WARSAW, Poland – The fourth World Congress of Families (WCF) made a bold statement over the weekend from the capital of a conservative country trying to hold back a tide of secularism.
Allen Carlson, WCF international secretary, said he hopes to counter secular trends with a new vision.
"We see a world restored in line with the intent of its Creator," he said.
That intent, as expressed at the WCF, is for marriage to be between a man and a woman, for the family to be the world’s primary economic unit, for parents to be the first educators and for true happiness to be the result. But Catherine Vierling, general secretary of the European Forum for Human Rights and Family, said that’s not a message EU members want to hear.
"Some actively promote and implement very aggressive anti-life, anti-faith, anti-family agenda behind closed doors," she told attendees.
More than 3,000 scholars, researchers and leaders from more than 60 nations attended the event.
Government disincentives to child rearing, abortion on demand, special rights for homosexuals and oppressive restrictions on home schooling families are just a few of the policies coming out of the European Union. All take special aim at the family.
U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Ellen Sauerbrey had a stern reminder to governments that take such a position.
"The state did not create the family," she said. "The family created the state."
