As young people are being told that condoms are dangerous and that the morning-after pill is abortion, The Pure in Heart Catholic lobby group should be officially investigated, says Rob Buchanan.

Pure in Heart, a Catholic lobby group targeting young people has reportedly told teens during school lectures that one in six condoms fail. Some other completely false and misleading claims the group has been teaching Irish children are that condoms kept in wallets melt and that young people “lose certain hormones” the more often they have sex.

The group was recently in the news for a bizarre and disturbing ‘role play’ exercise in which they used sellotape to bind kids’ hands together to demonstrate the effects of having multiple partners. They also made male students wear wigs as part of this highly questionable exercise. Unsurprisingly, many of the teens reported feeling extremely uncomfortable and were left feeling worried and confused about the information they had been given.

Pure in Heart are feeding lies to Irish children, not the comparatively harmless falsehoods of church dogma, but biologically and psychologically hazardous lies about contraception and the prevention of sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Instead of promoting abstinence in teenagers, they are promoting guilt and irrational fear, which is likely to lead to the spread of STIs and an increase in teen pregnancies.

They are instilling the idea that sexual desires are unnatural and shameful when the only thing that is unnatural and shameful about this whole thing is a group of unscientific religious fundamentalists sellotaping kids together and scaring them with fairy stories about condoms being unsafe and how morning-after pills are ‘abortion’.

To frighten children during their formative years is an abhorrent exercise and is surely akin to some form of abuse. Exploiting guilt and cultivating ignorance have long been the weapons of choice used by the Catholic Church in this country. The idea that these clowns are being invited in to our schools to manipulate children with lies and fear in the 21^st century is disgusting.

Pure in Heart are poisoning young minds and endangering young bodies. These people are reckless. Surely an official investigation into the extent of their lies and the subsequent damage to our young people should be undertaken.