Kim Davis is a Mess. So What?

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A lot of people are putting out a lot of spin trying to explain away, contextualize, minimize and otherwise  dismiss Pope Francis’ meeting with Kim Davis.  And guess what?  It is all irrelevant. In fact, it’s downright shameful.

It really doesn’t matter how the meeting came about or what was said between them. It also doesn’t matter that her life is a hot mess, or that she has done plenty of damage in her own life against the sanctity of marriage. The real point is that, when asked on the flight home, Pope Francis publicly affirmed civil disobedience as a “basic human right.”

A person doesn’t have to be perfect, or even decent, to have the right to exercise his or her basic human rights.  One doesn’t have to agree with Kim Davis to affirm her right to object to what she believes is an unjust law.  As I argued previously, regardless of what you think of her, Kim Davis has a basic human right to refuse to resign and, instead, engage in civil disobedience if she is being asked to do things she finds to be morally objectionable.

Furthermore, all Christians, and indeed, all persons of good will,  have a moral obligation to support her and anyone else who acts in accordance with their conscience, especially when that puts them in conflict with the law. That doesn’t mean that conscientious objectors can act consequence-free, but it does mean that they should be able to act without encountering the derision of others–especially people-of-faith.

Shame on anyone who would attempt to dismiss or minimize another person’s basic human rights because those rights were not to their political liking.  Without an inconvenient right to conscientious objection, true religious liberty does not exist in any meaningful way.  Religious people, of all people, ought to know better.

BE NOT AFRAID! Raising Faithful, Moral Kids in a World Gone Mad.

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Image Shutterstock.

Image Shutterstock.

I’ve been hearing from a lot of parents who, especially in the wake of SCOTUS decision on gay marriage have serious concerns about raising faithful, moral kids in the present culture.  It’s never been easy, but recent events take the challenge to parents to a whole new level.  How do we convey the Catholic vision of love and marriage to our kids in a world that defines these terms in completely different ways than we do?  How can we hope to compete?  In our weaker moments, I think it is possible for parents to fall prey to nightmare fantasies in which we are trying to raise our kids in some kind of post-apocalyptic, morally bereft,  Hunger Games world.

I have three words for you.  BE NOT AFRAID!!!

Be Not Afraid!!!

I don’t think it does any good at all to approach the culture with a spirit of fear. I regularly counsel parents–and we adopt this approach with our own kids–that “freaking out” about media, peer-pressure, social media, or the latest cultural trend is actually the best way to set our kids up to fall prey to the glamour of evil.  The more panicked we get, the more we send the message that our faith is weak, and unable to engage the world, much less stand up to it.  The more we live in fear, the more we set our kids up to become fascinated by the power of the thing we fear the most.

Reality Check

At worst, recent events compel Catholic parents to be willing to have more conversations we might rather not have with our kids–and to have those conversations earlier than we might otherwise prefer to. But with good information and a spirit of prayer neither we, nor our children, have anything to fear no matter what our background is or what challenges we face.   “Jenn-Henn” is a perfect example of what I am writing about.  At Only a Mere Woman Blog  Jenn writes bravely about her difficult upbringing and her struggles to make peace with her body, her femininity, and her sexuality.  Recently, she posted a review of Beyond the Birds and the Bees in which she spoke of how it not only helped her learn how to teach her kids to have a healthy sexuality, but it also is helping her heal her own woundedness.   She wrote…

For our second Book Club review, I have Beyond The Birds And The Bees: Raising Sexually Whole and Holy Kids by Greg and Lisa Popcak. I found it to be eye opening and a bit healing for me, due to my issues in regards to my own femininity, which will be the subject of my next post, if not more. The most striking thing for me is the idea that sexuality is more than one’s sexual orientation, who one is sexually attracted to; that it involves the whole being of a person as a representation of who they are at the core and informs their interactions with the world around them. The idea that sexuality has more to do with femininity and masculinity than what one does with one’s genitals is revolutionary to me. The idea that a person who follows all of the prescribed rules regarding chastity and modesty yet is ashamed of, say, their femininity actually has an unhealthy sexuality is mind boggling to me. Turns out I’ve been doing it very wrong. 

Anyway, for someone who doesn’t remember any sort of sex talk, and has been ashamed of herself and her body for so long, the advice was much welcome and needed. Giving examples of how parents can speak of the body and sex in respectful, matter of fact ways is extremely helpful. Showing how chastity and modesty are positives and not negative mandates is brilliant. But it really all boils down to teaching parents how to help their children grow up as well integrated people, people who know their worth and the worth of others, and are willing and able to do what it takes to preserve their dignity and that of other.  READ THE REST 

 

The Healing Truth

I’m grateful to Jenn for her willingness to share her own journey.  Her comments highlight the fact that wherever we come from, whatever our own struggles, and whatever obstacles the prevailing culture might want to through at us, we can heal and we can find the ways to give our children the things we wish we had been given.  We don’ t have to be afraid of anything the world can throw at us because we have the answers the world is seeking.  It simply up to us to discover and use the tools that will help us live what we teach and be a witness to the world of the positive, powerful Catholic difference at work! Now is not the time to hide from the culture. Now is the time to engage it with charity, courage and with our facts in order and to teach our children to do the same.

For more information on how you can raise faithful, moral kids in a world gone mad, check out Beyond the Birds and the Bees: The Catholic Guide to Raising Sexually Whole and Holy Kids.  And don’t forget to pre-order your copy of our upcoming book, Discovering God Together:  The Catholic Guide to Raising Faithful Kids which looks at the latest research of what it takes to raise children who can live and celebrate their faith!

Children Have a Right To a Mother and a Father? What Does That Even MEAN?!?

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Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

A colleague sent me the following question today.

“I’ve heard Pope Francis and others say that children have a right to a mom and dad, but I don’t know what that means in the concrete. I wouldn’t say, for example, that single parents have a responsibility to search for a spouse, or that the mom in Secondhand Lions was necessarily wrong to have her uncles raise her son. If SSM were ever banned again, should the state be empowered to take children from those households and place them with a mom and dad? I can’t see that. Any thoughts on what this right actually entails? What’s its limit and what accounts for that limit?”

I don’t suggest that the following is the ideal answer, but I hope that my comments can at least shed a little light on what the Church means by this idea.

Single parent households, adoptive and foster households (of which I am part), and even the uncles in Secondhand Lions (whose household, let’s face it, really could have used a woman’s touch) are all doing heroic and wonderful things. But,  we recognize that all these households face certain challenges; namely, the challenge of making up for what the children in those environments lost–their connection to their natural mother and father. These household’s ability to succeed at raising a child who can reach his or her full potential is directly dependent upon their ability to approximate what an intact family is, more naturally, capable of doing.

Gay parents, single parents, foster and adoptive households can do a wonderful job raising children–functionally speaking. Their capacity to be loving environments if not the issue.  The problem is that the best of these households will always have to work harder to give their children what they need compared to the best intact natural family household. 

The natural family represents the norm for what a child needs to potentially function at his or her absolute best and, in every other context EXCEPT gay marriage (where it is actually discriminatory to say so) we recognize that a child who’s relationship with his natural mother and father is impeded or eliminated is suffering from an injustice.

In gay marriage, we are forced to deny the child the right to grieve what, in every other context, the child is actually expected to grieve–the impairment or loss of his or her connection to his natural mother and/or father.

When the Church says the child has a right to a mother and father, that does not mean the Church is ignorant of all the ways natural parents screw up their kids. It also does not mean that other types of households can’t raise good kids.  It certainly doesn’t mean that anyone should swoop in and take kids from those households.  That would be horrible!

What it DOES mean is that we should never say it is just to do anything to anyone–especially a child–that would be unjust to do in any other context.

There is certainly much more that can be said about this, but I hope these comments help clarify things at least a little. 

What Did YOUR Pastor Say About Gay Marriage in Church Today?

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I’m interested in the experience of Catholic across the country.  Did you pastor address the SCOTUS decision in favor of gay marriage? If so, what did he say?   If not, how do you feel about your pastor’s silence?

In my parish, in Steubenville, Ohio neither my pastor, nor my deacon–who preached the homily and is a faithful theology professor–said anything about marriage.  There were no comments in the homily.  There were no petitions about it during the prayers of the faithful. There was no brief discussion after communion. There was no letter from our bishop.   Nothing.  It was like it never happened.

How is the Church responding to this historic crisis in your neck of the woods?

Comment, as  always, are on moderation.  It can take up to 24 hours for me to get time to go through them so be patient.  EVERY respectful comment about the topic–regardless of the side you are on–WILL be posted as soon as I get to it.

Gay Marriage: Getting the Conversation Right is More Important than Ever

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SCOTUS

Today, SCOTUS ruled 5-4 in favor of Gay marriage.  It is a devastating blow, not only to the Marriage Reality Movement but to the Christian understanding of reality itself.  For the secular culture, physical reality no longer matters.  The only thing that counts is a person’s feelings about him or herself and the world he lives in.   Facts don’t matter.  Matter doesn’t matter.  Only opinion and emotion.

In light of this historic decision, it is more important than ever to understand–and be able to articulate–why Roman Catholic do not, and cannot ever support gay marriage.

The discussion about gay marriage is a terrifically sensitive topic and for the faithful Catholic, it’s incredibly easy to discuss it poorly.  It is simply too easy to be cast in the role of angry, finger-waving, “hater” whose moral sensitivity meter is wound too tight and whose sole mission in life is to be an obstacle to the erstwhile happiness of people who supposedly love each other.  Now, with SCOTUS on the side of gay marriage, the situation is even worse.  Those who oppose gay marriage are officially bigots as far as the world is concerned.  Faithful Roman Catholics are now as righteous as the KKK in the eyes of secular culture.

It would be easy for us to console ourselves when we lose these conversations by reminding ourselves that we are blessed when persecuted for holiness sake (c.f., Matt 5:10) but we must do more.  Despite this decision, we must be prepared to evangelize and to proclaim the truth regardless of the cost.  The consequences of not making our case well are just too great to society, the Catholic vision of love and sex, and the protection of the family as the basic unit of society in any meaningful way.

ARGUMENTS THAT ARE DOOMED TO FAIL

Arguments that are rooted in religious/moral language (i.e., “God disapproves of this”), or the language of disgust (“gay marriage is unnatural” or “homosexual acts are distasteful”), even though they can be compelling for those who are already convinced of the rightness of the traditional view of things,  are easily overcome by the opposition.  For instance, how many of you have been shut up with simplistic responses like; “Your God might disapprove, but the God I know is a God of love and HE would NEVER stand in the way of our happiness.”  or “How DARE you say our love is disgusting.  You’re just a bumpkin, or worse, a bigot.  Why should we listen to you much less let you lead the way?  We’ve let ignorance lead for too long….”    Had you led with a better argument, you wouldn’t have been so easy to dispatch.

The thing is,  traditional Christians have much better arguments on our side than these; arguments that stand up to both logic and emotion.  To NOT use these argument to advance the cause of traditional marriage is to do our side a real disservice and to hand the victory to the opposition.  The marriage debate is not ours to win.  It’s our to lose.

THE BEST ARGUMENT–THE RIGHTS OF CHILDREN.

To begin, I really encourage friends of traditional marriage to arm themselves with Bill May’s little, but powerful, booklet, Getting the Marriage Conversation Right.   It offers what I really have seen are the best, can’t-lose strategies for defending the nature of marriage.

His point (and although it’s too much to get into in a a blog post, his argument is  absolutely correct from the point of both history and social science) is that marriage is the only institution in existence that guarantees the rights of children to to be united with their mother and father.  Period.  For the 4000 years marriage has existed as a social and legal institution (beginning with Hammurabi) marriage has been understood as the institution that unites a man and a woman to each other and any children born from their union.  No other social structure does that.

Additionally, the reason heterosexual marriage has enjoyed pride-of-place in society for 4000 years is not because of the bigotry or prejudice of the ancient pagan society that first gave marriage legal and social status.  If anything, ancient Babylon was even MORE tolerant of alternative arrangements than our contemporary society is.

Instead, heterosexual marriage was given priority over other relationship types common to the time (hook-ups with temple prostitutes, cohabiting, same-sex unions) because it, much more than any other relationship type, yielded several observable benefits that were necessary for the creation of an orderly society.   Let’s look at five.

1. Marriage unites children to their mother and father.    This is the most important benefit.  Even compared to cohabiting couples, marriage comes out ahead.  About 30% of cohabiting couples give up their children.  It is virtually unheard of for married couples to give up their children.   Further, only children born in a marriage have a legal right to know who their mother and father are and to be raised by that mother and father.  Any social movement that undermines this fact does violence to the dignity of children (and I’ll explain in a minute how gay marriage undermines this right).

2. Children raised by married mothers and fathers fare significantly better.   Children born to a married mother and father do better on all academic, social, psychological, spiritual, and interpersonal measures.  All the data supports this.  Again, any social movement that undermines this fact does violence to the dignity of children (and, again,  I’ll explain in a minute how gay marriage undermines this right).

3.  No other relationship-type protects the financial and social security of women like marriage.  Marriage is the best poverty-prevention program we know.  The middle-class does not exist without marriage.   Married women are more financially and socially secure than women in any other relationship type (including lesbian relationships).  This is true even of college-educated women (Although this group is most likely to be secure without marriage, only 37% of women have a college degree).

4.  Marriage socializes men.  In addition to the fact that married men are exponentially more willing to claim and raise their own children, married men are significantly less likely to commit violent crime than unmarried men.  For example, according to the DOJ,  65% of crimes against women are committed by unmarried men.  Only 9% of married men have commited a violent crime against a woman.  This ratio holds up across the board for crime statistics.

5.  Marriage secures sustainable fertility rates. Even though the gap has narrowed somewhat, married couples still have more children than unmarried couples.  De-population is the most serious social problem facing the West.  As marriage rates have decreased, societies are not producing enough children to support their social infrastructure.    Marriage sees to the success of future generations.

So what does any of this have to do with gay marriage?

Remember, the only reason heterosexual marriage has enjoyed special legal and social status for 4000 years is the benefits it gives to society which are not limited to the above.  Gay marriage does not grant any benefits to society and in fact, undermines several of these social benefits  For example:

~Gay marriage makes it discriminatory to say that ANY child has a right to a mother and father.  This is the most serious problem.  Homosexual couples may have children through adoption or assisted reproduction, but they can not provide both parents.  But if gay marriage is about getting society to recognize that homosexual families are “just as good as” heterosexual families, this requires denying that any children–not just children of gay parents–have a right to a mother and father or need a mother and father.  This flies in the face of all available data. Every child who is denied a mother and/or a father feels the lack.  Gay marriage would require society, and mental health professionals, to tell all children that their natural longing for two, opposite-sex parents is disordered.

~Same-Sex marriage does not provide the same level of security for the partners or children raised in those households.  Homosexual relationships do not appear to be as stable as heterosexual relationships even where gay marriage is legal. Therefore, children raised in homosexual households are, statistically, at great financial and social risk. This is not the most important concern, but it is legitimate.

~Same-Sex marriage does not socialize partners to the same degree. The incidence of intimate partner violence is higher for both lesbian and gay couples than it is for married, heterosexual couples. This increases the risk of instability for children in gay and lesbian households.  This is also not the most important concern, but it is legitimate.

HOW HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE UNDERMINES HETEROSEXUAL MARRIAGE.

1. The push for homosexual marriage asks society to give benefits to a relationship-type that does not grant any benefits to society in return and, in fact, undermines many of the benefits society might otherwise count on from marriage.  This makes it harder to not justify extending similar benefits to cohabiting couples or any other household arrangement.

2. Likewise, homosexual marriage also undermines marriage rates for heterosexuals.  Marriage is “more expensive” (in terms of the effort and commitment it requires) than other relationship types.  Because of this, the more society promotes other marriage-like relationships as equivalent to marriage, the less attractive marriage becomes especially among the poor and those without a college degree (the very people who benefit from marriage the most).  We’re already seeing this.  As cohabitation becomes more socially acceptable, marriage rates have decreased for these most vulnerable groups.  Since it is extremely difficult to be in the middle class without being married, the lower marriage rates among the poor or lesser-educated means that these groups are becoming trapped in the under-class.

In short, the best case against same-sex marriage has nothing to do with religion, morality, bigotry, or disgust.  It has everything to do with protecting the rights of children to have a mother and father and to be united to their mother and father and the need to insist that it is unjust to extend benefits to a relationship-type that convey no benefits to society in return.

Homosexual persons do not deserve to be treated with scorn, disrespect, or bigotry.  They are persons deserving of our love and respect just like anyone else.  But extending love and respect to our homosexual brothers and sisters does not extend to redefining marriage so that it socially and practically meaningless.

It is true that most couples are completely ignorant of the social and public dimension of marriage.  Most couples just think of marriage as  a public recognition of a private, emotional commitment, but most couples’ ignorance of the facts doesn’t negate the facts.  Society cannot afford to extend benefits to anyone or anything that does not work for the good of society.  People must be free to make their own choices about who they live with, but society can only afford to encourage those relationships and institutions that  demonstrably work for it’s good.

“Dear Gay Community, Your Kids are Hurting”

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This is a power letter from a young woman, raised by two women, who was a former gay marriage activist and is now a children’s rights advocate and mom of 4.

Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

Image via Shutterstock. Used with permission.

“….Kids of divorced parents are allowed to say, “Hey, mom and dad, I love you, but the divorce crushed me and has been so hard. It shattered my trust and made me feel like it was my fault. It is so hard living in two different houses.” Kids of adoption are allowed to say, “Hey, adoptive parents, I love you. But this is really hard for me. I suffer because my relationship with my first parents was broken. I’m confused and I miss them even though I’ve never met them.”

But children of same-sex parents haven’t been given the same voice. It’s not just me. There are so many of us. Many of us are too scared to speak up and tell you about our hurt and pain, because for whatever reason it feels like you’re not listening. That you don’t want to hear. If we say we are hurting because we were raised by same-sex parents, we are either ignored or labeled a hater.”  READ The Rest Here.