Penna Dexter

In a study of 10^th and 12^th graders conducted during peak Covid-19 school lockdown months, fewer respondents reported feeling depressed than in a study conducted two years earlier. The study’s lead author, academic psychologist Jean Twenge, says spending more time with their families was good for these teenagers’ mental health. The baseline for Gen-Z happiness is low. Their extensive social media use and often minimal in-person social interaction makes healthy family life crucial for them. Yet there are powerful societal forces threatening to mitigate the influence of the nuclear family. Countless studies and simple common sense tell us that a child fares best when raised by a married mom and dad. Even organizations one could describe as woke admit that kids with married parents do best. To them, the nuclear family is an oppressor precisely because it provides these good outcomes. The Colson Center’s John Stonestreet and Maria Baer point to Black Lives Matter’s prior statements of their intention to “disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement.” Mr. Stonestreet’s Breakpoint commentary identifies “scholars” who acknowledge the benefits but maintain that nuclear families “disadvantage other family arrangements…an example of privilege rooted in white supremacy.” In a recent sermon, Pastor John MacArthur told the congregation at Grace Community Church and his radio audience: “This culture is weaponized to destroy children. It’s systematically designed to do that.” He lamented the millions of babies “slaughtered in the womb”. He then critiqued public education where children “come under the influence of those whose agenda is anti-God, anti-Christ, and anti-Scripture.” Politicians, he said, “are making laws that are devastating to children under the pressure of sexual freedom, homosexuality, transgenderism” and banning hate speech to punish people who speak against these things. The current universal government daycare proposal with its stated goal to get mothers into the workforce is not a solution to the weakening of the American family. We must summon the courage to uphold God’s good design for the family.