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In Lessons 1 and 2 we pointed out the crucial realization that the answer to America's social troubles lies in restoring the family. Let us examine a few examples of how rebuilding the home brings natural solution to larger problems.
1. Solution to crime: Research shows that criminals are bred by broken homes, in particular where grandparents are not present. Happy families breed law-abiding citizens.
2. Solution to mental illness: Along the same lines, mental illness is bred by broken homes, in particular where grandparents are not present. Genetic and biological predisposition to mental illness determine only 30% of whether it will occur. The actual expression of mental illness depends mainly upon human factors. Happy families breed sane, balanced people. Divorces breed children likely to divorce.
3. Solution to drug abuse, alcoholism: Same point as that of mental illness: healthy family life ends drug and alcohol abuse.
4. Solution to the economy: Two-parent families do far better economically than one-parent families and divorced people. The extended family is the best environment for small-scale entrepreneurship. Small-scale entrepreneurship leads to large scale creation of wealth.
5. Solution to cultural decay: Good families create their own culture of family love. True parents do not enjoy decadent cultural products, nor do their children. In fact, they abhor them as more destructive than poison or lead-based paint. (If we spent the money and energy getting rid of sex-garbage TV that we do on getting rid of lead-based paint in our homes, the brains of our kids would be far better off.)
6. Solution to bloated and conflict-ridden government: Strong families do not require welfare. A society without welfare requires less government. A society without criminals and adulterers requires less government. Strong families create healthy communities which voluntarily care for the less fortunate, reducing the need for state intervention.
7. Solution to foreign affairs: As the family lives for the community, and community for the nation, the national leaders will guide the nation to live for the world, bringing world peace.
8. Solution to religious and racial strife: Good families live for the sake of other families, regardless of race or religion. This is because true family values transcend race and religion and culture. we've long known that children everywhere are the same. We should realize that husband and wives and parents and grandparents are the same everywhere in the world.
9. Solution to environmental destruction: Good families consume, wisely, products which are good for children. Good families value the environment above financial profit. Good families create good homes and gardens, creating a park-like environment in their own community. Good families do not litter; they respect cleanliness as next to godliness. (It is interesting that when we gave up godliness, we lost cleanliness in the bargain.)
10. Solution to AIDS: Good families practice sexual purity. AIDS is wiped out forever. So is abortion and illegitimacy.
Unfortunately, today, many young people view the wreckage of the family and reject marriage and family as desirable goals. Our culture has become skeptical about marriage. One of the unintended side effects of our high divorce rate is that many of our young people are avoiding marriage. Judith Wallerstein and Sandra Blakeslee, The Good Marriage: How and Why Love Lasts (Houghton Mifflin, cited in Trudy Bush, Happily Married With Children, The Christian Century, Jan. 21, 1996, p. 109)
1. Economically, traditional society rewarded strong families, but modern urban society discourages them.
2. Systematic governmental attempts to restore traditional, agrarian culture have led to horrors of social engineering, both Marxist (Cambodia, Stalinist Soviet Union, North Korea) and religious (Iran, Bosnia).
3. Problems have worsened by disastrous proportions even during government attempts to create a Great society in the United States.
4. And yet, few want to abandon the comforts and possibilities which modern industrial society provide.
1. Religions in their prime sustain the development of civilization, but always decline after achieving prosperity and power.
2. At best, small religious enclaves can survive (Pennsylvania Amish), but they have not influenced the larger society, because they offer no universal solutions.
3. Religion does not offer any explanation as to why the family has broken down. Hence, religious leaders offer traditional counsel, which has been in place for centuries and has proven ineffective at meeting today's challenges.
4. Religious guidance is praiseworthy, yet ultimately inadequate. It needs to be supplemented.
In the next lesson we will discuss the critical weakness of all religions in terms of supporting true family life.