Fifty years ago, the British press laughed at Frank Pakenham. The Labour peer, better known as Lord Longford, had set out to investigate the pornography trade, touring its shops and clubs and traveling as far as Denmark to see it for himself. The newspapers dubbed him “Lord Porn.” A Catholic convert and tireless advocate for prisoners, Longford called pornography a vulgar deception and an affront to human dignity.
He could not have imagined what was coming.
In Longford’s day, pornography required effort to find. Today, it is free, anonymous and infinite, delivered through the same smartphone a child uses for homework. Social media algorithms often push explicit content to users who never searched for it. A 2023 Common Sense Media study found that roughly three in four American teenagers had seen online pornography, with the average age of first exposure at about 12, often by accident.
Artificial intelligence has made matters worse. “Nudify” apps can strip the clothing from an ordinary photograph in seconds, and schools have reported students creating fake explicit images of classmates. AI generators produce sexual content on demand, and law enforcement has warned of a sharp rise in sextortion schemes targeting teenagers, sometimes using manipulated images. Congress responded in 2025 with the Take It Down Act, which criminalizes publishing nonconsensual intimate images, including AI deepfakes.
The danger is greatest for the young brain. Pornography acts on the brain’s reward system, releasing dopamine with every new image or video, and the supply never runs out. Over time, the brain can dull its response, so that more frequent use or more extreme material is needed to produce the same effect. Adolescents are especially vulnerable; their reward system matures early, while the prefrontal cortex, which governs judgment and self-control, keeps developing into the mid-20s. A 2014 study in JAMA Psychiatry linked heavier pornography use with less gray matter in part of the brain’s reward circuitry, and in 2019 the World Health Organization recognized compulsive sexual behavior disorder. Therapists report a familiar pattern among young users: anxiety, shame, isolation, distorted expectations about intimacy and difficulty forming real relationships.
For Catholics, however, this is not only a medical question. It is a moral one, and that is why it remains an extremely urgent matter for us.
We believe the human body is not a commodity but part of the person, created by God and, as St. Paul teaches, a temple of the Holy Spirit. St. John Paul II reminded us that the body is made for self-giving love, not for use. Pornography does the opposite. It turns the body into merchandise, exploits the men and women who appear in it, and trains those who watch to see others as objects rather than persons to be loved. The catechism teaches that pornography gravely injures the dignity of everyone involved and calls on civil authorities to prevent its spread. Its effect is a slow moral corruption: it deadens the capacity for genuine love, wounds marriages and families, and gradually makes what was once shameful seem normal.
Governments are beginning to act. Britain now requires pornographic sites to verify users’ ages, and in 2025 the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a similar Texas law. But laws alone will not be enough. Parents must talk with their children early and without embarrassment, delay unrestricted smartphone access, and make clear that a child can come to them without fear. The parishes and Catholic schools within our Diocese of Palm Beach must offer a truthful and beautiful vision of human sexuality as a gift ordered to love and life. We need more theology of the body everywhere! And those already struggling deserve accompaniment, not condemnation, through professional help and the mercy of the sacraments.
Longford was ridiculed for raising the alarm when the threat sat on a street corner. Today, it sits in our children’s pockets. As Catholics, we cannot remain silent. His campaign deserves to be taken up again, with greater urgency than ever.
