Speaking & Workshops

Christians claim to know God – the God who, having created us, tells us how to act in healthy, life-affirming ways, including how to behave sexually. The Christian church has a positive duty to help people form a healthy sexual self-identity, and behave in healthy, appropriate ways.

As an Evangelical Christian, all of Patricia’s work flows from a Biblical, Christ-centred worldview. She has spent many years developing a framework of Biblically informed seminars and lectures in healthy human sexuality. Her presentations challenge the listeners to reflect on how they could better live their whole lives including their sexuality to God’s glory.

Her presentations are appropriate for a range of audiences. Some talks are specifically focussed on building up Christians at different stages of life; while others are evangelistic and appeal to a broader group.

A church interested in this area of ministry would ideally start with the presentation on “Living with sexual integrity” – which is a call to Godliness in a sexualised society. This would be followed by a combination of presentations/seminars/workshops as appropriate to the needs of the specific church.

Basic presentation structure:

  1. Patricia’s talk – 35-40 minutes.
  2. Break during which participants text/write questions – 10-15 minutes.
  3. Panel discussion Q & A (Patricia plus 2-3 from the church) – 30-40 minutes.

Patricia offers group workshops in:

  • From diamond ring to wedding band
    A three-hour workshop for Christian couples on the Biblical framework for sexual intimacy in the engagement period and the role of sex in marriage.
  • To love and to cherish: Good sex in Godly marriage
    A workshop for Christian marrieds of all ages.

Would you like to invite Patricia to speak?

You can send Patricia a message on the contact page, or email her directly at kamalini1947@gmail.com 

Would you like to interview Patricia online? Or develop an online presentation?

You can send Patricia a message on the contact page, or email her directly at kamalini1947@gmail.com 

Patricia has crystallised some of her presentations on sexuality, sex education and relationships in her youtube channelClick Here

A short video about Patricia can be accessed here: Click Here

Patricia’s bio for publicity (short)

Patricia Weerakoon trained in medicine in Sri Lanka. She is an academic, sexologist and writer. She retired in 2012 from a career as director of an internationally renowned graduate sexual health program at the University of Sydney to pursue her passion for writing and public speaking. Her nonfiction books are gold-standard guides for good sex at all ages. As a sexologist she has translated her passion to bring good holistic sexual health to all people into practical sex education, sex research and sex therapy. Patricia has a recognised media presence and is a popular public speaker and social commentator in Australia. Patricia is an evangelical Christian.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Presentation Topics

Current Presentations can be downloaded here as a pdf document.

Tea maker’s daughter to Christian sexologist

Recommended audience: Suitable for churches and Christian groups of all ages Patricia was born in the tea plantations of Sri Lanka, in the last years of colonial ownership. In this presentation she shares her faith journey from the conservative upbringing as the only daughter of first generation Christian parents, to missionary boarding school and her introduction to sexology in Hawaii. This entertaining and informative presentation will be interspersed with excerpts from her novel ‘Empires Children’ (http://rhizapress.com.au/empires-children). You will also learn about tea manufacture and marvel at the beauty and majesty of central Sri Lanka.

Good Sex and Godly Marriage

Recommended audience: Suitable for married couples and those engaged to be married Christians claim to know God and follow his guidelines for life. How do we understand and interpret this in our marriages in a seductive culture that encourages individualistic narcissism and selfish careerism? And what part does sex and intimacy play in a Christian marriage? Is it essential? Necessary? Or just nice? This workshop/seminar explores the science and worldview of sexual desire, romantic love and long term attachment; and explores the role of sex in marriage through the lens of a Christ focussed biblical worldview. We will explore, from a biblical perspective, the male and female sexual response cycles and discuss the meaning and interpretation of intimacy and sex in marriage and the activities that may or may not be acceptable in a couple relationship. As well as common concerns and dysfunctions. There will be time for a couples’ communications exercise and a question and answer session.

Living with Sexual Integrity

Recommended audience: Suitable for Christians and the general community. Age 15+ What does it mean to live as a Christian in the sexualised world of today? Can we bring God’s view of gender, relationships and marriage to a world which screams out the message that every desire must be met – whatever the consequences? Patricia looks at what the Bible teaches us about sexuality and relationships, and applies it to life. This is seminar for you whoever you are. Are you a teenager? Engaged to be married? Long married? Single? Come and be challenged.

Eros, Intimacy and the Mind of God

Recommended audience: Suitable for Christians and the general community. Age 15+

Does scientific sex research contradict the Bible? Are we just a bundle of hormones? Is there a real connection between love, commitment and sex, or can I just ‘do it’ for fun? In this presentation, Patricia explores recent research on sexual desire (eros), attraction (love) and long term attachment (bonding) in terms of a Biblical model of healthy sexuality and marriage. his seminar is suited to any group that wishes to explore the connection between biological and social research and Biblical patterns for love and relationships.

The Chemistry of Desire, Love and Bonding

Recommended audience: Suitable for Christians and the general community. Age 15+

Ever wondered about that magical moment of pure desire, when your heart’s thumping with that cosmic connection of LOOOOOOOOVE..? What about after you’ve settled down & grown old together? What bonds two people together then? Come learn about the chemical conspiracy that’s designed to bring us – and keep us – together for life! This presentation looks at the biological basis of sexual attraction, within the context of God’s purpose for relationships and sex. This presentation is suitable for singles and couples of all ages who want to understand sex and sexuality from a lifestyle perspective of Godly living.

Empowering Eve: A Challenge to Christian Women to Healthy Sexuality and Great Relationships

Recommended audience: Suitable for Christian women and their non-Christian friends. Although relevant to women in all stages of life, it is most appropriate for women in a relationship.

This interactive women’s-only seminar explores the female sexual response, and how it differs from the male response and the complementary nature of male and female roles in the home and the bedroom. Common myths and misconceptions will be discussed, and difficult issues – such as the use of erotica and internet porn – can be explored, if appropriate and requested. Some topics: What happens to our bodies when we get “turned on”? How can we communicate our desires to our partner? Can we enjoy sex even when we don’t feel “sexy”? Is an orgasm essential for sexual satisfaction? What to do when sex is difficult? What sex variations are appropriate? What about sex toys?

 Defining Gender and Identity

Recommended audience: Appropriate for a Christian audience 15+. It is best suited to a Christian group who wants to understand the complexity of gender identity, gender roles and sexual orientation, and the church’s pastoral response to these issues.

This seminar can be adapted for ministry training.

The presentation overviews, and seeks to harmonise, three different perspectives on gender identity definition – medical, social, and evangelical-theological – in the hope that a model of gender identity informed by all three will truly lead to holistic personal and social well-being.

We will review the fourfold classification of gender, sexuality and identity which is currently used in secular medical research: (1) biological development; (2) individual gender identity; (3) same sex sexuality; and (4) gender expression (masculine, feminine and androgynous).

We will discuss the contemporary assumption that gender and sexual identity is a radically malleable personal choice, and the related societal trend towards redefining gender as a spectrum with no normative connection to one’s embodied biology or socio-cultural moral norms in contrast to the Biblical-theological perspective of gender being an aspect of being embodied images of our creator God.

This discussion will conclude by exploring how Christians can respond in compassion to people with gender confusion without in any way compromising their conviction of the Biblical theological view and teachings.

 

Beyond the Birds and the Bees: Helping your Children Understand Sexuality

Recommended audience: Parents, potential parents and youth workers.

This presentation is suitable for Christians and non-Christians. Our children live in a sexualised environment. Magazines, media and the internet present a smorgasbord of sexualised images and acts. The age of first sexual activity and exposure to porn is now in the low teens and the rate of sexually transmitted diseases in our youth rapidly increasing. What is the role of the parent and family in sex education? Has the church a part to play in this? Why is so important that parents take an early role in sex education?

This presentation looks at the development of the teen brain and the significance of environmental and parenting. It will explore the effect of media, magazines, peer pressure, drugs/alcohol and pornography in shaping children’s sexuality and gender. It is a challenge to parents to fully engage in their role in shaping and influencing your children to: manage their bodies, confront secular influences, and conduct their sexuality and relationships, in ways that are both Godly and healthy.

Teens Sex and Technology

Recommended audience: Parents, potential parents and youth workers. This presentation is suitable for Christians and non-Christians. Youth 15+ may be invited to attend (at the discretion of parents)

Cyber-communication and ease of internet access has resulted in a generation of digital natives, to whom information on anything and everything is available literally at their fingertips. It has also resulted in a form of existence in a cyber-community global village where friends are counted by Facebook contacts, and identity is an on-line profile or avatar. This presentation builds on the one described above ‘Beyond the Birds and the Bees’, with a special emphasis on issues such as the role of social media, cyber relationships, cyber bullying and pornography.

Teen Sex: By the Book

Recommended audience: This is a seminar for late teens (15+) and young adults. Parents may or may not be invited to attend.

The presentation is based around a Teen Sex By the Book published by Anglican Youthworks. Utilising current Australian and International research on sources of sex information, brain development, teen sex behaviour, risk taking and porn use, the seminar challenges young people to reassess their current sexual attitudes, values and behaviour, based on questions such as: Is sexual desire a gift from God, or the Devils way of making you do it? Why wait? Is there such a thing as ‘safe sex’ outside of a committed marriage relationship? How does what you feed your mind on (porn, fantasy) influence your thinking and your future sexuality. 

Hot topics for teen sex

Recommended audience: Teenagers and preteens >12 years. This is also appropriate for high school presentations

Sex is natural. It’s fun. You need it to be happy. Everyone’s doing it. You’ve got to be in it to be popular. What’s wrong with experimenting anyway? How would you know what you like, even who you are if you don’t check it out?

And what about sexting and selfies? Isn’t that just a form of getting to know each other? And then there’s pornography, fantasy and self-stimulation – surely that’s completely harmless?

Do these statements sound familiar?

Have you ever wondered if God has anything to say about sex? Is God a killjoy who wants you to not enjoy sex? And the Bible-is it just an old rule book on what not to do?

Patricia Weerakoon, a Christian sexologist and author will explore with you the challenges of living as children of generation Z (born between 1995 and 2009) – The most digitally connected, socially informed, advertised and sexualised generation that ever walked this earth! 

HIGH SCHOOLS: Sex: What has God got to do with it?

Recommended audience: Teenagers and preteens >12 years. This is also appropriate for high school presentations and youth camps

Sex is natural. It’s fun. You need it to be happy. Everyone’s doing it. What’s wrong with experimenting anyway? You’ve got to be in it to be popular.

Do these statements sound familiar?

Does God have anything to say about sex? And the Bible-is it just an old rule book on what not to do?

Patricia Weerakoon, a Christian sexologist and author will explore with you the challenges of living as a child of God in a super-sexualised cyber world where gender variance is the accepted norm.

Come and be challenged as she explores Gods plan for sex and relationships.  

SCHOOLS: Years 5,6,7 - Growing up Sexual: Body, Brain and Behaviour

Recommended audience: Suitable for boys and girls in years 5.6 and 7.

The presentation will explore

  • Changes in the body with puberty and adolescence (each person develops differently. Identity is not dependant on what you look like)
  • Brain development (emotional brain and thinking brain. How what you feed your brain affects what you think and do)
  • When sex enters your life:
  • Understanding the feelings of sexual desire and falling in love,
  • What is sexual intimacy?
  • Taking care of your brain and your body (resisting pornography, social media, sexting, selfies…)
  • Developing an identity (Who am I?): Who influences decisions? Peer pressures, social norms (including social media) versus an identity based on Christ
  • Why do you need adults? The importance of significant adults as helpers (parents, teachers, youth workers in church).

Single and Sexy

Recommended audience: Suitable for Christian singles (never-married, separated, divorced, widowed) and those in ministry with singles.Currently Patricia is able to speak to women only. Her son Rev Kamal Weerakoon is available to speak to men.

Christian singles come in all ages, professions, relationship status and genders. You may be never-married, separated, divorced, widowed; a gardener, lawyer or minister; heterosexual or homosexual; teenager or octogenarian. Some of the comments I hear from single Christians:

  • “I have nobody to freely and intimately love, touch and share my thoughts with. It makes me jealous to see others have it when I don’t.”
  • “I don’t know how to deal with my sexual desire”
  • “I would like to feel wanted as more than just a friend.”
  • “I struggle with being alone and not having someone to talk to.”
  • “What makes me sad? The loneliness, the rejection (nobody wants me), unfulfilled sexual desire, unfulfilled maternal desires and being different, not fitting in (especially in family-oriented Christian culture)”

While recognising the goodness of relationships and marriage, it is important that singles and couples recognise that their significance and security lie with Christ and not on the consummation of any earthly desire – however good it may be. In an interactive workshop, Patricia will explore the concerns of single Christian women and the churches response. It provides a safe place for single women to discuss their concerns on relationship, intimacy and sexuality, and explore ways in which these feelings and desires can be dealt with.

Sexy and Sixty plus

Recommended audience: Suitable for mature couples, both Christian and non-Christian.

The Genesis relationship of man and woman in a one-flesh naked and no shame relationship has no use by date. Aging brings questions: How does sex change as we get older? Is there a male menopause? What do we do when sex doesn’t happen spontaneously anymore? Is medication the only answer? What do we do when one person is disabled or unwell? How do we establish a new relationship? This presentation examines the changes in sexuality in aging and challenges mature adults to look beyond the media society portrayal of sex to a mutual intimacy based model of sex and relationship.

Sex Education in the Cyber-world

Recommended audience: Suitable for parents, carers, teachers, youth workers, both Christian and non-Christian.

Children of generation Z (born between 1995-2009 are the most digitally connected, socially informed, advertised and sexualised generation that ever walked this earth.

As parents you have to be informed and connected with your children if you want them to grow as whole sexually healthy human beings capable of making informed Biblical decisions about life. Ignorance is no longer an option. You are their primary sex educators.

Patricia Weerakoon, a Christian sexologist and author will explore with you the challenges of parenting children in a super-sexualised cyber world where gender variance is the accepted norm.

She will look at recent research on the adolescent brain and consider how you as parents teachers and carers understand and counter common myths of identity, sexuality and gender.

Purity in a Pornified Culture

Recommended audience: Suitable for anyone over 15 years age, both Christian and non-Christian.

The Bible tells us we are created as male and female for relationships. And in the most intimate relationship of all, that of two gendered beings come together in marriage – a committed other focussed sexual one-flesh of mutual trust and intimacy. Pornography distorts this Biblical pattern for relationship and sexuality. It replaces it with a second hand experience of prurient self-gratification and vicarious orgasmic highs. What is particularly alarming is the way in which porn works. Use of pornography as a sexual stimulant rewires and reconfigures neurological pathways in the brain. It changes sexual scripts in the brain for desire, arousal and intimacy.

Patricia Weerakoon, a Christian sexologist and author will explore the effects of porn use on children, teens and adults. We will discuss how the very neuroplasticity that leads to people becoming hooked on porn can be used for recovery.