Robin Barfield, Young People and Pornography: Understanding and Responding Pastorally (Grove Books, 2025)

‘Pornography viewing amongst our young people is at pandemic proportions’ (p.3). This is no exaggeration. And yet many youth leaders feel out of their depth. How can we talk about this sensitive issue with our young people while ‘maintaining safe boundaries and abiding by safeguarding policies’ (p.22)? Should we involve their parents in these conversations? And how can we actually, practically help them?

Robin Barfield’s Grove booklet can’t answer all of our questions in its 28 pages, but it does provide a really helpful starting point, and plenty of practical advice.

A really helpful starting point, and plenty of practical advice.

The booklet begins by looking at what pornography is – or, to be more precise, Sexually Explicit Internet Material (SEIM). Robin explains that this term ‘locates and describes it better than the term pornography’ (p.3). What young people’s parents – or youth leaders – think of when they hear the term ‘pornography’ is something very different to what our young people are accessing.

And they are accessing it in frightening numbers, as Robin lays out in chapter 2. As adults involved in the lives of young people, we must be aware of how pervasive the use of SEIM is among them, how early and freely they are accessing it. It does not make for easy reading, as Robin warns in the introduction, but it is necessary reading. These are the facts, painful and saddening as they are. We cannot bury our heads in the sand.

As well as outlining the scope of the situation, chapter 2 also outlines its effects – the way SEIM use changes how young people think about sex, bodies, other people, and human value. According to one survey, 45% of young people say that SEIM ‘has been their main source of sex education’ – and this is content rife with violent, non-consensual acts (p.6). SEIM is changing what our young people think is normal sexual behaviour.

Chapter 3 turns to consider three important theological ideas about the body: that we are our bodies (i.e. the body is not a separate container for the real us, but an intrinsic part of who we are as humans); that our bodies are designed for personal interactions with other human beings; and that our bodies are a gift (from God, for us, and for others). SEIM is fundamentally dehumanising – it is an inversion of those three truths.

This first half of the booklet might help those engaging with young people who don’t see their SEIM use as a problem. The combination of stats and theological reflections presents an intellectual and an emotional case that can be brought to the SEIM user.

Other young people might already be convinced that their SEIM use is an issue, and the problem for them is how to actually stop using it. The second half of Robin’s booklet turns to these practicalities.

Chapter 4 is an interview with a young man who struggled with secret SEIM use as a teenager. This young man’s story grounds the issues we’ve been talking about in real life, and also suggests some of the easy steps those around him could have taken to help – and the steps he could have taken to help himself.

Rather than siloing our youth group conversations, Robin advocates for the necessity of involving parents.

Chapter 5 suggests three actions we can take to begin helping our young people to deal with SEIM use. There is much in here that is useful, including some insightful comments about the need to recognise the power that adults wield in these conversations, and Robin’s experience of working with young people comes through particularly strongly in this chapter.

One theme throughout is engaging with parents. Rather than siloing our youth group conversations, Robin advocates for the necessity of involving parents. This could look like one-on-one conversations with a parent, sitting in on a chat between a young person and their parents, or a regular group meeting with parents and young people where you talk about various issues. However we do it, ‘[h]elping parents to manage expectations and preparing them well for these conversations will be a key part of your strategy as a youth leader’ (p.25).

Overall, Robin’s booklet does not shy away from this difficult, even horrifying topic. Nor should it. As youth leaders, parents, or other adults involved in the lives of children and teenagers, we must be actively involved in conversations about SEIM. We need to be aware of what our young people are faced with every day so that we can equip them with the tools to deal with it in healthy, godly ways. If you're looking for somewhere to start, you couldn’t do much better than Robin’s excellent short booklet.