The Health of Our Teenagers

by Tara Wentworth

 

I was doing some research on the health of our families recently.  The Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. has provided some very sobering statistics concerning the condition of our young people, particularly from 7th through 12th grade.  This particular study divided the young people into six different categories:  intact married, two parent families; stepfamilies; one biological parent co-habitating with a partner families; both biological parents co-habitating families; divorced single parent families; and always single, never married parent families.

The first part of the study looked at the correlation between family structures and a number of different social maladies that occur amongst this (and most) age group.  In most instances those from the intact, married families were the least likely to engage in fighting, theft, alcohol abuse, running away and sexual promiscuousness as well as to do better in scholastics.  Those from co-habitating families had the highest or were most likely to engage in these various activities.

They also looked at the correlation between those who attended religious services regularly and those who did not.  Without exception, those who attended religious services at least weekly, even those from families that were not intact, had significantly less problems in those same areas of fighting, theft, alcohol abuse, running away and premarital sex, as well as being better students.

I think what was most sobering to me was that in all of the categories they charted, our children, even those in two parent, religious homes, had a significant amount of issues in each of these areas.  For instance, almost 13% of our teenagers who live with both biological parents and go to religious services at least once a week, have confessed to committing a theft of $50 or more.  That means, they didn’t just steal a pack of chewing gum from the convenience store but purposely stole something of significant value.  8.5% of these same teen agers have used “hard” drugs, almost 28% have gotten into a fight and 22% have gotten drunk this past year.

That may not seem like a big deal to many of you.  Our society seems unaware of the effects these frightening statistics will have on the overall health of our families, communities and our country.  Unless we begin to give our children better guidance, more supervision and some absolutes, I fear that these statistics will continue to worsen.

Parents, this is a “wake-up” call.  It is your responsibility to teach your children, not the school system or your religious institution.  We must turn these awful statistics around or we will have no future leaders in any sector of our society that will be able to discern and make decisions that will keep us the great country we have been for most of our young history as a nation.  What kind of posterity will we leave our children and grandchildren?  I personally do not believe it is too late, but I do believe it is time to wake up!

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