Catholic Mysteries of Sex

Nicaragua is an overwhelmingly religious country. The Spanish brought Catholicism in the sixteenth century. Since then it has been joined over the years by every sort of religious sect. There are now Evangelists, Baptists, Jehovah's Witnesses, Moravians, Mormons and Anglicans to name but a few. As you walk through any of the cities of Nicaragua, you are surrounded by churches, meeting halls and other places of worship. During the day and in the evenings you are likely to hear singing echoing from many of these buildings, as the faithful sing and clap their way to salvation.
In the catholic churches, images of the Virgin Mary are everywhere. Sometimes she stands alone, but often she has an infant Jesus in her arms or by her side. What you never see is a pregnant Virgin Mary. I googled pregnant Virgin Mary but there were very few results. Pregnant Marys seem to be rare. There is a pregnant statue in Pangil (the Philippines), called Virgin de la O. There is a pregnant Mary in the Portuguese city of Evora. There is another in the cathedral in Leon, Spain (but not in the cathedral in Leon, Nicaragua) and another depicted on a column in the cathedral at Santiago de Compostella. Once upon a time in medieval Tuscany there were many images of a pregnant Mary but as fashions changed they started to disappear in the fifteenth century. There are no doubt others, but they are significantly unusual.
Why this reluctance on the part of the church to show Mary as a pregnant woman? It was a question I had in mind when visiting Mama Licha in Esteli, where she helps inform pregnant women, some as young as 14, about sexual health and childbirth. For many young women in Nicaragua the mysteries of sex seem to have remained mysteries and girls have no idea why they become pregnant. Could it be that the catholic church's wilful sentimentality about the Virgin Mary which specifically leaves out the messier side of women's fertility is to blame? This absence of engagement with women's sexuality is not unique to Nicaragua, of course, but in churches all over the catholic world where statues of the Virgin Mary stare down from pedestals with a dreamy look in their eyes. No thought of sex there. You are left with the impression that Mary was not only a virgin but never went through pregnancy either.  One can only come to the conclusion that until and unless the church reconciles itself to human sexuality in all its forms and stages, the tragedy of ignorant,  pregnant teenagers will continue.