The Archbishop of Santo Domingo, Cardinal Nicolas de Jesus Lopez Rodriguez, said this week sexuality is a gift from God and as such should be treated “in a respectful, appropriate and serious fashion.”

During a television program taped with a group of young people, the cardinal expressed the widespread concern about the high number of teenage mothers who experience great frustration because the fathers of their children do not assume their responsibility.

Cardinal Lopez Rodriguez recalled that sexuality is a “most beautiful gift that God has given to man and woman, and which should not be used the way many people believe, swapping out partners as if they were wild animals.”

“On the contrary, man must make use of that formidable capacity that God has given him in a respectful, appropriate, and serious fashion; for example, 12 and 13 year-old children should not be having sex, because that is neither serious nor appropriate,” the cardinal continued, emphasizing that “engaged couples, when they are married, should make appropriate use of sexuality, but they should not play around.”