Burundi Catholic church does not support the idea of distributing condoms to students and youths and strongly condemns promotion of sexual liberalism.
On March 8, the Archdiocese of Gitega wrote a letter addressed to the heads of schools under the Catholic convention calling on them to stop working with organizations or associations whose teachings in terms of sexual health violate the doctrine of the Church and Burundian culture.
According to the diocesan supervisor for education, Abbé Simon Nzigirabarya, certain organizations or associations are destroying Burundian culture and promoting sexual libertinism “under the pretext of educating our young people about their sexual rights”.
He deplores the fact that certain school officials give permission without verifying the content of the subject taught: “Organizations or associations have granted themselves the right to sneakily enter our schools, whereas, as a Church, we have a project of education recognized by the State to serve as a basis for human, moral, social and intellectual education”.
And to ask the heads of schools under Catholic conventions to refer to the diocesan office for education anyone who wants to work in their schools for verification of modules in the field of education.
As a reminder, in November 2021, the Archdiocese of Gitega also sent a letter to the Ministry of National Education denouncing lessons in basic school which lead to the degradation of human values.
“Lesson 12 entitled ‘Youth Rights and Appropriate Sexuality and Reproductive Health Services’ encourages young people to wander off sexually. It teaches young people that sexual pleasure is a right for them without any explanation,” said the pastoral and family department of the Archdiocese of Gitega, speaking of a lesson in the course of Human Sciences exempted from the 7th to 9th grade.
He asked for the removal of this lesson and replace it by one that encourages young people to abstain. He also called on the government to stop the distribution of contraceptives to young people; “They are reserved for couples who want them for birth spacing”.
