Federal data from 2007 says 40 percent of births in America are to unwed mothers, a trend experts say is especially common in middle-class America. In one St. Louis community, the notion of getting married and having children ”” in that order ”” seems quaint.
For most of their relationship, Nathan Garland and Brianne Zimmerman have marked their anniversary by New Year’s Eve, 2001. They say that was the day they both knew they had found the one.
“It seemed obvious to me the first time we kissed,” Garland says. “Just kind of connected, right then. It really was that obvious.”
They moved in together shortly afterward. They decided to have a baby a few years later, but had no interest in getting married.
As a person whose mother was widowed at the age of 38 and left with three sons to raise, aged 4, 7 and 12 years, I can tell you that the absence of a birth-father in the family can be a continually heart-wrenching experience for a young child.
And a man who is willing to conceive a child and yet not share in a close marital relationship with the child’s mother is less-than-a-father, he is in archaic English a “cad.”
#1 I too was reared by a widowed mother and agree with your statement. However not all unmarried fathers are in that position by their choice alone. So what do you call the guy who truly wanted to be married to the mother of his child but was refused because of such reasons as loss of medicaid? Oh and let’s not forget the lauding of single motherhood in this culture. A lauding which paints fathers as unnecessary appendages who will only get in the way of a mom’s freedom and empowerment.
The sad thing is that many of today’s single moms view single motherhood as the norm having been reared by single moms themselves. And many man have no idea of the important role fathers play in the lives of their children or why weekend parenting just is not enough for healthful child development.
related and quite depressing:
All Joy and No Fun
Why parents hate parenting.
http://nymag.com/print/?/news/features/67024/
The calm (nonjudgmental) ending of this NPR story was especially disappointing. I think it’s simply ludicrous to suggest that the jury is still out on the effects of such a massive number of children being raised without two married parents. Now in one sense that’s true; this is an unprecedented social experiment, and so, sure, we can’t predict ALL the effects that will eventually make themselves apparent in 20 years or so. But there is already more than enough data to show that the overall effects are very, very bad. By every objective standard: success in school, avoidance of crime and drug troubles, etc. children without two married parents do much, much worse than children who enjoy that stable, divinely-intended home environment.
That an incredible 40% of American children are now born out of wedlock is absolutely mindboggling in its far-reaching implications. It demonstrates perhaps better than anything else how perilous and catastrophic has been our corporate slide into a permissive culture that’s in moral free fall.
There are lots of myths in our day about co-habitation that need to be exploded, and two of the chief myths are: 1. that living together is harmless; and 2. that it’s actually a good way to test drive a relationship to see if it would work. There’s already plenty of solid scietific data that’s piled up to prove that cohabitating couples are significantly MORE likely to end up divorced (if they eventually get married), not less. And that cohabitating couples are even less stable than married ones. Nor surprise there; it’s just what you’d expect.
What IS genuinely surprising is that so many couples today can testify with all sincerity that “[i]they didn’t feel any pressure to get married.[/i]” That profound sea change in the culture is not a sign of a positive growth in tolerance but is rather symptomatic of what’s terribly wrong with our antinomian culture.
I hesitate to bring it up, lest it seem racist, but this NPR report doesn’t mention that while the rate of children born to unwed mothers has hit an alarming 40% level among Americans in general, bad as that is, it doesn’t go on to note that among African Americans, the figure is an even more appalling 67% or so. The black community has been utterly devastated by this plague of epidemic numbers of children being born to unmarried mothers and absent fathers.
But what I find most discouraging is that the rates of cohabitation and giving birth outside of marriage are virtually as high within the Church as outside of it. That is a totally unacceptable scandal. We Christians desperately need to get our house in order.
David Handy+
#1. Anglican,
I agree with you. Better dad than cad. Marriage or abstinence is the only answer to this mess.
But why get married if there is no pressing reason to do so? If you can get all the benefits without getting married, why add that risk? Will they be unaware of the damage they will do to their own children? Of course. As far as they can see, there is no damage to be seen. Their kids are normal. What’s the problem?
Because so many of these people are “liberal,” then they have no reason to examine the past and assess their own behavior in its terms. The past is dead; they’re the future, no? And the truth is, they WON’T pay, but the culture as a whole will be subtly corrupted. Decadence looks like any other period to the participants. Only history will know better. Larry
Agree with all comments above. Bottom line – lack of really committing to anything that might get in the way of the word “I”…..Me and My
As one who came of age in the 50s and 60s, I can tell you that the sexual moral standards then were much stricter than now or even in the 70s, 80s, and 90s – duh! Having made that statement that everyone knows, let me explain why I think it is significant to say it: society back then did not accept pregnancy outside of marriage as acceptable or ok. As a result, most girls and guys (yes, guys, too) did not have sex in high school and generally until later in college. There was always one girl who got pregnant and went away to the Crittenden Home, but, in general, that simply was not something that happened. As a corollary, divorce was not socially acceptable, either. As a result, families stayed together as a rule. Also, churches upheld these standards and taught them. Now arguments today that it’s better for some families to split for the children’s sake and that judging folks on moral grounds is unchristian (and I put that in lower case on purpose) is, of course, part of the liberal agenda. And our reappraising churches are constantly trying to conform to these liberal political agendas.
In areas where folks don’t like the standards or don’t feel like they can meet them, the liberal agenda and way of life is to change the standards, or better yet, “redefine” them. Remember that priest out in CA who was redefining “chastity” a few weeks ago to make it mean faithfulness and loyalty, because he couldn’t fit Glasspool into the chastity category. We have let the liberals (reappraisers) redefine our standards and words, inch by inch, over the last 50 years, so that there are no longer standards. In 2003, the reappraisers couldn’t get the language they wanted through GC regarding approving and blessing SS relationships. So they put through a phrase that was purposefully ambiguous, that the church “acknowledged” that such relationships existed within the church (or something similar – I don’t have the exact wording). The point was that they couldn’t get the word “approved” through the vote, so they substituted “acknowledged” and then later interpreted that to mean “approved.” As we are beginning to understand from the reasserting side, words are important. And to let the other side define them is the way to lose all that we have.
I leave you with these questions: in 1960, did the word “gay” mean one was homosexual or happy? were the words “homosexual” and “queer” words that were indications of good things in 1960 or of questionable things? was the word “gay” adopted to get away from the words “homosexual” and “queer?” did the liberals tell those who refused to use the word “gay” that they were showing disrespect for homosexuals by continuing to use that term instead of the term “gay?” As my grandmother said before she died, “‘Gay’ used to be such a lovely word, but now they have turned it into something tawdry.” I say “marriage” and “fidelity” used to be such steadfastly stabilizing words, but now they have turned them into something sneered at and trifling.