Gabriel Marcel’s The Mystery of the Family, from Homo Viator, is an interesting article that describes the breakdown of the family. It’s scary to think that the problems Marcel addressed in 1942 are the same problems the family faces today. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the family is worse off in the present than it was in Marcel’s time. Marcel was entirely accurate in stating that "the family does not suggest just one problem, but an infinity of problems," such as abortion, contraception, divorce, premarital sex, to name a few. Today, there is an ever increasing agenda of the same sex and transgender lobbies that are adding a new threat to the family.
I particularly found the part where Marcel talks of his university experience interesting. He tells of a time when he was called on to speak of divorce in class. His dilemma was that he knew that many of the students were children of divorced parents and felt a little uncomfortable about bringing judgment upon their parents. He asks the question, "should we, with no fear of appearing dogmatic, courageously tackle these questions while in so doing we risk upsetting and scandalising impressionable young beings; or should we confine ourselves to the hollowest of phrases or to historical or so-called historical facts and thus...help to encourage the loose relativity which has tended in our day to weaken all real moral judgment so prejudicially?"
I say that we should courageously tackle these questions! So what if we upset or scandalize, so long as we proclaim the truth. The reason why there is such a gigantic threat to the family (in Marcel’s time as well as ours) is because very few had the courage to stand up and present the truth that was not watered down and delivered so as not to offend. Jesus Himself offended. It’s not that Jesus or the words He spoke were offensive, but rather the people who received them were hard-hearted, sinful, and morally corrupt. No one likes to be told that what they are doing is wrong. It’s in human nature to be offended when someone points out our faults. That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t point them out though. That only leads to relativism. We need as many people as possible proclaiming the truth, especially at universities! If not, then we will see more of the same types of reactions that we saw at the University of St. Thomas, where Ben Kessler spoke out against contraception and pre-marital sex. If he got that kind of reaction at a supposed catholic university, then you can only imagine how he would have been received at a secular university.
One of the reasons that there is such a high rate of divorce is that so many people rush into marriage without considering that it is a holy sacrament and that its unbreakable bond should not be taken lightly. I knew a couple who had met, gotten engaged, married, and then divorced all within the span of a year. Later on it was discovered that their marriage counselor had told them that they should not marry each other. When you consider couples who get married in similar fashions and then have children (thinking that a child will make solve their problems), and once they can’t take it any longer (usually without even trying to work things out) get divorced, it is no wonder that families are breaking up.
Nowadays, unmarried couples are living together without any intention of getting married. Why is this? Because today’s culture has been stripped of its values. People would rather not have to worry about commitment. They pledge to stay with someone forever...or at least until something better comes along. Our relativistic society breeds nothing but selfishness.
This is most prevalent in American society, where everybody is taught that the measure of your worth is how much money you make. It’s a "me" society. This attitude carried into the family leads individuals to think only of what they can get out of a relationship, instead of giving of themselves fully for the sake of the other. Of these marriages, Marcel says, "there is nothing in the inward depth of character, nothing in the very centre of the will which corresponds to the socially binding form or even, alas, to the strictly sacramental character of the union entered into. It is more than probable that in a society where divorce is not only accepted, but regarded in many circles as a more or less normal contingency, a time must inevitably come when the irresponsibility with which so many unbelievers lightly and heedlessly get married, is communicated from one to another until it infects even those who by tradition, human respect or some remnant of faith are still impelled to take a vow of fidelity in the presence of God, only find out too late that by this contradiction they are themselves caught in a trap from which it is not possible to escape except at the price of a scandalous renunciation or dishonorable subterfuge."
The loss of ideals when it comes to marriage has also lead to another threat to the family; the lobby for same sex "marriage." In Pennsylvania, the House just passed a "gay marriage" ban and not a day goes by that there isn’t a letter to the editor of the local newspaper in Pittsburgh voicing disgust at the lawmakers and supporters of traditional marriage. One letter even admitted that there was a decline in moral values, but saw nothing wrong with same sex "marriage." The author of the letter (as well as the other authors) is most likely a supporter of abortion as well, with the thinking that it supports women’s rights. The (contradictory and false) thought that abortion somehow supports and enables women is on the same level of thinking that same sex attraction is natural and should be affirmed through the legal rights of marriage. Anyone with brains can see that if same sex "marriage" and abortion were allowed to persist, not only will families die out, but so will the human race. As Marcel said,
"The men of my generation have seen carried out before their eyes with
extraordinary tenacity a work of systematic subversion which is no longer
directed against revealed doctrines or principles hallowed by tradition, but
against nature itself. Man, whatever brainless biologists may think about him,
will never be on the same level as the animals. Wherever he is truly himself,
wherever he is faithful to his vocation, he is infinitely above them. Wherever
he deliberately renounces his true calling, he falls infinitely below them. As
for the humanism for little Voltaireans on the retired list, offered by those
who advocate a return to the just mean, to average virtues, to prudent
calculations and methodical precautions, we know with tragic certainty that it
is the tremulous forerunner of the worst individual and national disasters."
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