On the second day of World Congress of Families IV – at Warsaw's Palace of Culture and Science -- the focus was on threats to and opportunities for the natural family.
Sessions included: "Media and the Natural Family," "Pro-Family Initiatives;" "Marriage As a Social Good – Why Get Married?", "The Attack On Traditional Marriage," "Impact of Pornography On The Family," "Hollywood And The Family," "Promoting and Protecting The Large Family," "Bioethics – 21st Century Challenge to Human Dignity," "Beyond The Contraceptive Mentality" and "Legalized Euthanasia or Family Care."
Among other notable scholars, researchers, leaders and academicians, the 3,200 delegates from over 60 countries heard from Ewa Kowalewska (European Director of Human Life International), Patrick Fagan (Heritage Foundation), Dana Rosemary Scallon (former MP, European Parliament, Katarzyna Mazela (Forum of Polish Women), Paul Mero (Sutherland Institute), Gwen Landolt (Real Women of Canada), Tobias Teuscher (Political Science Institute, Brussels), Marie-Claire Hernandez (Family and Society, Mexico), Angela Conway (Australian Family Association), Ted Baehr (Christian Film & Television Commission), Fr. Jaroslaw Szymczak (Institute for Studies on Family Science, Poland), Marek Jurek (Speaker of the Polish parliament) and Anatoli Antonov.
In a plenary session address, Fagan declared, "Feminists of Europe take note, the safest place for children is in the natural family. The most dangerous is cohabiting couples."
Speaking on the impact of pornography, Bob Knight of the Media Research Center disclosed: "The leftist wants every aspect of life regulated except sex. Sex advances their reshaping of society." Angela Conway of the Australian Family Association added, "The evidence that pornography causes harm is so obvious that government warnings should be mandatory." And Marie Claire Hernandez added that due to Internet pornography, "We may be facing a tidal wave of lost intimacy, selfishness and crime."
On a related topic, Hollywood and the Family, Don Feder (Communications Director of the World Congress of Families) warned: "Every day, an American industry drops metric tons of toxic waste in your countries and homes. I refer to Hollywood, whose principle products – with honorable exceptions – are sex, violence, perversion, nihilism, attacks on religion and a thoroughgoing anti-family ethic."
As a euthanasia panelist, Fr. Thomas Euteneuer, the president of Human Life International, stated, "When in any society, the natural family is denied its basic rights to care for its members or when it is deprived of its social and legal protections, it very soon becomes victim of the aggressive forces that promote killing on a massive scale and stands before these forces vulnerable to their depredations."
As part of the panel on "The Attack On Traditional Marriage," Ben Bull of The Alliance Defense Fund observed, 'Marriage will be destroyed by making all relationships equal." Fr. Dariusz Oko professor of philosophy at Pontifical Academy of Theology in Cracow, observed that "assistance, compassion, medical counseling" were the only way to approach homosexuality from a Christian perspective." Lynn Wardle, a law professor at Brigham Young University, added, "Legalizing same-sex marriage will drain marriage of its social meaning."
Brad Wilcox, a professor of sociology at the University of Virginia, speaking on cohabitation and the well-being of children, noted: "The rise of European cohabitation leads ineluctably to increases in lone parenthood, and we know from recent social science research that lone parenthood poses a threat to the well-being of children in European societies such as Norway, Sweden and England."
Delegates agreed that much needs to be done to counter deleterious trends and make governmental leaders and the general public aware of the indispensability of the natural family.
World Congress of Families IV will conclude tomorrow, Sunday, May 13 with a panel on "Faith and Family -- The Vital Bond," and a closing ceremony.
For more information on World Congress of Families IV, go to
www.worldcongress.org.
To schedule an interview with Allan Carlson, please contact Larry Jacobs at 011-423-663-072-673.
The Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society located in Rockford, Illinois is an independent, non-profit research and education center that strives to be the leading source of fresh ideas and new strategies for affirmation and defense of the natural family, both nationally and globally. The Howard Center is also the organizer of the World Congress of Families project which unites people of goodwill who recognize that the family is the fundamental unit of society and coordinates the efforts of pro-family groups from more than 60 countries worldwide.
The World Congress of Families (WCF) is an international network of pro-family organizations, scholars, and leaders that seeks to restore the natural family as the fundamental social unit and the 'seedbed' of civil society. The WCF was founded in 1997 by Allan Carlson, president of The Howard Center. To date, there have been three World Congresses of Families – Prague (1997), Geneva (1999) and Mexico City (2004). WCF IV will be in Warsaw, Poland, May 11-13, 2007.