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6.3. Defend the Sovereignty of the Family
71. Today the family needs special protection by the public
authorities. While the family has been oppressed by the State at times, now the
family also finds itself exposed to attacks by private groups of
non-governmental organizations, transnational bodies and public organizations.
The State has the responsibility to defend the sovereignty of the family
because it constitutes the fundamental nucleus of the social fabric.
72. Moreover, to defend the sovereignty of the family is
to contribute to the sovereignty of nations. Today, in the name of
ideologies of Malthusian, hedonist and utilitarian inspiration, the family is
the victim of forms of aggression that go as far as to question its existence.
The communications media propagate the total separation of the unitive and
procreative purposes of the conjugal union 63 and trivialize
multiple pre and para-marital sexual experiences, thereby weakening the family
institution. In various countries, the average age at marriage has increased
significantly as well as the age when women have their first child. The number
of marriages that end in divorce has reached alarming proportions.64
The "broken and recomposed" families, for which children suffer very
much, generate poverty and marginalization. There is a contrast between
the recognized primary and decisive role of the family (very significant in
many surveys), and the neglect and hostility to which the family institution is
subjected and the erosion the family is suffering in some regions and nations.
73. What is worse is that under the impulse of international
public organizations, presumably "new models" of the family are being
put forth which include single parent homes and even homosexual unions. Some
international UN agencies, supported by powerful lobbies, wish to impose
"new human rights" on sovereign nations, such as "reproductive
rights", which include access to abortion, sterilization, easy divorce, a
"lifestyle" for young persons that favors the trivialization of sex,
and the weakening of parents' lawful authority in their children's education.65
74. While an exacerbated liberal individualism is
exalted together with a subjectivist ethic that encourages the unbridled
search for pleasure, the family also suffers the resurgence of new expressions
of Marxist socialism. One tendency which appeared at the Beijing
Conference (1995), presumes to introduce the "gender ideology" into
the culture of peoples. This ideology affirms, among other things, that the
greatest form of oppression is man's oppression of woman, and that this is
institutionalized in monogamous marriage.66 The ideologists
then conclude that in order to end this oppression, it is advisable to put an
end to the family based on monogamous marriage. Marriage and the family, rooted
in the heterosexual union, are allegedly the products of a culture that
appeared at a precise moment in history but which ought to disappear so that
women can be freed and occupy their rightful place in productive society.
75. We are aware that the Holy Father, and in following his
footsteps the Pontifical Council for the Family, have already spoken out many
times about these ideologies which are not only anti-life and anti-family but
also destructive of nations. On the threshold of the third millennium, the
pastoral care of life, that is received and transmitted generously in the
family, stands out as a priority need for the Jubilee Year: "Each
family, in some way, should be involved in the preparation for the Great
Jubilee. Was it not through a family, the family of Nazareth, that the Son
of God chose to enter into human history?".67
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