Talking with kids about controversial topics has always been a challenge for parents, but today, the stakes are especially high. With an increasing number of kids who have been influenced by the culture (especially when it comes to relationships and sexuality), parents must know how to navigate these tumultuous waters that they will inevitably encounter with their kids.

More and more parents are opting for alternatives to public education, such as homeschooling, nontraditional schooling, or private, Christian schooling; but if we’re honest with ourselves, it can’t stop there. According to a 2022 study, of 57,000 undergrads from 159 of the nation’s most elite postsecondary institutions, homeschooled and privately schooled kids “are as or more likely to identify as LGBTQ or non-binary than those from public or private school backgrounds.”  

In other words, it’s not enough to insulate children from bad ideas, especially when insulation is accompanied by silence on issues our kids are hearing about all the time from the culture, their peers, and media. 

What I most want my children to hear from me is the good news of the Gospel: that by faith, they can receive the true, good, and beautiful work of Jesus Christ on their behalf, which he accomplished through his death and resurrection, offering them forgiveness of sin and eternal life. I want them to hear that following Jesus means every part of their life can be transformed and made holy by him. And I want them to know that this good news is for everyone: that Jesus crosses every boundary in his determination to seek and save the lost.

The way I approach tough conversations – like LGBT+ questions – in front of my kids can subvert or reinforce any of these truths about the Gospel, and this will be the same for the children in your life as well.

Some of us may struggle to know what to say at all, so we end up saying nothing to our kids, even if our hearts are in the right place. This could be motivated by good – we don’t want to misrepresent God. But, if we say nothing… We can also undermine how our children understand the Gospel.

We could unintentionally communicate that God doesn’t care about our sexuality. If we never tell our children that God says a clear “no” to same-sex sexual relationships, we could leave them to conclude that Christians can just follow their hearts. We may unintentionally signal that the Gospel is a ticket to heaven that has no relevance to our holiness here. If they’ve heard at school or in the neighborhood that same-sex relationships are good, and they’ve heard nothing from us, they may assume we agree.

On the other hand, our silence could accidentally communicate that sexuality is too shameful to discuss. They might conclude that God wants nothing to do with it because it’s dirty, or that God isn’t interested in saving their friends who identify as LGBT+. Maybe Jesus’s work isn’t for everyone. Again, we’d never teach this outright. But in the silence, our kids can be left to wonder and reach terrible conclusions that don’t reflect God’s heart. 

So how can we talk to the children in our lives in ways that underline the Gospel rather than undermine it?

Some churches fear becoming too political from the pulpit. But when bad ideas are everywhere, the Church, much like parents, must have a response. Scripture is not lacking for real direction in real time.

A better approach than insulating kids is to infuse them. The “infusion” approach welcomes hard questions, encourages students to think and search for the truth, and helps them learn what it takes to find answers that are both thorough and thoughtful. The goal is to equip students how to handle bad ideas, harmful practices, and sinful behaviors, knowing that they will inevitably encounter these things in an increasingly secular culture. This ideology is really what is at the root of Sexual Risk Avoidance Education – an approach we really lean into here at Abundant Life: You Were Made for More.     

In the 1950’s, researcher Dr. William McGuire suggested bad ideas operate much like viruses do, and the more exposure one has to bad ideas in a controlled setting, the less likely they are to succumb to those ideas later. McGuire performed a series of experiments in which he tried to convince subjects of a lie, specifically that brushing their teeth was bad for them. Unsurprisingly, those who received no preparation for what they were about to hear were more easily convinced to stop brushing, while those who had been warned they were going to hear a bad argument were harder to deceive.  

More surprising were those found to be easiest and hardest to dupe. The most vulnerable were not those with zero preparation, but those who’d merely had the truth reinforced. They had been told things like, “You know brushing your teeth is good for you, right? You’ve been taught this since you were little. Trust us.” When they heard arguments against brushing their teeth that they’d never heard before, this group felt sheltered and even deceived.  

The least vulnerable were those who had not only been warned about bad arguments they’d hear but were also taught how to respond. In fact, they were warned they may face additional bad arguments. In other words, they were prepared to be aware and vigilant.  

This experiment demonstrates the method many Christian parents and churches use to pass on their faith to their kids. Reinforcement without seriously countering ideas, is doomed to fail. In fact, it may leave young people more vulnerable to lies. We need to equip our kids to think for themselves. This requires courage. It also requires confidence that the truth is, well, true, and that answers can be found. Hope is communicated when we speak the truth about God’s vision for sexuality and the truth that we were just as lost as any of our neighbors before Jesus found us. Hope will tell our kids that they can be in the world but not of it, on mission with Jesus to pursue holy living, no matter the cost. This is the bottom line: the Bible’s teaching on our sexuality is ultimately about the Gospel message of Jesus’s unending love for us. And that Gospel gives us everlasting, unbelievable, life-changing, prison-breaking hope.