Marriage/Family

Mounting evidence shows living together before marriage increases likelihood of divorce.

Couples who lived together before marriage were 48% more likely to divorce than couples who moved in together after being engaged or married , according to a new study.

Cohabitation, or living together before marriage , has become a prominent and growing mode of relationship development. About 70% of marriages start with cohabitation , and around 50% to 65% of the country believes living together before marriage will actually improve the likelihood of staying together. Read more

Supreme Court: India same-sex marriage case tests judges.

The government’s main contention from the start has been that only the parliament can discuss the socio-legal issue of marriage and the court has no right at all to hear the matter.

Disregarding the government’s objections, the judges had said they would not wade into religious personal laws but look at whether the Special Marriage Act of 1954 – which allows marriages between people of different castes and religions and weddings held abroad – could be tweaked to include LGBTQ+ people. Read more

The Church of England Could Do Better on Marriage.

It’s an ongoing problem familiar to all supporters of marriage, those who think marriage is a good thing and that the evidence supports it. How do we best present our case to those who haven’t chosen marriage, or who would like to choose marriage but haven’t found somebody yet, or for whom their own marriage or marriage of somebody close to them has been a disaster?

Where is the hope? Read more

Parenting/Parental Rights

Why Are So Many Kids Attempting Suicide?

One factor that hasn’t been adequately considered, especially in the context of adolescents, is LGBT activists’ endorsement of suicide as a means of protest. When LGBT activists, for example, ask “non-affirming” parents whether they would “rather have a living son or a dead daughter,” they suggest that suicide is a legitimate, practically necessary recourse for a child who is not “affirmed” by her parents. Vulnerable children, whether they identify as transgender or not, are prone to internalize and act on that logic, as the AMA report illustrates. Read more

Why It’s So Hard to Get Kids Off Their Screens.

At home, parents are finding it extremely tough to pry their kids from screens. “There’s a myth that ‘My child should be able to get off-screen without a meltdown,’” said Cherkin. “But it’s not a fair fight.” Tech companies have studied what makes an activity sticky and applied those lessons with a vengeance.And just as it’s hard to drag a gambler from the slot machines — next time could be a winner! — it’s hard to drag our kids from their screens. (And us from our emails.) There’s a reason drug dealers use the same term for their clients as tech companies do: “users.” Both are dedicated to creating addiction. Read more

Military Doctor Hopes Gender Transitions for Kids Will Cause Psychotic Disorders to ‘Melt Away’.

The military’s frenetic embrace of transgender ideology is being implemented too slowly, complained a team of five researchers led by Air Force Colonel Dr. David A. Klein, in an article presenting eight policy recommendations to expand gender transition procedures for minors in the military hospital system.

The article asserts “unwanted” puberty is “demonstrably harmful, while claiming that “gender-affirming health care … optimizes patient-oriented outcomes” and alternative strategies are “unethical.” Read more

Sanctity of Life

In Bolivia, evangelicals offer government plan to prevent violence against children.

Coinciding with Children’s Day in Bolivia, the National Association of Evangelicals of Bolivia (ANDEB) has led, together with other organisations and institutions, a march for children called “United for Children”.

In addition, the organisation has published a manifesto addressed to the Bolivian authorities in which they regret the lack of visibility of the needs of children and the lack of action regarding their problems. This is the part of the population that deserves priority attention from all levels, according to the group representing evangelicals. Read more

Parade of Nations a “glimpse of heaven” at 2023 Heartbeat International Conference.

In brilliant waves of color, the flags of 90 nations—all home to Heartbeat International affiliates—swept into place onstage Wednesday evening at the Heartbeat International Annual Conference in Louisville, Ky., a dramatic visual reminder of the international nature of the pregnancy help movement.

Volunteers carrying the flags of roughly 70 nations without attending representatives entered first and flanked the stage. Read more

US gov’t to spend $1.5 million on abortion ‘hotline’.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is offering a $1.5 million grant to a provider of a planned abortion hotline, reflecting President Joe Biden’s priority of expanding abortion through all nine months of pregnancy at taxpayer expense without any limits.

The Office of Population Affairs wants to establish a “hotline” to provide information to “pregnant clients” on “pregnancy termination” as well as adoption and prenatal care. The grant would explicitly exclude pro-life organizations, as the hotline operator must provide “neutral, factual information and nondirective counseling on each of the options,” as if information on prenatal vitamins is the same as where to get an abortion. Read more

Religion

A new survey explores how and where Americans seek divine connection — and who they pray for.

The survey found that during the lockdowns, some 53% of people who prayed actually prayed more and many sustained that elevated level of spiritual practice.

Although it identified a strong spiritual streak in the American public overall, the new survey is not at odds with recent research from the Pew Research Center, showing that religious “nones” are on the rise. The share of those who don’t affiliate with any faith group rose from 16% to 29% from 2007 to 2021. Read more

1 Year Later: Dobbs Leak Led to Attacks on Justices, Pro-Lifers, Catholics.

On May 2, 2022, someone leaked the draft Supreme Court opinion indicating that Roe v. Wade would soon be overturned. The Dobbs leak spurred illegal protesting intended to influence the justices, attacks on Catholic churches and pro-life pregnancy centers, and even an assassination attempt against Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. Read more

Arkansas Governor Signs Bill Strengthening Religious Freedom Protections.

The Conscience Protection Act (HB 1615) stipulates that the Arkansas government “shall not take any discriminatory action against a religious organization on the basis of the religious identity or status of the religious organization.”

The bill also states that religious organizations cannot be discriminated against for “maintaining policies and procedures in accordance with a sincerely held religious belief, or the religious organization engaging in religious conduct protected by the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.” Read more

Sexuality

Nation’s top abortion provider is now also a top provider of ‘transgender care’.

Live Action News has estimated that between 2014 and 2019, Planned Parenthood saw a 669% increase — nearly 700% — in the number of facilities offering cross-sex hormone injections for transgender-identifying individuals, an increase from 26 centers to 200 centers.

In other words, the nation’s largest abortion provider has now set itself up as the second-largest provider of transgender-related services in the nation. Read more

Pornhub Blocks Access to Utah in Response to Age Verification Law.

In response to a Utah law set to go into effect Wednesday requiring pornography sites to verify the age of users in order to block access to minors, MindGeek, one of the world’s largest pornography companies, has blocked all Utahans from accessing their flagship site Pornhub, along with a number of other porn sites owned by the company. In light of MindGeek’s move, experts are pointing to a potential sea change that could occur in internet safety for minors if more states follow Utah’s lead. Read more

Gates-funded Planned Parenthood org tells kids under 10 ‘commercial sex work’ is a ‘relationship’.

The International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) is receiving attention for a Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) toolkit it released in 2017, a portion of which was recently highlighted on Twitter by Nicole Solas of the Independent Women’s Forum.

The guide advises that children under 10 should be taught that “Sexuality is a part of you from the moment you are born,” and that children aged 10-18 should be taught that “People are sexual beings throughout their lives,” and that “Everyone has sexual feelings.”

But even more disturbingly, “commercial sex work” is listed as one of many “different types” of “interpersonal relationships” — including dating and marriage — about which children under the age of 10 should be taught. Read more