Interesting points. I recently read a book which included studies addressing why our kids are experiencing sexual maturation earlier than in former years. Food additives are among the potential culprits, but some have other theories as well. We do expect our kids to have a longer time between puberty and marriage these days, and from the faith perspective, that requires additional teaching on our part to encourage teens and young adults to wait for the real thing.

Thanks for commenting!

That said, we will likely never significantly reduce pre-marital sex and teenage sexual activity until we, as a society, seriously address the educational system and the hormones in the meats and dairy products our children consume. Year round schooling would allow young people to be out of college at age 20 as in many other countries. Removing the hormones from our livestock and thus from our children’s diets may just allow the age of physical sexual maturation (aka puberty) to rise back to where it was in our grandparents’ day. These 2 changes would reduce the number of years from puberty to marriageable age. These 2 issues will not likely be addressed, so parents – more so than in the past – need to play an active and ongoing role in talking to, and setting some common sense rules for their adolescent children.