FAGAN Pat (U.S.A.)

Director of the Marriage and Religion Research Institute, Washington D.C.

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Lecture and abstract of the conference entitled:
Demography and the Culture of Relationship between Couples
27-29 May 2021, Hungary
Organized by Family Science Alliance, Batthyány Society of Professors and European Family Science Society


 

The married father: the new patriarch serving his wife and children.

Abstract

The principal goal of parenthood is to raise their children to marry a great spouse,
With the French Revolution, the modern assault on the family and religion began in a public policy
organized fashion. By the 1960’s its strategy had been refined to a parsimonious agenda: the removal of
the married father (“the patriarch”) from the family. This was achieved by “sex gone wild”. By 2010 only
46% of American teenagers (15-17 years old) lived in an intact married family with both biological
parents and only 17% for the Black teenager.

The rebuilding of culture depends on the reemergence of the male as father in the always intact married
family. For that teenage chastity and purity of heart are fundamental needs. The father’s role is central
in forming these virtues in his son— the older male teaching the younger male how to be a great male,
one capable of serving his wife and children all his life.

He tutors him in the avoidance of pornography.

To be successful as a tutor requires that a father be close to his son. That closeness is most easily
attained in infancy, starting with the birth of the child, and maintained through activities together (play
and work).

Between the parents, the father, rather than the mother, is the greater transmitter of both intact
marriage and religious practice.

Within his marriage to his wife lies his power to shape the marriage goals and ideals of his sons and
daughters.

He deliberately befriends other families so that his children have virtuous peers by the time he reaches
adolescence and learns how to be a male who is comfortable with females (the sisters of his friends and
the friends of his sisters).

The father is not only his son’s closest mentor but also introduces him to other mentors.

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