Sex Education OK, But Law Defective

A little over twenty-five years ago, around dawn as my coffee was making,
I walked outside to pick up the newspaper.  As I opened it up,
I saw my picture on the front page with the headline below,
“Reverend: Sex Education OK, But Law Defective.”
Then I remembered that I had had a thirty to forty minute chat
on the telephone with a reporter earlier in the week.
As I read over the article, walking back to the house,
I was shocked that I had said everything that I had said.
Somewhere in that earlier conversation, I must have forgotten
that I was talking to a reporter who was carefully recording everything.

This took place on April 26, 1981, and the paper
mentioned the article again recently, twenty-five years later.
It was a difficult moment back then because a
friend of mine, Merrill Blackburn, and I were
getting ready to go to Mainland China in a
couple of days under Open Doors with Brother Andrew,
and the last thing that a preacher wants is to
leave with his congregation in a big controversy.

As I stood in the pulpit later on that Sunday morning,
I preceded my sermon by mentioning the front page article.
There was a long pause, and one man raised his hand
to speak.  It was Colonel Floyd W. Shiery, a retired
Army chaplain with a doctorate in theology, our beloved,
volunteer assistant pastor who was close to eighty years old. 
I held my breath.  And Dr. Shiery spoke:
“We are very proud of you for the stand you have taken.”

Dr. Shiery’s words immediately ended any potential fallout from
the article in our congregation.  The article also had the effect
of killing this kind of sex education in our local public schools
for the next decade.  But I’m still amazed at how graphically
I laid out the argument.

Bob Vincent
   

Reverend: Sex Education OK, But Law Defective

Rev. Robert Vincent: A little learning is a dangerous thing.

By Raymond L. Daye
Town Talk Staff Writer

Comprehensive sex education is a good idea, but not without moral values included in the lesson, according to a member of the committee that formed the parish sex education program.

The Rev. Robert Vincent Sr., a member of the Rapides Parish Parental Review Committee and pastor of Jackson Street Presbyterian Church, said he is an advocate of sex education in the schools.

However, he is glad the School Board declined to fund the program because of what he called the “defective” state law that keeps morals and values from being part of the class.

“Public education has to be undergirded with certain value judgments,” Vincent said. “For example, I would not want a world history teacher to leave my child with a neutral stance toward the Third Reich. I would want them to know it was totally reprehensible and that the people running the death camps of Auschwitz were not just good ol’ boys doing their thing. They were criminals, not because they broke international law but because they broke moral absolutes.”

Vincent said Act 480, which set up the guidelines for sex education in the state, is “a defective piece of legislation because it prohibits values and morals from entering the class. That is very dangerous,” he said. As it now stands, a student “can get up and tell his teacher he gets his greatest satisfaction from having intercourse with his pet goat. Under the law, the teacher cannot even say, ‘Johnny, that’s not healthy,’ let alone ‘Johnny, that is morally wrong.’

“The teacher can only say something if there is some physical danger involved in copulating with animals,” Vincent said.

“The same thing applies to any teacher. I would hate for a little Fascist kid to stand up in history class and say Hitler was right, that the Jews were destroying Germany’s economy and Hitler only did what he had to do. I would hate for a teacher to be bound by law from saying, ‘Wait a minute. Let’s look at the facts of the case here.’ That’s what Act 480 does with sex education,” Vincent said.

“Sometimes no knowledge is better than defective knowledge,” he continued.

“I really believe ‘a little learning is a dangerous thing.’ I advocate fully comprehensive sex education, which includes values.”

Vincent is still on the committee.

Some other clergymen and other members have dropped off for one reason or another. The committee has been inactive since it delivered its plan to the Board last summer.

“In the very beginning, at our first meeting, we took a vote to decide whether to pursue the matter at all—whether to have sex education or not,” he said. “Those who voted against it tended to pull away.” Others who first said they would serve on the committee “later saw their time priorities were different” and they were unable to serve after all.

The Alexandria Daily Town Talk, Page A-1, Sunday, April 26, 1981

Referenced again a quarter century later:

April 26, 2006
Section: Opinion
Page: 07C

FROM THE PAST

25 Years Ago in The Town Talk
April 26, 1981

Sex education discussed: Comprehensive sex education is a good idea, but not without moral values included in the lesson, according to a member of the committee that formed the parish sex education program. The Rev. Robert Vincent Sr., a member of the Rapides Parish Parental Review committee and pastor of Jackson Street Presbyterian Church, said he is an advocate of sex education in the schools.