On Valentine’s day, a pro-life group in the Philippines handed out candies and rosaries in exchange for condoms. These condoms were also liberally distributed that day by organisations promoting safe sex. By offering candy and rosaries, they were promoting their message that sex should be saved for marriage, implying that the availability of condoms encourages sex in irresponsible ways. 

This mild-mannered media stunt is part of much longer history of contestations taking place in the Philippines around reproductive health and rights, sexuality and gender. In these contestations the Catholic Council of Bishops of the Philippines, plays a key role. (1)

Since January 2025, debates around this centre on a bill aiming to combat teenage pregnancy, which has been rising in recent years especially among under-15s. I was doing fieldwork in Bagiuo at the time, interviewing professionals in the field of sexual and reproductive health. All of them stressed the need for better sexuality education in the light of the rise in teenage pregnancies, many mentioning specifically that the youngest girl to give birth recently was only 9 years old. 

The teenage pregnancy bill was already proposed some time ago, and garnered wide support initially. However, in January 2025 its progress was derailed because of a video made by opponents of the bill, a direct attack on proponents of sexuality education in schools. They warned that the bill promoted teaching children how to masturbate, and about oral and anal sex and was counter to Filipino values. It was produced by a coalition of conservative and religious actors, united in ‘project Dalisay’ opposing the bill (a timeline of the campaign and its effect was put together by Rappler here).

There are two observations to be made here: the first is the similarity between the attacks on sexuality education in the Philippines and the Netherlands. The second is the tendency such attacks reinforce to create a hard choice between being religious, and promoting safe sex, contraception and sexual wellbeing.

I followed the news on this bill with interest. What I found interesting was the fact that the accusations found in this video echoed accusations made in the Netherlands against the annual week of ‘spring fever’ (Lentekriebels). The accusations by project Dalisay seemed to echo the accusations made by the Dutch organisation Civitas Christiana. This organisation went even further, accusing Rutgers not only of inciting too young children to sexual acts, but also of promoting an agenda of paedophilia. (2)

As proponents of sexuality education in both countries explain tirelessly, these accusations are false: at that age, the emphasis on bodily integrity, that it is your own, and getting to know your body and the senses: smell, sight, touch, etc.. In the Netherlands, the main Dutch organisations working on sexual health and reproductive rights (Rutgers) recently won a court case against Civitas Christiana, with the Dutch judge ordering the latter organisations to stop spreading misinformation and correct earlier claims. 

In the Philippines, project Dalisay was able to make these arguments by making the connection between the reference in the bill to ‘comprehensive sexuality education’ according to ‘international standards’, finding European and UN guidelines on CSE that suggest that masturbation could be a topic among children (which were denied by UN representatives). Proponents quickly adjusted saying that of course, sexuality education should be following Filipino cultural values, but the damage was already done. It is unlikely that this particular bill will pass at this moment in time, especially since president Marcos has withdrawn his support publicly, calling it ‘woke nonsense’. 

To anyone following these debates, it might seem that at the moment there is no sexuality education in schools in the Philippines and the state of reproductive health and rights is bad. However, this is not the case: this bill builds upon a law on responsible parenthood and reproductive health that was passed in 2012, covering a very wide spectrum of topics around reproductive health, from breast cancer screenings, to provision of free contraceptives to, indeed, sexuality education in schools. Currently, contraceptives are freely available via local health centres, and sex education is implemented in public schools, monitored by the department of education. 

During the 15 years of lobbying for this law to pass, religious opposition was fierce and the law was challenged in the supreme court to discuss whether the bill was unconstitutional because it included the provision of contraceptives which they considered to be abortifacients. In the Philippines, abortion is constitutionally forbidden. However, the bill was supported and developed by an extremely wide and varied coalition of groups, including religious groups. Despite the opposition of the Council of Catholic Bishops, Catholic intellectuals and religious leaders spoke up in explicit support for it. 5 years after its passing, it came into effect.

Now, to the second observation: What happens in skirmishes such as these, is that an opposition is created between religious/conservative and ‘progressive’ ideas about gender and sexuality.  In both cases, the innocence of little children is presented as something that should be protected against ‘woke nonsense’ which will mess them up. In other words, this is part of a worldwide ‘anti-gender’, anti-woke reaction gathering together conservative religious leaders, and populists as described by countless researchers, journalists, and most recently by the scholar who has been considered the icon of ‘gender ideology’ Judith Butler in their book ‘ who’s afraid of gender’. (3)

At the same time, research shows time and again that the positions of religious leaders and influencers should not be taken to represent the realities of the approximately 1,3 billion people that may call themselves Catholic, or the approximately additional billion of other types of Christians, especially when it comes to reproduction, sexuality and intimate life in general. For the Philippines, an excellent ethnography describing the ways Catholics navigate reproductive dilemmas has been written by Christiane Collantes. (4) This is of course, also recognized by religious leaders themselves: in fact, when one dives down into their discussions, one find that they recognize the same issues progressives want to address. There are many organisations that work on sexual and reproductive health and promote sexuality education in schools that are more 'religion friendly' (see for example Care for Sexuality in the Netherlands).

In addition, I found that public health workers and activists were very matter of fact in resisting the binary choice that seems to appear in public discourses. In some cases, they were very explicit in stating that they do not let their work or activism be influenced by their pastors. Even those who were active in born-again churches, a strong form of religiosity, did not find the arguments of their religious leaders against the free provision of contraception and sexuality education in schools convincing at all. As one person whose work involves providing free contraceptive devices, including IUTs described it: ‘I sit in church and listen to the pastor telling all those stories about contraception and abortion and I know it is simply not true.’ Another person, a young activist who organizes prayer meetings and sex education, was explicitly asked by his pastor to stop doing his work and refused to listen. Both his religiosity and belief that sexuality education and protection are important were sincere and important to him. 

In short: there are plenty of people who can combine condoms with candies and rosaries on Valentine’s Day, whether married or not. In terms of societal debates, it is important that those organisations and professionals that bridge the apparent divides are not forced into positions that they have to choose between their faith and their professionalism. Both (secular) progressives and (religious) conservatives have a responsibility to not unnecessarily reinforce this false choice. Furthermore, as researchers, it is important that we do not only follow the contours of the controversies scripted by the ‘woke vs anti-woke’ culture wars framework but pay attention to all the different ways social and cultural realities escape and move beyond this framework. 

If you want to learn more about these topics, you can join our free online course Religion and Sexual wellbeing: Pleasure, Piety and reproductive rights. Both the Netherlands and the Philipines are case studies in this course, along with Zimbabwe.

Notes:

(1)  Miguel Antonio Garcia Estrada, Kent Jason Go Cheng, and Rutcher Madera Lacaza, ‘Legal Changes and Evidence on Unmet Need for Contraception, Philippines’, Bulletin of the World Health Organization 102, no. 11 (1 November 2024): 778–85, https://doi.org/10.2471/BLT.23.290577; Sylvia Estrada-Claudio, ‘Voices and Choices in Reproductive Rights: Scholarship and Activism’, IN THE ASIAN CENTURY, 2015, 97–115.

(2) Willemijn Krebbekx, ‘Spring Fever in The Netherlands: Framing Child Sexuality in Sex Education and Its Controversies’, Youth 5, no. 1 (March 2025): 6, https://doi.org/10.3390/youth5010006.

(3) Judith Butler, Who’s Afraid of Gender? (Dublin: Allen Lane, imprint of Penguin Books, 2024), https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/452776/whos-afraid-of-gender-by-butler-judith/9780241595824.

(4) Christianne F. Collantes, Reproductive Dilemmas in Metro Manila: Faith, Intimacies and Globalization (Springer, 2017).