Sisters Sue Lewis of Epiphany Parish in Coon Rapids, Minn. and Gretchen Thibault of St. Charles Borromeo Parish in St. Anthony, Minn. started working on the program several years ago after feeling like a better offering was needed for their own children.
“It actually started when my oldest daughter (Dana, now 24) was approaching fifth grade,” said Lewis, 44, who lives in Andover, Minn. and has six children with her husband, Tom. “There just wasn’t a lot out there. But it made me uncomfortable that the schools seemed to be doing what parents, in an ideal world, should be able to do. I think that’s where it began. But, we never thought of creating a new program at that time.”
It was then that she realized that it really is the parents who are supposed to be teaching their children about sensitive topics like sexuality and they shouldn’t just hand over that task to the school.
Rather, the ideal is to have a program used both by the parents and the school together, with the parents taking on primary responsibility for this part of their children’s education.
With this realization, the two moms started moving forward with their goal of creating a program that would talk about puberty and the physical changes children experience during adolescence, but in the context of church teachings about chastity and God’s overall plan for creation.
A major component is the concept of love — love of self, love of others and God’s love for all people.