This started as a response to Julie’s very well-thought out comment in response to her first impressions of the Family Manifesto I mentioned in my last post, but they are interesting issues. She is right that the manifesto starts with a false foundation and depicts the foundation of the family as a sort of romantic love, although I believe they back away from that later. Later, this is an expression of the created order.
The biggest difficulty I had with this document is that it is a little vague and generic and there are several statements that could mean several things. I enjoyed chapter one much more. The manifesto seems to seek a governmental solution through a form of Christian activism and seems to support some form of Interfaith and the UNs ability to further these goals. Or maybe not. I’m not sure. For the moment, I’ve credited most of the specific problems with the document to an attempt to make this document appealing to humanity, not just Christians.
Is such a thing possible or even desirable? As a Christian, can we set aside religious and denominational differences to work together toward a common goal? Should we? After all, we hold that all solutions flow naturally from a right relationship with Christ. But here are a couple of quotes that are more what was in mind when I said that they are close. Close enough to discuss. And, just for your information, Chapter I also gets into the philosophical background for the ideas in our culture. Rousseau, Locke, Hobbes, etc. So you know that would attract my attention!
First, what appears to be the foundation they are going forth from. I agree with the first part and would say the second part has to do with Christ. Like I said, they are close.
The problem is not serial divorce, nor gay marriage, nor widespread elective childlessness, nor the general disregard for the lives of the very young and very old. Those are only symptoms. The deepest problem is the loss of a generally shared vision, firmly grounded in nature, of what the family is, and why our destiny as individuals and as a society is inseparable from its proper flourishing.” Wilfred McClay, quoted in The Natural Family, a Manifesto (p. 30)
The hope:
The institution of the home is the one anarchist institution…It is the only check on the state that is bound to renew itself as eternally as the state, and more naturally than the state. G.K. Chesterton, What’s Wrong with the World (1910)
The reason:
A just political life also flows out of natural family homes. True sovereignty originates here. These homes are the source of ordered liberty, the fountain of real democracy, the seedbed of virtue. The Natural Family, A Manifesto (p. 6)
This is where they run into some difficulties, because they treat the family as an end, but they haven’t defined what they mean by that, yet. Today’s problems also flow naturally from the family because our families are without a foundation. And a bit tying this to America’s founding:
In his provocative book The Myth of American Individualism, the political historian Barry Shain shows that “Americans in the Revolutionary era embraced a theory of the good life that is best described as reformed Protestant and communal.” The American Revolution, he asserts, had more to do with the defense of “familial independence” than it did with quests for personal liberation. Americans of the founding era, Shain insists, were rooted in agrarian, religious, family-centric communities. These Americans saw family households as the common source of new citizens, the places where the character traits necessary to free government would be shaped, the foundation stones of ordered liberty…Ibid, p. 39
It goes back to “first principles” which the authors attempt to do. I think those of us on the more conservative side will tend to say that the first principle is Christ and until the foundation is set, the rest is irrelevant. But we can uphold a model for the world…and our churches splinter the family as much as the world.
Principled Discovery is a place to stop and discuss news and information related to faith, family and particularly education. Pour yourself a cup of tea and join the conversation! 
I have been commenting on your blog for awhile now. You know that I am fairly conservative in my politics and pretty fundamental in my theology. And, I found this document over-my-top ~
I am very leary of the theological/political agendas that seem to permeate this document. I disagree with the idea that Christians can create a better society using the political/legal system and do not believe that there is any biblical support for this stance. When I trace this thinking back to its root, I generally find RJ Rushdooney and his Chalcedon Foundation, other theonomists and hyper-patriarchal (not complementarian as asserted by this manifesto) groups.
As Rushdoony is considered a father of the homeschooling movement, I have found myself reading a lot of his writings (or the writings of those that hold him up as a role model). I read these thoughts and I find myself nodding in agreement with a lot of what he has to say. But, truthfully, as I am reading I eat the meat and spit out the bones ~ and I find a lot that I just spit out.
[seems to seek a governmental solution through a form of Christian activism]… that is a problem. I don’t want to create a large government to forward the liberal agenda. I would be equally uncomfortable creating a large government to forward the conservative agenda.
This is the problem I have…Christians cannot work through government to change the heart of man. You know I agree with that. I don’t see him as a Rushdooney-type…more trying to appeal to the instincts of a broader range of people: Protestant and Catholic, Christian and Muslim, monotheist and polytheist, religious and secular.
If anything, I think he is straying from any idea of a “Christian” nation in favor of ne built on the family.
If I were to write this, it would be to the churches, starting with the foundation in Christ and moving out from there. If the church cannot fix the crisis in its own family, it has no business trying to teach the world what to do. And if we can, we teach through providing a model, not through legislation.
I like the point near the end, however, about what the imposed western ideas really are and where they originate.
He raises several interesting points…but I’, not sure exactly what he means with his solutions, yet. The manifesto seems to suggest something, but it is contradicted later. I’ll decide more as I read further.
ok i’ve finally read it.
while i do think there can be some sort of inter-faith or inter-denominational “activism” such as we’ve seen in some parts of the pro-life & pro-family movements, i think questioning this in a document you are supposed to sign on to is important. when it comes down to it, just because there is some sort of ritual for marriage in animism is no reason to join together with those who practice it.
i also think you are right when you say this should be directed toward the church, not the state. i found myself thinking a few times that this simply seeks to establish a new type of socialism (living family wage, all families owning their own property, etc)
also, i would have to say that his view that corporate america is basically evil and is one of the roots of this problem and therefore must virtually eradicated (my interpretation of his rather overt ideal of the return to agrarial living) shows a great misunderstanding of economics. he seems not to want us to return to the 1950’s but the 1850’s.
while i agree with a lot of it, there is far too much i find to be in direct opposition to my faith to sign on to it. but i am tired of typing with one hand now…:-)
I agree with that! I can’t say for sure what he is saying at the moment…at points they seem to back away from what ruffled me at first. I am NOT recommending signing on to it. Not as it currently stands. But there are some issues I think are interesting and worthy of discussion.
He is trying to go forth from the family as a universal concept and prove its importance from that. It is the same sort of reasoning Rousseau used in his idea of the natural man. But with that reasoning, you can end up anywhere, because it isn’t firmly grounded.
He presents an idea for the family that I think is very interesting, and part of that is this agrarian lifestyle to which you refer…the family business as the union between the economic and the sexual.
Of course, I’m reading this while working on an article about a mission with an interesting, family focus and purpose.
I didn’t like the attack against business, the elevation of the UN nor the apparent elevation of FDRs social policies later. But then, he also states in places that the solution cannot be found in legislation, but must be a cultural shift. That I agree with. I’m hoping this will be clarified later, so that I can say for sure whether I think they are adding to the problem, or are just a little off-base in their reasoning.
Other than the apparent praise of the UN, which has actually proven itself at using these documents to bring about the opposite of their stated goals, the other examples can as readily be interpreted as providing historical background for the problem. I can’t disagree with the fact that the industrial revolution placed a huge stress on our families. Something that wouldn’t have occurred, however, if the church had been more “up to the challenge.”
I am still of the opinion that almost all of our social ills can be traced back to a failure in the church to have an effective, biblical response.