The young recognize how important the body and sexuality are for their lives and for the growth of their identity, since they cannot live friendship and affectivity without them. In today’s world, though, they encounter phenomena in rapid evolution in this regard. Above all, developments in science and in biomedical technologies have a strong influence on perceptions about the body, leading to the idea that it is open to unlimited modification. The capacity to intervene in DNA, the possibility of inserting artificial elements into the organism (cyborg) and the development of neurosciences constitute a great resource, but at the same time they raise anthropological and ethical questions. An uncritical acceptance of the technocratic approach to the body weakens one’s awareness of life as a gift and the sense of creaturely limits:one can be misled or exploited by economic and political forces (cf. Francis, Laudato Si’, 106). Moreover, in some youth circles, there is a growing fascination for risk-taking behaviour as a tool for self-exploration, for seeking powerful emotions and obtaining recognition. Alongside the continuation of older phenomena, such as precocious sexual behaviour, promiscuity, sexual tourism, the exaggerated cult of the physical, today one notes the widespread diffusion of digital pornography and exhibition of the body online. Such phenomena, to which young generations are exposed, constitute an obstacle for serene maturation.They point to social forces that are utterly new and that influence personal choices and experiences, making them fertile terrain for a kind of ideological colonization.
TheoFonsAt the sources of the faith