The Scottish Executive is to spend 170,000 funding a sex and relationships education programme for children that promotes abstinence and advises against using contraceptives.

The programme - entitled Called to Love - has been devised by theExecutive's sex education project Healthy Respect and the ScottishCatholic Education Service. It will be tested out in seven schools inEdinburgh, Midlothian and Inverclyde.

Michael McGrath, director of the Scottish Catholic Education Service,said: "It will be taking a Christian perspective and will be promoting apositive view of the value of abstinence."

He added that the programme would not be advocating the use of condomsand other contraceptives. "It won't be promoting artificialcontraception - the only way to guarantee avoidance of sexual infectionis to abstain from sexual intercourse."

A spokesman for Healthy Respect said Called to Love would follow theCatholic Education Commission's guidelines on teaching of relationshipsand moral education in Catholic schools.

"The project fully recognises Catholic teaching on the sacramentalsignificance of marriage," said the spokesman. "The contents of the(support) materials will be fully supportive of church teaching in orderto meet the distinctive needs of those pupils attending Catholicsecondary schools but will be made available to all schools inScotland."

Healthy Respect was launched in 2001 as a three-year project. In March2005, it was announced that the programme, which is based at NHSLothian, would continue until 2008.

Dr Alison McCallum, NHS Lothian's director of public health, said: "Itis important that all young people receive all the relevant informationwhen they are making decisions that may shape their lives.

"By working in partnership with the Scottish Catholic Education Servicewe can ensure that the materials developed by this project communicateclearly the importance of respecting self and others, which is a corevalue of Healthy Respect."

Health minister Andy Kerr described Called to Love as a "positive step"for Scottish children. "Education is crucial to delivering culturalchanges based on the principles of self respect, respect for others andstrong relationships as outlined in Respect and Responsibility, oursexual health strategy," he said.