The same is true of any other speaker on this subject. There is no fixed method by which a right knowledge of sex in life can be universally taught. We may learn how to teach biology or physiology, or how to adapt the law of life and of coming to life in plants or animals to human laws, but that does not necessarily qualify us to meet the problems of sex in life or to teach others to meet them. There are a few essentials to the proper teaching of the meaning of sex in life and if we possess these we ought to be able to deal with our problems as they come, if we are capable of using our possessions.
First, a real living belief that our bodies are the “temples of the Holy Spirit,” a belief which applies to all parts and functions of the body and makes it a sacred duty to keep them healthy and clean and strong.
Second, an intelligent knowledge of the body as a machine so that we may use it and not abuse it.
Third, a calm, moderate knowledge of the more common perversions of sex and their relations to other forms of nervous troubles, and a belief in human ability to overcome weakness and sin as well as to cure disease.
These things we can learn and keep on learning at lectures, but how to give them out from our personality to other personalities is for each person his or her own individual problem. It must be solved by bringing his or her own experience of life, plus specific knowledge, plus sympathy, plus common sense, to bear on each problem and so to adapt it to the understanding of the person in question that it will help the existing need.
When the Wise Men of Bethlehem presented gifts, each brought his own gifts, not another’s. They were wise men. If we social workers are wise, we shall cease to try to gain from others words in which to express the knowledge of the meaning of sex in life and will bend our energies to gaining high ideals, simple workable knowledge of the use of the body and the evils of its abuse and an understanding heart and common sense.
Then we shall be able to bring our gifts to this subject and present it to those who need it in such forms as to be practical and effective.
A PLEA FOR COMFORT STATIONS
RELL M. WOODWARD
Surgeon United States Public Health Service