Posted on 05/13/2005 9:12:01 AM PDT by -=[_Super_Secret_Agent_]=-
THE DESTRUCTION OF MARRIAGE PRECEDES THE DEATH OF A CULTURE
Sociologists and anthropologists who have studied the death of civilizations have found that rampant sexual immorality, feminism, and homosexuality have been factors in destroying nations.
by Rev. Louis P. Sheldon Chairman, Traditional Values Coalition
In his 1979 book, Our Dance Has Turned to Death, Christian sociologist Carl W. Wilson outlined the dangers facing traditional marriage and the family in America's increasingly sexualized culture. Wilson could clearly see what was going to happen to the American family if our society continued to be sex saturated.
Wilson noted that history reveals that nations decline and eventually die when sexual immorality becomes rampant and the traditional family is discarded in favor of group sex, homosexuality, infidelity, and unrestrained sexual hedonism.
He pointed to the writings of British anthropologist J. D. Unwin, whose 1934 book, Sex and Culture, chronicled the historical decline of numerous cultures. Unwin studied 86 different cultures throughout history and discovered a surprising fact: No nation that rejected monogamy in marriage and pre-marital sexual chastity lasted longer than a generation after it embraced sexual hedonism. Unwin stated it this way, "In human records there is no instance of a society retaining its energy after a complete new generation has inherited a tradition which does not insist on prenuptial and postnuptial continence."
Unwin found that nations that valued traditional marriage and sexual abstinence were creative and flourished. He described this as "cultural energy" that can only be maintained when sexual activities remain restricted within marriage.
Sociologist Pitirim Sorokin, in The American sex revolution, found essentially the same thing when he examined sexual immorality as it relates to cultural decline. Sorokin noted in the late 60's that America was committing "voluntary suicide" through unrestrained sexual indulgence. He observed that as individuals began engaging in pre-marital sex unrelated to marriage, the birth rate would decline and our nation would be slowly depopulated. He predicted an increase in divorce, deserdesertion, and an epidemic of sexual promiscuity resulting in a rise in illegitimate children. His predictions, unfortunately, have come true.
Sorokin's study of decadent cultures convinced him that a healthy society can only survive if strong families exist and sexual activities are restricted to within marriage. Sexual promiscuity leads inevitably to cultural decline and eventual collapse.
Carl Wilson notes that decadent cultures display seven typical characteristics: Men reject spiritual and moral development as the leaders of families; men begin to neglect their families in search of material gain; men begin to engage in adulterous relationships or homosexual sex; women begin to devalue the role of motherhood and homemaker; husbands and wives begin to compete with each other and families disintegrate; selfish individualism fragments society into warring factions; and men and women lose faith in God and reject all authority over their lives. Soon, moral anarchy reigns. When the family collapses, the society soon follows.
Marriage Is Dying In Scandinavia
Dr. Stanley Kurtz, a fellow with the Hoover Institution has written extensively in recent years over the impact that homosexual marriages will eventually have on our culture. In two important papers published in The Weekly Standard in late 2003 and early 2004, Kurtz describes how the legalization of same-sex marriage in the United States will lead inevitably to the destruction of marriage altogether. Homosexual marriage will open the floodgates to other bizarre sexual arrangements including polygamy and polyamory (groupings of males and females into a “married” unit).
Writing in The End Of Marriage In Scandinavia, (The Weekly Standard, 2/2/04), Dr. Kurtz notes, for example, that Sweden has increasingly separated the idea of marriage from parenthood and that the prevalence of homosexual partnerships has only helped accelerate the decline in marriage.
Marriage, due in part to homosexual partnerships, has changed culture attitudes to view marriage as having little to do with rearing children.
Kurtz also observes that Sweden is probably the most secular nation on the earth and that “Swedes themselves link the decline of marriage to secularism. And many studies confirm that, throughout the West, religiosity is associated with strong marriage, while heightened secularism is correlated with a weakening of marriage.”
In Norway, the de facto legalization of homosexual marriage has not only weakened the traditional family structure, it has also caused severe divisions within the Norway’s Lutheran state church. Says Kurtz: “Gay marriage lessened the church’s authority by splitting it into warring factions and providing the secular media with occasions to mock and expose divisions. Gay marriage also elevated the church’s openly rebellious minority liberal faction to national visibility, allowing Norwegians to feel that their proclivity for unmarried parenthood, if not fully approved by the church, was at least not strongly condemned.” In Norway, the normalization of gay marriage has helped normalize unmarried cohabitation and caused church divisions.
Kurtz observes: “Once in place, gay marriage symbolically ratified the separation of marriage and parenthood. And, once established, gay marriage became one of several factors contributing to further increases in cohabitation and out-of-wedlock birthrates, as well as to early divorce.”
Homosexual Marriage Will Lead To Social Chaos Dr. Kurtz’ essay, “Beyond Gay Marriage,” (The Weekly Standard, 8/4/2003) describes the likelihood that same-sex marriage will lead us into social chaos by also legalizing polygamy and polyamory (group sex as a “family”).
According to Kurtz, “Marriage will be transformed into a variety of relationship contracts, linking two, three, or more individuals (however weakly and temporarily) in every conceivable combination of male and female.”
In a related article published in National Review, (6/31/2003) Dr. Kurtz quotes homosexual activist Paula Ettelbrick who says that homosexual marriages must, of necessity, include a third person (a sperm father or female egg donor) as part of a marriage triad.
She writes: “… the family structures of lesbians and gay men who have children simply do not fit into the marital structure erected to envelope heterosexual, married couples with their children … every lesbian couple with a biological child has an automatic third person—the donor/father—who factors into the family. … Significant changes to the legal rules of parenting would have to be made to accommodate these families.”
Not only would polygamous homosexual relationships be legalized, but transgender marriages. Transgender is an umbrella term used by homosexual activists to describe heterosexual cross-dressers, homosexual drag queens, and transsexuals (individuals undergoing sex change operations). Some only go through half of a sex-change operation and live as “she-males.”
In early 2004, two male-to-female transgendered individuals tried to get married in Kansas but were denied a marriage license. They have threatened to sue the state to be allowed to marry each other.
The legalization of homosexual marriage will lead to a litigation nightmare in our nation over custody of children; legalized polyamory and transgender marriages.
The legalization of homosexual marriage will also threaten the religious freedom of Christian businessmen and subject children in our public schools to even more aggressive recruitment efforts. In addition, homosexuals will push for passage of hate crime laws to criminalize any verbal or written opposition to their goals.
Religious freedom could die once homosexual marriage is legalized and Christians could be jailed for simply criticizing homosexual behavior.
If we do not learn from history, we are doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. And, once the moral decline begins, it will be very difficult to turn things around.
William Bennett, in The Broken Hearth says it well: "My concern is that we are now embarked upon an experiment that violates a universal social law: In attempting to raise children without two parents, we are seeing, on a massive scale, the voluntary breakup of the minimal family unit. This is historically unprecedented, an authentic cultural revolution-and, I believe, socially calamitous. We may be under the illusion that we can cheerfully deconstruct marriage and then one day decide to pull back from the brink. But as a friend of mine puts it, once you shoot out the lights, can you shoot them back on again? As the long record of human experimentation attests, civilizations, even great civilizations, are more fragile and perishable than we think."
Our culture must strengthen traditional marriage, promote abstinence before marriage, and reject any attempts to undermine the natural law by redefining marriage to include same-sex couples. The future of our civilization is at stake! This is a battle we cannot afford to lose.
"Our culture must strengthen traditional marriage, promote abstinence before marriage, and reject any attempts to undermine the natural law by redefining marriage to include same-sex couples. The future of our civilization is at stake! This is a battle we cannot afford to lose."
We are losing and will continue to lose so long as judges rule our country.
As John Adams said, our true strength lies in our faith in God and His fundmamental moral principle.
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other."- John Adams, Oct. 11, 1798
While we're at it, we can outlaw divorce and start prosecuting heterosexual adultery. Oh wait...that has no popular support.
This immediately came to mind. Depart from the word of God and this is what you get. Wake up America.
Yup, the more you read history, the more you see that this is true. Sadly, you also see that any effort to stop it is pretty futile - slowing down this trend is the best you can hope for...
I can always count on you to sum it up nicely and express just what I am thinking. Thanks.
Have a great day!
Rather than outlaw it, it would be great if these things weren't so "celebrated" in the media. Unfortunately, political correctness has removed "shame" from our vocabulary and our understanding.
25 years ago, a divorce was seen as a personal failure. An adulterous liaison was something that happened in the seediest locations, by wicked people. Sure, they happened, but it wasn't something people could shrug off and say their actions made them proud.
We don't need laws to keep these things in check; we just need to restore a culture where shame can be a more effective weapon in the preservation of society.
"We have no government armed with power capable of contending with human passions unbridled by morality and religion. Avarice, ambition, revenge, or gallantry, would break the strongest cords of our Constitution as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate for the government of any other."- John Adams, Oct. 11, 1798
Those that do not care for the Constitution would appear to agree. Theirs is a living one - ie. not really a Constitution at all.
We can peer over the Atlantic and learn that a secular majority society doesn't have much use for democracy, either, and are willing to concede freedoms to unaccountable bureaucrats.
Well, thanks! You too - even if it IS Friday the 13th!
Not surprising at all since marriage is ordained of God and involves His very image.
We pervert it at a terrible cost.
And now you have no argument except sentimentality.
You have let them create an artificial culture in which legal marriage has no logical place.
You've been bamboozled.
On point, accurate.
FMCDH(BITS)
I just had to bump your post.
Thanks...that John Adams quote is one of my favorites. Those men knew what they were doing and why...and those seeking to tear it all down do too.
Exactly. We the people are not deconstructing marriage. The ruling cabal in black robes are.
Read Later
Words of wisdom, amigo.
Right on.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.