Is it sinful for Catholics to drink alcohol, or should they learn how to use it responsibly?

(Yes, I know the answer, but please bear with me...)

If so, when should they learn? When they're on their own, among their less-than-mature friends, or should their parents guide them in this area as well?

Here is what I'm referring to --

You have two kinds of discipline -- EXTERNAL and INTERNAL. External discipline is being FORCED to do the right thing because it's physically impossible to do the wrong thing. Example: You live at home, mom & dad are there, there's no alcoholic beverages in the house.

INTERNAL discipline is true self-discipline, where a person chooses to not drink too much (or not at all) even though he is over 21, has money, lives on his own, and decides to attend a party hosted by one of his friends where alcohol will be present.

Raising children is all about teaching them to make the right choices, and guiding them -- forming their free will to make the right decisions. Helping them learn from their successes AND mistakes, so that one day they will make the right decisions on their own.

This is a very profound matter in the world of discipline and child-raising. If everyone understood this (what I wrote above), you wouldn't have NEARLY as many sheltered children with strict parents go absolutely CRAZY when they get to college or otherwise leave home. All their life, discipline was too forced an external -- little or none of it was internalized. So massive rebellion ensues at the first opportunity.

Drinking alcohol is morally acceptable.  Of course, young women who are especially susceptible should not be encouraged to drink more than a single glass in social functions.  

Coed house parties/sleepovers are not legitimate social functions.  It is truly absurd that anyone thinks they could ever be justified, any parent who sanctions them is committing an objectively grave sin.  

But the alternative is for them to have their first drink with their friends

And we're supposed to believe that if they drink with their friends in the presence of "watchful parents" (yeah right! - more like indulgent, irresponsible, law-breaking parents) that they will not be grievously tempted?  It's a false alternative to say either they can have house parties here or elsewhere.

If everyone understood this (what I wrote above), you wouldn't have NEARLY as many sheltered children with strict parents go absolutely CRAZY when they get to college or otherwise leave home.

First of all "going crazy" is an act of rebellion.  In my experience children with lax parents engage in far more "partying" than children with strict parents.  It goes without saying most young women should not be put into a situation where they are surrounded by vicious companions.  They should not be leaving home to attend the university.

What your presenting is a classic false alternative.  The idea that coed drunken sleepovers (and inexperienced boys and girls will be drinking to excess and having their passions inflamed) is Catholic and is some sort of "training" is literally insane from a Catholic perspective.

Priests and husbands that allow women too much leeway are one of the most serious problems in tradition.  Giving dispensations during Lent for drunken coed sleepovers where underage girls drink?  That's quite insane.  For women, social acceptance is drastically more important than it is for men.  This is the reason that principle is always sacrificed when women call the shots.  The remnant will shrink to a handful if we can't even agree that having a house party for drunken teenagers is evil.

When my daughter was a teenager, I don't remember how old - 14 maybe - on special occasions I would ask her if she wanted a glass of wine with dinner.  At first, she said okay.  But when she tasted it, she said it was "nasty".  But despite knowing her distaste, whenever we were having wine with dinner, I would ask her if she wanted some.  She usually said no.  My intent in doing this was not to "push" alcohol on her, but rather to take away the mystery and rebellious aspect of it.

When she started college, though, she had older friends who could buy alcohol legally.  She became more interested in trying a few things.  She tends toward the sweet girly drinks.  I allow her to drink in my presence.  She'll be 21 in December.  From what I can tell, she is very well controlled.

When I was growing up, we weren't allowed to drink at home.  Subsequently, we weren't controlled at all.

My parents knew plenty.  It's hard to hide being plastered.

Believe what you like.  Raise your own children the way you see fit.  I'm just telling you what I did and why.  It seemed to work.  And I'm very proud of my daughter.

I think the practice of a tiny bit of wine mixed with water on special days is perfectly OK.  For the most part it will curb the insanity later on when they are on their own.  

It is a very good practice to teach children elegant manners.  

But first and foremost, there must be no alcoholism in the home by the parents for the children to endure, if this is going to work.

The damage can be beyond belief for the children of alcoholics.

My father is Italian and so naturally he enjoys his wine with his meal.
Even before I was a teenager, he would give my siblings and myself a little wine with the meal.
I have never had a problem with alchohol and I have never had uncontrollable urges to drink alchohol.
I enjoy it and moderation and I enjoy have a few drinks with friends to relax and socialise.

The idea that alchohol is bad is a puritanical protestant one and even Our Lord and St. Paul encouraged drinking, in moderation of course.

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The idea that alchohol is bad is a puritanical protestant one and even Our Lord and St. Paul encouraged drinking, in moderation of course.

Too true.

And MomofMany is very astute and balanced on this subject IMO.

Actually, we all are !
 :cheers: :cheers: :cheers:

My father is Italian and so naturally he enjoys his wine with his meal.
Even before I was a teenager, he would give my siblings and myself a little wine with the meal.
I have never had a problem with alchohol and I have never had uncontrollable urges to drink alchohol.
I enjoy it and moderation and I enjoy have a few drinks with friends to relax and socialise.

The idea that alchohol is bad is a puritanical protestant one and even Our Lord and St. Paul encouraged drinking, in moderation of course.

Great post.  Latins know how to deal with these things best -- food, drink, celebration, how to avoid excess and do everything with a Catholic spirit (hint, everything is integrated into family life).  This applies to marriages, too; in Greece, for instance (the Greeks are not Latins but share many of the same customs and attitudes), the parents do not save up for their daughters to go to college.  Instead, they begin building a home as soon as they have their first daughter, and over the years they build a bit more and more until, twenty years later, it is finished and her new husband and her move into one of the floors of the dowry-house.  When the next daughter marries, she will live on the other floor with her family, and the extended family thus stays together.  The parents were investing in their daughter's real future -- that of her soul and her vocation.  They didn't force her to go into debt and spend years as a "professional" pant-suited paper-pusher to pay off the debt only so that she would marry late and be able to afford a big TV to distract her kids and a second car to drive them to the mall.

I don't see why alcohol (and only a small amount at that) is only fit to be introduced to "teenagers" at the table.  This amount of excessive moderation is simply not practiced in non-Anglophone and non-Mohammedan countries, particularly in European Mediterranean countries, where binge drinking and public drunkennes are also considered shameful.  After all, many Italians still to this day maintain the ancient custom of cutting their wine with water, which Saint Louis recommends young men learn to do at a young age lest, when they are older and have more of an affinity for drink, they become vulnerable to drunkenness.  This seems to be the true Catholic attitude, wherein wine is viewed as a gift from God that needs to be used in its proper place -- part of a meal, or as medicine, or part of a celebration that is honoured by the family.  In this way, binge drinking and public drunkennes would seem -- to youths growing up using wine as it is meant to be used -- like what they are : Strange behaviour that is obviously sinful.