THE
P RTAL
May 2017
Page 24
What has happened
to the Traditional
Family in the West?
Geoffrey Kirk raises an important issue
M
ay, they are saying, ends in June. But in today’s febrile politics nothing is that certain. What we
can rely on is that Catholics will be unable to vote, in June, for a party – any of the existing parties –
which will seek to protect and foster the traditional family, especially the party of the Vicar’s Daughter.
The statistics are horrific.
culture. It will surprise nobody but the hierarchs if this
rather backhanded response exacerbates the problem,
‘The number of divorces throughout the EU is on the and yet the problem is real and pressing.
increase’, writes the Daily Mail, ‘with an average of 1.8
divorces for every 1,000 people. But in Britain and in
If birth rates continue to fall and families become
Finland the rate is 2.8 divorces per 1,000, compared a rarer commodity in the West, the very future
with just 0.6 per 1,000 in Luxembourg.
of Catholic Christianity in its historic European
homeland is threatened.
While the divorce rate increased only slightly during
the 1990s, the rate of births outside marriage has risen
We need to remind ourselves, before it is too late,
sharply - more than one child in four was born outside that Islam is fecund and family-friendly.
marriage in the EU in 1999, compared with fewer than
one in five in 1989. The figures vary widely between
member states - ranging from just 4% of births being
outside marriage in Greece to 55% in Sweden. Britain
is well above the 26% EU average, at 38.8%.’
Those statistics are the result of policies embraced
by all political groupings. Equality legislation, gay
marriage and abortion on demand – all of them
effectively irreversible – have radically altered our
society and its perception of co-habitation. They have
made it increasingly difficult for those who want a
traditional upbringing for their children to achieve or
support it.
The scramble for ‘equality’ will before long have
made the right to family life a privilege of the moneyed
classes. Anyone who has worked in primary education
knows the problems, anxiety and heartache which
many children suffer, and which an unstable family
environment ensures.
What is to be done? Since the ballot box is of no
avail, can the Church have some effect?
It seems not. After two protracted Synods on the
family, the favoured solution of the hierarchy is a
loosening of the sanctions surrounding divorce – a
half-hearted genuflection to the ambient secular