Governments that kind-heartedly bestow other people's children on homosexual couples also have both the power and the motivation to confiscate those children from their original parents, even when the parents have done nothing to warrant losing them.
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Government and feminist propaganda suggest that single-parent homes result from paternal abandonment. In fact, they are usually created by family court judges, who have close ties to the social service agencies that need children. By forcibly removing fathers from the home through unilateral or "no-fault" divorce, family courts create the environment most conducive to child abuse and initiate the process that leads to removal of the children from the mother, foster care, and adoption.

Marriage is not meant solely, or even mainly, for husbands and wives. Marriage exists as a public institution because children need mothers and fathers. Once marriage is treated as a mere celebration of the love of two adults, there is no reason for it to necessarily happen before children are born instead of after. And if marriage could just as well happen after children are born, it doesn't really need to happen at all. European parents have increasingly stopped marrying because they no longer think of marriage as an institution meant to bind children to their mothers and fathers.

Gay marriage helps Europeans see it that way, making them consider marriage nothing more than the expression of mutual affection between two adults. But this view translates into marrying long after children are born -- if parents don't break up first. It means rising rates of parental cohabitation, and higher rates of family dissolution. That's what's happening in Europe. Do we want it to happen in America?

"Marrying Kevin was the last thing I was thinking about doing," Spears tells People magazine in its July 12 issue. "But then I said, 'You know what? This is my life and I don't care what people think. I'm going to get married. I'm in love with him.'"
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Of the quickie Vegas ceremony, "That thing was a total ugh," she says. "I was not in love at all."
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Federline, who performed as a backup dancer for Justin Timberlake, Spears' former boyfriend, previously was involved with Shar Jackson, star of TV's "Moesha." They have a 2-year-old daughter and are expecting another baby.
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In an interview set to air Wednesday, Jackson told syndicated entertainment show "Access Hollywood" that "after I meet her (Britney) and everything's cool, we can be one big happy family."

What about the younger heterosexual couple who also want intertwined lives without the full economic entanglements of marriage? Or the widowed mother who is economically dependent on the son who is also her sole caregiver? Or the two friends who decide to raise a child together but who aren't, and don't want to be, married? Or the lesbian couple who want their child's biological father to be a recognized part of their family? When is the law going to catch up with them?

Nancy D. Polikoff of American University voices the concern of many family law scholars who support full gay rights but are skeptical of our society's exclusive focus on marriage. "I am in favor of equality and I believe that as long as marriage exists for heterosexuals it should exist for gays and lesbians," she says. "What I don't want to have happen is the eclipsing of a more just reform of how the law deals with families -- all sorts of families."

[Ahrons] concedes that children of divorce are at higher risk in comparison to children of intact families. How much higher risk? That is the question.

Ahrons is in a perfect position to investigate. She returns to interview 173 adult children whose divorcing parents she interviewed more than 20 years ago.

The "average" children of divorce and their "average" divorced parents [who read this book] will also discover something perhaps more important: Namely, they do not exist.

Though she says she expected to find patterns, arrangements that worked better than others, she is startled that what mattered to children was often different from what mattered to adults.

Knight and nearly 50 other male educational and faith-based leaders from around the state are participating in a two-day seminar at Hinds Community College in Pearl to learn how to train others to be better fathers and role models for their children. The workshop, sponsored by the Mississippi Department of Human Services, is focusing on "Seven Secrets of Effective Fathers" and "Connecting With Your Child." Rick Guy/The Clarion-Ledger Ron Nichols, director of training for the National Center for Fathering, talks about fatherhood at the Hinds Community College Campus in Pearl Tuesday. National Fatherhood Initiative statistics show children who live without their biological father are, on average, two to three times more likely to experience educational, health, emotional and behavioral problems than children who live with their married biological parents. They are also more likely to be poor, use drugs, be victims of child abuse and engage in criminal activity. "There is scarcely a social path we are trying to deal with that doesn't trace back to fatherlessness," MDHS executive director Don Taylor said. "There are very compelling reasons why we need people who can teach others how to be responsible fathers." Participants in the seminar include representatives from Jackson Public Schools, Headstart, Family First and several faith-based communities. They all have the mission of taking what they've learned and leading other groups of men across the state to be better fathers.

Many teens learn how to manipulate their divorced or separated parents to their own advantage, according to a Ball State University study.
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The researchers interviewed 50 teens whose parents were separated or divorced. They discovered strategies that include:

Withholding information from one parent to avoid punishment or to solidify a relationship with another parent. Children can gain an upper hand by controlling information flow because, following a separation or divorce, there is often reduced communication between parents.

Moving from one home to another. Children often move into the home of the parent who is less controlling. They do this to punish the other parent or to escape a situation they don't like.

Cutting one parent completely out of the teen's life. This allows the child to control when and where they have contact with that parent.

"None of these options would be open to a child in a single household with two parents," Menning said. "Parents talk and form a team to raise a child. Separate the two parents and the child can use the situation to play one off the other."

Richard Marback is a kid magnet.

The kids in his Cub Scout troop rush to hug him. Around his Detroit neighborhood, other people's children always want to pop by to have a serious, adult conversation with the cool dad. (Marback has four kids of his own.)

Often as not, it's fatherless boys who cluster round the most.

Ronnie Gray has four children of his own. That would be more than enough for most dads, but not for Mr. Ronnie, as he's known at the St. Anthony Outreach Center at 23rd and Market streets.

He is also known as coach, uncle, mentor, friend, cheerleader and drill sergeant. And sir, as in "yes, sir" and "no, sir."

Gray, 54, is a stickler for old-fashioned values, ones that go beyond proper manners and good behavior. Ones like "Love thy neighbor" and "Do unto others. ..."

This slender, lively man has spent the last 20-odd years being a father figure to dozens, if not hundreds, of young men -- most of whom had little or no contact with their biological fathers.

"Ronnie sees the need in the kids," said Chuck Williams, who founded the Outreach Center with Gray and others in 1992.

President Bush comes to Cincinnati Monday to push one of his administration's more controversial ideas: a $1.2 billion program to promote marriages in poor communities.

Then he goes to a $25,000-a-couple fund-raiser in Indian Hill.

The president's Health Marriage Initiative would offer free- or low-cost premarital counseling to parents on welfare. It would teach them how to resolve conflicts, be good parents and keep a marriage going.

Some critics see it as government meddling in private relationships.

Others see it as a waste of money. Some see it as condescending toward single parents or poor people.

Nationally one in two marriages today ends in divorce despite a decade of marriage education programs focused on reversing the trend.

Meanwhile, children who reside with single mothers are five times more likely to be living in poverty, according to an analysis of Census 2000 data by the conservative Heritage Foundation.

* 86% of marriages take place in a church (not sure of source, don't quote it)

* Churchgoing unmarried mothers are 70% more likely to rate their relationships with the fathers of their children as excellent (Wilcox's analysis of Fragile Families data)

* But only 11% of unmarried mothers report excellent relationships with the fathers three years after the birth of their child (Id.)

The price of love goes up $5 on Thursday when a new law slaps a surcharge on Minnesota marriage licenses to fund a program that will encourage new, urban parents to tie the knot. One of several new laws that take effect that day, supporters say the surcharge makes more sense than it first appears. The increase from $80 to $85 will help fund the new program targeting unmarried couples whose babies are born in Minneapolis and St. Paul. Besides promoting marriage, it will encourage responsible fatherhood. With the help of local hospitals, the program will approach unwed parents soon after their child is born. "That's the magic moment when they are wanting to do right by the baby and each other," said William Doherty, a University of Minnesota professor who will direct the program.

The Rev. Calvin O. Butts III, pastor of Harlem's Abyssinian Baptist Church, was stunned recently when three couples who wanted him to preside at their weddings asked if he would alter the traditional marriage vows. Forget the till-death-do-us-part injunction, they suggested. Instead, would he mind substituting a more realistic escape clause, say, "as long as our love shall last"?
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David Blankenhorn, president of the pro-marriage Institute for American Values, maintains that vows define a marriage. Saying they are just words, he says, is like saying the marriage certificate is just a piece of paper.

"The vow exists on its own, exerting social and sacred authority that is independent of the couple," he has written. And he argues that its symbolic value has been undermined by two trends: leaving the duration of the commitment vague or unstated, and allowing couples to compose their own vows.

"The new vows are created by the couple and presented to society," he writes, "signifying the goal of conforming marriage to the couple."