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