UFI Reader Poll: Should public schools be allowed to offer elective credit for religion classes that students take off-campus during school hours?

Here is the question that we asked UFI readers:

“Should public schools be allowed to offer elective credit for religion classes that students take off-campus during school hours (during legally allowed “release time”)?”

Here is how readers responded:

96 Percent                           Yes

 2 Percent                            No

 2 Percent                            Not sure

There was a large response to this question – kind of surprised us.  The original case dealing with “release time” was decided in 1952 (Zorach v. Clauson) where the U.S.  Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of granting students release time from public schools to attend religious education or services.

A new case originated in South Carolina where a recently passed law allows school districts to give elective credit for release time classes in a way similar to how students are allowed to transfer credits from private schools.

Because of increased graduation requirements, it has become increasingly difficult for students who participate in “release time” to obtain enough credits to graduate.  The South Carolina law was an effort to accommodate these students.

The Beckett Fund for Religious Freedom is defending the Spartanburg, South Carolina, School District and the case is expected to go before the 4^th Circuit Court of Appeals later this year.

Richer Than I You Will Never Be…

My favorite “down-time” activity with my children was easily the time we spent cuddled on the couch or bed reading together.  The emotions shared as we experienced the love of a young boy for his dogs in “Where the Red Fern Grows;”  the anxiety and anticipation shared as four young children traveled across war-torn Europe in search of their parents in “Escape from Warsaw;” and the shared adventure as we read “The Storm Testaments” are precious memories my children and I will always share.

As a young mother the poem “I Had a Mother Who Read to Me” was my inspiration.

“You may have tangible wealth untold;

Caskets of jewels and coffers of gold.

Richer than I you will never be-

I had a mother who read to me.”

— StricklandW. Gillilan

Studies kept me reading to my children even into their pre-teen and teenage years.  We took road trips as a family where we spent hours in the car.  My husband drove, I read, and miles and time disappeared.

My husband has instilled in us all the need to ALWAYS carry reading material.  Long lines in the grocery store aren’t an irritant when I can pull from my purse a good magazine article.  Waiting for Mom or a younger brother at the Mall isn’t a problem as long as a good book can be found in the backpack.

Several years ago we traveled all across the Eastern Seaboard.  I brought a book to read aloud.  Was I just a bit disappointed when my children suggested I put off reading?  Yes.  But I felt the satisfaction of success. They spent the long hours between sights in their own little world of fantasy and excitement. One son was reading “Jurassic Park.”  Our oldest son was reading “Atlas Shrugged.” Our daughter was reading “The Work and the Glory.”  Ben Hur and Magnificent Obsession were being read by our other two sons. At the end of our vacation, when asked what he liked best, one of our sons said, “The uninterrupted reading between cities.”

And I was reminded of a poem all of my children memorized in grade school.

 A book, I think, is very like

A little golden door

That takes me into places

Where I’ve never been before.

It leads me into fairyland

Or countries strange and far

And, best of all, the golden door

Always stands ajar.

                           Adelaide Love

Myth Buster Monday: Is the individual who is single someone to be envied?

There are many who think that living the single life is the perfect life.   Some of these individuals struggled to understand why anyone would choose to tie themselves down to one individual and relinquish autonomy and freedom in the process.  Popular culture portrays the single, “sex and the city” lifestyle as the ultimate hip and happy way to go through life.  But does the research agree?

Take a look at just a few of the studies that show marriage as superior to the single life.

Happiness

Married people were happier and healthier than widowed, divorced, separated, cohabiting or never-married people, regardless of race, age, sex, education, nationality or income.
Charlotte Schoenborn, “Marital Status and Health: United States, 1999-2002,” Advance Data from Vital and Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 351 (2004).

People who were married reported the highest levels of well-being, regardless of whether they were happily married or not. “Even when controlling for relationship happiness, being married was associated with higher self-esteem, greater life satisfaction, greater happiness and less distress.”
Claire Kamp Dush and Paul Amato, “Consequences of Relationship Status and Quality for Subjective Well-Being,” Journal of Social and Personal Relationships 22, 5 (2005): 607-627.

Married people were more likely than those who were not married to be very happy. Forty-three percent of people who said they were very happy were married, versus 24 percent of unmarried people saying were very happy.
“Are We Happy Yet?: A Social Trends Report,” Pew Research Center, February 13, 2006.

Mental  emotional health

The rate of suicide among the divorced/separated/widowed is almost 75 percent higher than the rate of those who are married.  The rate is even higher among the never-married.

Kate Fairweather-Schmide, et al., “Baseline Factors Predictive of Serious Suicidality at Follow-up:  Findings Focusing on Age and Gender from a Community-Based Study,” BioMedCentral Psychiatry 10 (June 2010):  41.

Compared to single peers, married college students were approximately 30 percent less likely to seriously contemplate suicide. “The single most protective factor [from seriously attempting suicide] was being married.”
Jeremy Kisch, Victor Leino and Morton Silverman, “Aspects of Suicidal Behavior, Depression and Treatment in College Students: Results from the Spring 2000 National College Health Assessment Survey,” Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior 35.1 (2005): 3-13.

Because of “the therapeutic benefit of marriage,” rates for alcoholism, suicide, schizophrenia and other psychiatric problems run lower among married men and women than among their unmarried peers. The married man or woman enjoyed “continuous companionship with a spouse who provides interpersonal closeness, emotional gratification and support in dealing with daily stress.”
Robert Coombs, “Marital Status and Personal Well-Being: A Literature Review,” Family Relations 40 (1991): 97-102.

A study found “that marriage continues to be beneficial for mental health.”  Canadian men and women in a stable marriage experienced “significantly lower levels of distress relative to those who remain single, separated; or divorced.”  In the short term, the psychological distress brought about by change in marital status impacted men and women equally.
Lisa Stronschein, Peggy McDonough, Georges Monette and Qing Shao, “Marital Transitions and Mental Health:  Are There Gender Differences in the Short-Term Effects of Marital Status Change?” Social Science & Medicine 61 (2005): 2293-2303.)

Physical health

Singleness was one of a number of important “psychosocial predictors of premature mortality.”
Carlos Iribarren, David Jacobs, Catarina Kiefe, Cora Lewis, Karen Matthews, Jeffrey Roseman and Stephen Hullley, “Causes and Demographic, Medical, Lifestyle and Psychosocial Predictors of Premature Mortality: The CARDIA Study,” Social Science & Medicine 60 (2005): 471-482.

“The size of the health gain from marriage is remarkable. It may be as large as the benefit from giving up smoking.”
Chris Wilson and Andrew Oswald, “How Does Marriage Affect Physical and Psychological Health? A Survey of the Longitudinal Evidence,” Institute for the Study of Labor,” Discussion Paper No. 1619 (2005).

“Virtually every study of mortality and marital status shows the unmarried of both sexes have higher death rates, whether by accident, disease or self-inflicted wounds, and this is found in every country that maintains accurate health statistics.”
Robert Coombs, “Marital Status and Personal Well-Being: A Literature Review,” Family Relations 40(1991): 97.

Marriage was associated with better health across all major health domains and across all types of conditions within health domains. Of the non-married groups, divorcees had the worst overall health profiles.
Amy Mehraban Pienta, Mark Hayward and Kristi Rahrig Jenkins, “Health Consequences of Marriage for the Retirement Years,” Journal of Family Issues 21, 5 (July, 2000): 569.

 Financial Health

Among couples who married and stayed married, the per person net worth increased on average by 16 percent with each year of marriage. Compared to those who remained single, getting married increased one’s wealth, on average, by 93 percent.
Jay Zagorsky, “Marriage and Divorce’s Impact on Wealth,” Journal of Sociology 41, 4 (2005): 406-424.

Individuals who were not continuously married had significantly less household wealth than those who remained married throughout life. Average household wealth of unmarried adults was 63 percent lower than that of married adults. Within the category of unmarrieds, this reduction difference was 77 percent for the separated, 75 percent for the never-married, 73 percent for the divorced, 58 percent for the cohabiting and 45 percent for widows. The reduction difference was 86 percent for unmarried women and 61 percent for unmarried men.
Janet Wilmoth and Gregor Koso, “Does Marital History Matter? Marital Status and Wealth Outcomes Among Preretirement Adults,” Journal of Marriage and Family 64(2002): 254-268.

Analysis of the National Survey of Families and Households indicate that married men earn more than single, noncohabiting men. Wages appear to rise more rapidly following marriage.  Leslie Stratton, “Examining the Wage Differential for Married and Cohabiting Men,” Economic Inquiry 40 (2002): 199-212.

Go here to see more on “The Marriage Advantage”

 

Are the Unborn Human?

The answer to some questions seem so straightforward and simple.  Are the unborn human?   As 15-year-old Lia points out, that question is the crux of the abortion debate.   With amazing easy and articulation, Lia lays out the pro-life arguments for you in this video.  Enjoy and share.

 

 

UFI Reader Poll: “Are you supportive of IVF technology for helping infertile couples knowing that it often involved the destruction of human embryos?”

Here’s the question we asked our UFI readers:

“Are you supportive of invitro fertilization (IVF) technology for helping infertile couples become pregnant knowing that it often involves the destruction of human embryos?”

Here is how our readers responded:

53 Percent           No

41 Percent           Yes

 6 Percent            Don’t know

Although infertility is a painful experience for millions of married couples and technology that ends suffering is always welcome, we still have to take a long hard look at the perhaps unintended consequences that arise from IVF.  Here’s a quick overview of some of those issues:

1.  Human embryos are human life at its earliest stages of development and should be accorded respect as such.  Treatment for infertility often leads to the creation of more embryos than the couple may need.  Many of these human embryos are destroyed during the actual IVF treatment, others are frozen, discarded, used for experimentation, or given to other couples.

2.  The children that are born as a result of the embryos that are “given away” then struggle with their origins and identities.  These “donor-conceived” children have lifelong outcomes that are worse than children raised by their biological parents.  Children then begin to be treated as a commodity.  At what point are we selling human beings?

3.  The women who provide the eggs for fertilization have to endure a medically invasive process that has the potential for serious health risks.  Worse yet, no study has ever been done on the risks associated with women going through the process – the medications or the egg harvesting procedures.  These women are being drawn to submit to the procedure because of the potential to make substantial sums of money without any real knowledge as to its consequences.

“A Tale of Two Fathers” New Study

By Ann Bailey

Nearly half (46 percent) of American fathers under the age of 45 say they have at least one child who was born out of wedlock.  Yes, you read that right – almost half.  I was shocked when I read that statistic.  When you consider that the share of children in the U.S. born to unwed mothers went from five percent in 1960 to 41 percent in 2008, I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised.

Here’s a sampling of some of the statistics that made the news in the recently released Pew Research Center study entitled:  “Tale of Two Fathers.”

• Twenty-seven percent of fathers with kids 18 or younger live away from at least one of their children.  That number is twice the rate of the number of fathers who lived apart from their children in the 1960s.
• Black and Hispanic fathers were much more likely to have children out of wedlock, at 72 percent and 59 percent respectively.  This compares with 37 percent of for white men.
• Education is also a factor with 13 percent of fathers with at least a bachelor’s degree having children outside of marriage, 51 percent of those with high school diplomas, and 65 percent of those who didn’t finish high school fathering children outside of marriage.
• In the age bracket of 20-24, three-fourths of those fathers had children outside of marriage, while in the 35-44 age range, that number stands at 36 percent.
• College-educated men tend to marry and get better jobs and are more involved with their children than less educated men.
• On a positive note, of the married fathers who are involved in their children’s lives, the number of hours a week that these fathers are involved with their children has gone up from 2.6 hours in 1960 to 6.5 hours per week today.  But sadly, on average, the number of fathers involved with their children grows smaller with each passing year.

U.S. Pres. Obama has written of not having his father in his life and has stated that it is “a hole in child’s life that no government can fill.”   We absolutely agree and so does the empirical data.  But why then are there so many people, especially on the political left, intent on encouraging sexual relations outside of marriage, encouraging notoriously unstable cohabiting relationships by implementing policies like domestic partnerships, promoting no-fault divorce, and putting in place policies that effectively dismantle marriage.  Why do we continually hear in popular culture and in the media claims that marriage doesn’t matter or that same-sex relationships – “two moms” or “two dads” – work just as well for children as a married mom AND  dad.  There is such a huge disconnect in all of this!

Fathers matter.  Fathers matter…  Children need their father married to their mother and they need them to have a long and successful marriage.  The dire statistics mentioned above need to be reversed.  There are too many children with “holes in their lives” and the government can never create enough social programs to fill the gap.  Let’s promote the importance of fathers every day, not just on that special day in June.

Adult children Need Support Too!

By Rachel Allison

It has been over five years since my father passed away.  Over the past couple of days I have been thinking of him a lot.  My Dad was a man of few words, but life’s lessons had given him a wisdom that enriched each of our lives.  When he spoke, “we listened.”

My youngest sister tells of an endearing experience she had with Dad.  She had been having some very discouraging setbacks in life.  One morning she received a phone call from him.  The first thing she heard after she picked up the receiver was dad singing, “I just called to say I love you.  I just called to say how much I care,”  (“I Just Called to Say I Love you” by Stevie Wonder.)  My sister started to cry, but the ensuing conversation comforted and gave her hope and courage to tackle the future.

I have been surprised in recent years to hear friends admit that now that their adult children are out of the house, “they’re on their own.” In other words, these mothers and fathers with years of wisdom have chosen to let their children make mistakes without a word of advise.  I am so much better because my parents stayed involved.  Granted, they lived six hundred miles away, so it’s not as if they were at my door every day, but they were always just a phone call away and they always took the time to offer advise when I needed it.

The advice I specifically remember came at a time when I was a newlywed.   Looking back I see a very immature (dare I admit even spoiled?)  young woman who called her parents often to express her frustrations with her new husband.  My parents would always listen, but our conversations always ended with my mom and dad telling me how much they loved and appreciated my husband.  They NEVER EVER badmouthed him.  As the months and years passed, my tirades subsided, but when I did need to vent, my parent’s positive expressions were always a reminder of just why I married my husband.

Now that I have three adult married children I am determined to be as good a listener and advisor.  I try to NEVER EVER badmouth my son-in-law or daughters-in-law.  The few times my children have called with relationship issues I listen and I give them advice as to how THEY could make the situation better.  We learn from an accumulation of generations of wisdom.  And when the wisdom is shared each generation tends to get better and better.

Have you ever wondered if your efforts made a difference?

Diminutive, yet outspoken and articulate, Wendy Wright has spent many a day standing on a street in front of abortion clinics trying to convince the women who enter to not abort their unborn babies.  Wendy, now  days, appears on national news broadcasts trying to convince the country –and even the world – of the wrongheadedness of abortion, radical feminism, same-sex marriage, and lots of other issues that are important to those who support families and traditional values.

We at United Families are grateful to count Wendy Wright, Concerned Women for America, as a friend and ally.  We wanted to share her brief, yet remarkable story.  It’s for those of you who work hard and wonder if it ever really makes a difference.

Because of You …”

June 17th, 2011 by Wendy Wright

After speaking to Generation Joshua home school students, telling stories of rescuing babies from abortion, I explained why Christians need to be engaged in public policy by showing what happens when we’re not.

During the Q&A session, a young woman asked, “Have you ever met one of those babies that you rescued?” I said, “I hope to one day. Gosh, they’d be about your age now!”

I was shocked by her response. “I was rescued from abortion and adopted because of you,” she said. Her birth mother wrote her letters mentioning me.

What a beautiful gift, to see the fruit of a seed that was sown years ago!

 

UFI Reader Poll: Which of the social issues is of greatest concern to you?

Here is this week’s question:

 

“Of the social issues impacting families, which is of greatest concern to you?”

 

Here is how UFI readers responded:

34 percent               Religious Freedom

14 percent               Parental Rights

10 percent               Stopping abortion

31 percent               The “gay agenda”

0 percent                 High rate of divorce

0 percent                 Cohabitation                

11 percent               Out-of-wedlock child bearing

Father’s Day: A Time to Recommit

It’s June and in my corner of the world, that means warmer weather, summer vacations, kids out of school and Father’s Day!  In just over a week we will be celebrating the influence of dads in our lives.  United Families International has researched the critical place fathers play in the lives of their children.

We recognize that dad is not only the one to toss us high into the air, teach us to ride a bike and fix its flat, loosen the tight grip on the pickle jar, move our boxes as we go away to college and comfort us when we make mistakes, but fathers also provide the security that keeps kids in school, and out of drugs, mischief and prisons.  Social science clearly shows that having a father in the home lessens substantially the risks of unhappy, delinquent children in society.

I wish to thank Tom Christensen for the following write up on fathers.  Having been involved in pro-family work for over 25 years and as the father of 15 children, Tom certainly understands the importance of fathers and families in a healthy society!

Cordially,

Carol Soelberg
President, United Families International

Father’s Day was first officially recognized by President Johnson in a presidential proclamation issued in 1966, then signed into law as a national holiday by President Nixon in 1972.

It is is now celebrated by virtually every nation in the world.  Father’s Day is a day to remember the sacrifices and contributions of fathers.  However, it is a day to recognize something more.   As President Obama highlighted in his Father’s Day proclamation last year, it is a time to observe the devastation caused when fathers are missing in the lives of their children:

 An active, committed father makes a lasting difference in the life of a child.  When fathers are not present, their children and families cope with an absence government cannot fill.

A year before President Johnson instituted Father’s Day as a national holiday, an obscure Assistant Secretary of Labor named Daniel Patrick Moynihan ignited a national controversy when he documented similar conclusions in his prophetic report: “The Negro Family:  The Case for National Action.”  The “Moynihan report” substantiated the fact that entrenched, multigenerational poverty in the inner-city is fueled by the absence of fathers in the home. Years later, senior Democratic Senator Moynihan (now deceased) elaborated:

From the wild Irish slums of the 19th century eastern seaboard, to the riot-torn suburbs of the Los Angeles, there is one unmistakable lesson in American history:  a community that allows a large number of young men to grow up in broken families, dominated by women, never acquiring any stable relationship to male authority, never acquiring any rational expectations about the future–that community asks for and gets chaos.

Fatherlessness at the time of the Moynihan report was primarily a black problem.  At the time of the Moynihan report, nearly 20% of all black children were born to unmarried mothers. Today, according to 2009 US Census data, nearly 20% of all white children are born to single mothers.  Among blacks, the rate is currently well above 60% and would be higher if the U.S. Census still counted children living with two unmarried parents as living in a single-parent household.

The problem of fatherlessness is a national epidemic driving our most urgent social problems: crime, illiteracy, poverty, abuse.  The epidemic is not an excessive number of pregnancies, which some assert should be reduced through expanded public sex education and reproductive health services.  The problem, as documented in the Moynihan report, is excessive out-of-wedlock pregnancies, which can only be addressed by the return of responsible men (and women) to traditional marriage and basic parental responsibilities.

In a few days, President Obama will issue another Father’s Day proclamation, honoring the nation’s fathers both living and deceased.  Such a declaration and ensuing celebration is fitting and proper.   But as a nation, we must set a higher standard for fathers.  We must especially honor those who enter into a marital covenant and keep it their entire lives with fidelity–those who commit their “lives, fortunes, and sacred honor” to the care and maintenance of a family.  This is the common lot, but most fulfilling and essential duty, of mankind

Tom Christensen and his wife of 28 years, Dixy, reside in South Jordan, Utah where they are successfully raising their last ten of fifteen children. Christensen, who served for five years as CEO of United Families, lead delegations and spoke at UN conferences in New York, Nairobi, the Hague, Lisbon and Geneva, and published several articles on family policy. Christensen was featured in the front page Deseret News series, “Utahns Making a Difference Abroad,” and received in Budapest in behalf of United Families, the “Family and Peace Award” from the World Association of Non-Governmental Organizations.