Why the Attack on the Family Is Doomed
Writer, speaker, wife, and mother-of-five Kimberly Ells tells the story of the Hadjok family living under communist rule in Hungary before their escape over the Austrian border in The Invincible Family.
By day, the two children, Vera and Johan, attended a compulsory state school, which indoctrinated them and all the other students in the tenets of Marxist socialism. When darkness fell, however, their parents brought the light of truth to Vera and Johan. Ells shares their story from James A. Michener’s The Bridge at Andau:
At night after we had put out the lights upstairs we would gather in the cellar, and I would teach the children the true history of Hungary. We would discuss morality and the Catholic religion and the lessons of Cardinal Mindszenty. We never allowed the children to go to sleep until we had washed away the evil things they might have heard that day.
Ells then adds via Michener:
The result of Mr. and Mrs. Hadjok’s nightly teaching in the cellar was captured by a brother-in-law’s assessment of young Vera: ‘… At ten she understood the evil of communism. At thirteen she is a holy patriot.’ ‘Against such children,’ said her father, ‘what could communism do?’
So why, asks Ells, did these children and so many of their peers believe their parents instead of the state? “Because parents love their children more than regimes love children, and children can tell the difference.”
Communism collapsed in Hungary in 1989, yet today parents, children, and the family remain under attack locally, nationally, and globally. The Invincible Family covers a wide spectrum of the ongoing postmodernist assaults on the traditional family, from the denigration of fatherhood to comprehensive sexuality education to policies advocating children’s sexual rights and beyond. The aggressors in this army are Marxists, radical feminists, the United Nations, countless politicians (including ones in the United States), and dictators.
As we follow Ells’ arguments and data, dismay or even despair might be the natural reaction for proponents of the family and of civilization itself. All these bureaucrats and officials, all the cultural elites and experts spouting off nostrums and concocting schemes, the vast sums of money that back these efforts to replace the family with ideology and the state: All these might induce readers to give up the fight and huddle under the sheets.
Despite her dire warnings, however, Ells again and again reminds us of the ancient power of the family, particularly of motherhood. She writes, for instance, “For millennium, women—mothers—have gained and maintained the allegiance of the very young.” As Ells tells us, opponents of the family understand this unique power of the mother, “the keystone of the family … the architect of society,” and so it is true femininity and motherhood they seek to destroy. Destroy that bond, and all is lost.
To give both women and men more weapons in their arsenal of defense, Ells includes a “What You Can Do” list as the epilogue to her book, practical suggestions, some of them quite simple, designed to strengthen the bonds of the family and thwart the conniving ambitions of those wishing to rule or annihilate this foundation stone of culture. Her recommendations include some of those found frequently here at Intellectual Takeout: sharing the past with children through books and stories, forming support groups with likeminded friends and neighbors, and staying abreast of the news regarding family policies. She also specifically recommends exploring StopCSE.org, which exposes the agenda of comprehensive sexuality education.
For the family unit to break, parents only need to stand by and allow it to happen. But by caring for, educating, and standing up for their children, parents can hold the family firm. As Ells says:
Take heart. The family cannot be destroyed. It can only be abandoned. Mothers, fathers, stand fast. Do not step aside. Your child is uniquely yours and no one else’s. Do not be dissuaded. Do not abandon your post. Do not surrender your greatest treasure. Guard it with your life.
In the Book of Samuel, David killed a roaring giant with a sling and stones from a brook. Parents will kill today’s evil colossus with even more powerful weapons: steadfast courage and love of their children.
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Image credit: Reddit-r/Pics