Elder Bruce D. Porter

• The family unit is eternal. The differences between men and women were not created by society but are “woven into eternity”. A family brings a renovation of life, truth, and civilization. These fail if the family fails. We see such failures now because the family structure is in a state of crisis. In the United States alone there are 70 million cohabitating couples, 40% of children born out of wedlock, and the highest divorce rate in the world.

• Those of the rising generation don't know how to have a normal family. They are being bombarded with the idea that free sex has no consequences, children are a burden, and self-fulfillment is paramount. These ideas lead to unhappiness.
  

• We now have a generation of marriage-age young adults who are well educated but extremely lonely. Students come home after graduating from college and bawl on their beds because they are so unhappy and don’t know why. They are feeling the absence of a connection with family. They are stuck at the “sterile apex of the ‘me-generation’.”
  

• Selfishness in any degree weakens family, so it is understandable that this ‘me’ ideology would have a destructive influence on the formation of families. Elder Porter recommended The Rise of Selfishness in America by James Lincoln Collier.
  

• Society in America loves self and freedom of choice. The irresponsible male is set up as the ideal man. However, Jesus Christ teaches that salvation comes from selflessness and submission. “Happiness is not something you get; it’s something you give.”

• Tolerance originally was defined as racial and religious non-discrimination and civility. It included respect for another person’s point of view. The current definition, however, allows for an all-encompassing acceptance of everything. It’s a refusal to make ethical judgments or moral statements. Often these arguments are one-way; those who argue tolerance are intolerant towards religious beliefs even though the First Amendment applies to all freedom of speech.

• A higher virtue than tolerance is love and charity. True love is a desire to bring happiness to others. Happiness is best achieved in the family. When we help others understand the doctrine of the family, we are showing our love for them by helping them achieve the truest happiness.
  

• God’s blessings are highly conditional, even and especially the ability to feel God’s love. When we stray, we feel it less.
  

• May every child know the joy of a happy home.

• Elder Porter: The Importance of the Family LDS Church News
  

Stand for the Family

I slipped into the half-full auditorium and found a seat in the back. I realized too late that I had planted myself right next to a googly-eyed couple who had little fear of expressing their affection. I looked up and spotted another set of snugglers in the row ahead. I laughed as I said to myself, “Really, Amy? What inspires a single girl to go alone on a Friday night to a conference on families?”

To be honest, I don’t know. All that I know is that over the last several months, my feelings about families have completely changed. I grew up knowing that being a part of a family made me happy and was an important part of my theology, but I think that that was the extent of my honest conversion to the idea. Having recently felt the full meaning of the attack on the family in my own life, I was forced to a recognition of my lukewarm support of this important entity. I also was brought to my knees at the realization of the extent of the contorted effort to disband the family unit. It’s everywhere: in politics, the question of marriage is debated; in media, free and casual sex is promoted and accepted; in school, safe sex is taught more liberally than pre-marital abstinence. These are no longer abstract concepts in tattered newspapers or sociology textbooks; these are issues that will affect the strength of my future family. There is fast fading any opportunity to be gray on my position concerning the family. Either I believe in it and work for its preservation, or I don’t. I might be tempted to think that my state of being ‘between families’ qualifies me to sit on the sidelines of the family debate, but I have an even more pressing obligation to defend the family I hope to form someday.

I was glad to gain some added insight into the attack on the family over a two day symposium presented at BYU called Stand for the Family. The following posts will be personal notes on several of the presentations. The first is from the Friday night message given by Elder Bruce D. Porter.