Ejeagwu: Still celebrating St. Valentine’s Day

ST. VALENTINE’S Day is a holiday celebrated on February 14. In the West, it is the traditional day on which lovers and their beloved express their love for each other through the exchange of love cards, flowers, confectionaries, etc. Historically, Valentine’s Day was named after a Roman Priest who lived during the reign of Emperor Claudius. It was believed that Emperor Claudius had an army and it seemed that for them to be physically and mentally fit to win wars, they ought not to get married, and because of this, he prohibited young men getting married. 

       St. Valentine was against this law and so secretly joined army couples in marriage. On one occasion whilst he was doing this, he was arrested and jailed. In jail, he became friendly with the jailer’s daughter; a blind girl. Her kind words became the source of strength and encouragement that kept Valentine going till the day of his execution. Because of the emotional bond he had formed with the blind girl, on the eve of his execution, he wrote her a note titled “From your first Valentine.’’ Later in 496 AD, Pope Claudius began the celebration of Valentine’s Day in his memory. But subsequently, February 14, took a different shape. It became a day lovers go the extra-mile to make sure that their beloved get the best of gifts. Love! Love!! Love!!!

   From St. Thomas Aquinas’ definition of love as “to know, to will and to do the good of the beloved” it follows that true love never wants any evil to happen to the beloved. It promises infinity, eternity, and a reality far greater than an infinity, which gives meaning to our everyday existence. Yet we have also seen that the way to attain this goal is not simply by submitting to instinct/passion. The virtue of purity and growth in maturity are called for and these also pass through the path of renunciation because far from rejecting or prisoning (?) Eros love, they heal it and restore its pure grandeur.

    However, it is sad that today under the pretext of celebrating Valentine’s Day; people kill and commit suicide out of jealousy for a love that is not genuine. Sexual promiscuity is not without its negative effects, ranging from the use of contraceptives (pills and condoms) leading to so-called “unwanted” pregnancy and resultant abortion. It must be pointed out that love and life are inseparable; physical intimacies (sexual acts) generate life most times. With the use of contraceptives you are saying you accept sex but not its natural, in-built consequences; you do not want to be responsible for your action and to face the consequences, you do not want what it was created for, you want to get what you want from it but not allow it do what it ought to do. This is quite illogical. Pre-marital or extra-marital sex is self-serving and not self-giving love. Love is always self-giving.

   It is erroneously believed by many that on Valentine’s Day, you show your partner how much you love him/her through having sex. But this actually shows how little you love each other. Sacrifice (self-giving) is what makes a couple great lovers. It is an integral part of love. Therefore, any love relationship that is devoid of sacrifice is not love at all. To sacrifice, you think of the consequences of your action on your partner, not on yourself. Sex outside marriage says, “I love it” instead of “I love you”; i.e. I love me but I want you

    It is a widely held view that the highest incidence of venereal disease transmission occurs on each Valentine day.  As we celebrate Valentine Day, it is estimated that seven per  cent of children below the age of 10 are already sexually active; 85 per cent of males and 77 per cent of females had sex before the age of 19. About three out of every five teenagers now have one Sexually Transmitted Disease (STD) or the other. However, the youth seem to be languishing in immorality in Nigeria, but not so in the U.S. where the most recent report by the Federal Government notes that almost 75 per cent of 15-to-17-year-olds have never had sex, and the majority have had no sexual contact at all, and those who have, wish they had waited. Public health models in the U.S. prioritise risk avoidance as the best way to promote optimal health outcomes, and the sexual risk avoidance (SRA) approach is consistent with this paradigm. And this message may be making a difference.

   As we celebrate Valentine’s Day, many young Nigerians celebrate “Lust Day” or “Sin Day”. From being a day of true love, Valentine’s Day has become a day of sexual harassment; lecturers sexually harassing some girls, male employers sexually harassing their female employees. Valentine’s Day these days has become the day many unmarried young girls advertise their breasts and buttocks on the streets. It is a period when secondary school boys and girls browse pornography on the Internet and cell phones. It is a day when unmarried girls become pregnant. It is a day when men and women revel in liquor and spirits. It is a day when many husbands become unfaithful to their wives and vice-versa.

   Therefore, we must go back to the real meaning of Valentine’s Day. It means expressing true love not lust or physical intimacy. Young people should use their useful energies to do something good not to indulge in illicit sex. One’s lust will be sublimated to divine love; egotism should be transformed into true love while parents’ blessings will ensure the well-being of their children. Government should stop teaching condom-cantered sex education in schools, as this promotes sexually permissive risk reduction activities among the youth. Rather than counseling young people not to have sex, these programmes draw heavily on discredited concepts and condone sexual experimentation by schoolchildren as normal, expected, and healthy. Government should retrain its teachers to teach sexual risk avoidance through abstinence, because most parents want their children to wait for sex until marriage. Sex education teachers must teach according to the faith and morals of the parents of the children, because parents have the primary responsibility of passing on their faith and morals to their children and the government has the subsidiary role of helping parents to do this in school. 

   Sexually permissive risk reduction education teaches school pupils how to wear condoms, about kissing and masturbation, so-called “safe-sex” about sterilisation and how to commit abortion. Whereas, risk avoidance through abstinence sexuality education verges on complete physical, spiritual and moral education of the child, in general, risk reduction sex education fails to provide a strong message to delay sexual activity. It fails to provide students with the skills needed to develop emotional intimacy preparatory to loving marital relationships as adults. It seems that a lot of people are ignorant of the fact that the so-called “safe-sex” is not achievable because “No contraceptive can guarantee one hundred per cent effectiveness” and so it unfailingly leads to pregnancy, disease etc. No matter how much we try to deny it, condoms and other contraceptives can never prevent but can only reduce the risk of contracting HIV/AIDS, other sexually transmitted diseases, pregnancy and the third risk i.e. psychological and emotional disorders arising from premarital sex.

    However, being in true love is a wonderful experience. Valentine’s Day to some is the best day to show true love to their loved ones. But I believe that true love does not need a special day to be shown. A guy asked his girlfriend for sex all in the name of showing her how much he loves her. Is that true love? No, it is mere exploitation. Abstinence from sex cannot kill. When has sex become the main reason why people go into a relationship? Sex is not love; even in marriage, sex is not a daily occurrence. Young people must respect their dignity which arises from being made in the image and likeness of God; they must exercise self-respect and practise self-control. Our youth must be refined and chaste, with young girls showing the boys the way.

    One should not exchange sex for love or sex for gifts because the same person that claims to truly love you will be the same person who leaves you soon after. Stories are always told of girls surrendering their virginity on Valentine’s Day as gifts to their supposed boyfriends, who will soon after leave them for a fresh catch/girl. I discovered that at the end of any relationship that did not involve sex, it might hurt but not as when one has lost one’s pride. Your virginity is the only unique gift you have as a virgin boy or girl. Your virginity dwarfs your physical beauty, your chain of degrees, fat bank account, posh cars, latest cell phones, family name, etc. How I wish St. Valentine can rise from his grave and make it clear to people that what they are doing on his day is immoral. Those who celebrate Valentine’s Day immorally are in fact insulting St. Valentine.

   Let us, therefore, make the best out of Valentine Day celebration with self-restraint and for true development. Extend your love to the less privileged, they need our love most.

•Ejeagwu is on the staff of Project for Human Development (PHD).