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Published Date: March 10, 2010

Tags: Catholic youths, chastity campaign

Young Catholics praying at the Domus Cordis gathering in Jakarta

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A Catholic youth group in Jakarta archdiocese has launched a nine-month-long campaign to stress the importance of chastity to other young people.

Organizers of the Domus Cordis (sanctification and evangelization) group, say the campaign will include talks based on Pope John Paul John II’s Theology of the Body, the recruitment of “chastity ambassadors” to spread the message, as well as the use of media and social networking websites.

Organizers say they launched the True Love Celebration (TLC) campaign after the National Commission for Child Protection reported in 2008 that 93.7 percent of 4,500 junior and senior high school students surveyed had engaged in petting and oral sex, and that 97 percent watched pornographic movies.

In addition, 21.2 percent of the senior high school students had gone for abortions.

“These cases are one reason why young Catholics decided to launch the campaign by using Pope John Paul II’s emphasis on chastity in his Theology of the Body as a focus,” TLC’s co-chairman Kevin Darmawan told UCA News.

Theology of the Body is the topic of a series of lectures on the human person given by the late Pope. It was the first major teaching of his pontificate.

About 300 mostly young Catholics attended the TLC launch on March 6, officiated by Domus Cordis moderator Jesuit Father Thomas Aquino Deshi Ramadhani.

Darmawan said the campaign would include nine monthly gatherings, starting this month, featuring praise and worship and talks based on Theology of the Body.

The campaign also aims to invite as many as young people as possible to become “chastity ambassadors,” who would share with others the importance of living a chaste life and what true love is all about.

Sixty such “ambassadors” have already been recruited two months ago, “who will spread the … message to others at least once a week,” said Darmawan.

The campaign will also use multimedia such as social networking websites, and radio and television to spread the chastity message, he said.

One “chastity ambassador,” Vincentius Wedyanto, admitted that he used to watch pornographic films. “I want to change my life,” he said. “And this campaign’s gatherings, confession sessions and prayer meetings make me realize that God is the only one who can heal me,” he told UCA News.

Father Ramadhani, who teaches biblical studies at the Jakarta-based Driyarkara School of Philosophy, said the campaign is in the form of a nine-month-long novena. “It is actually an expression of concern of young people who want to concretely translate Theology of the Body” into action.

Young people are targets of the campaign, he added, “because we … believe that they can reach out to other young people.”

Source: Catholic youths launch chastity campaign (UCAN)

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