The Geneva Declaration 1999
Our Purpose
We assemble in this
World Congress, from many national, ethnic, cultural, social and
religious communities, to affirm that the natural human family
is established by the Creator and essential to good society. We
address ourselves to all people of good will who, with the
majority of the world's people, value the natural family.
Ideologies of statism, individualism and sexual revolution,
today challenge the family's very legitimacy as an institution.
Associated with this challenge are the problems of divorce,
devaluation of parenting, declining family time, morally
relativistic public education, confusions over sexual identity,
promiscuity, sexually transmitted diseases, abortion, poverty,
human trafficking, violence against women, child abuse,
isolation of the elderly, excessive taxation and
below-replacement fertility. To defend the family and to guide
public policy and cultural norms, this Declaration asserts
principles that respect and uphold the vital roles that the
family plays in society.
The
Family and Society
The natural family is
the fundamental social unit, inscribed in human nature, and
centered on the voluntary union of a man and a woman in the
lifelong covenant of marriage. The natural family is defined by
marriage, procreation and, in some cultures, adoption. Free,
secure and stable families that welcome children are necessary
for healthy society. The society that abandons the natural
family as the norm is destined for chaos and suffering. The
loving family reaches out in love and service to their
communities and those in need. All social and cultural
institutions should respect and uphold the rights and
responsibilities of the family.
The
Family and Marriage
The cornerstone of
healthy family life, marriage brings security, contentment,
meaning, joy and spiritual maturity to the man and woman who
enter this lifelong covenant with unselfish commitment. In
marriage, both husband and wife commit to a life of mutual love,
respect, support and compassion. Spousal conflicts that can
arise in marriage are opportunities for personal and marital
growth, not, as modern cultures encourage, reasons to break the
covenant. Divorce is destructive to families and society.
Society and public policy should discourage divorce, while
taking legal or other appropriate action in cases of
intransigently abusive relationships. Steadfast commitment in
marriage provides the security in family life that children
need. Children also need and are entitled to the complementary
parental love and attention of both father and mother, which
marriage provides. Communities and religious institutions should
care for families and households whose circumstances fall short
of these ideals. Social policies should not promote
single-parenting.
The
Family and Children
The natural family
provides the optimal environment for the healthy development of
children. Healthy family life fulfills the basic human need to
belong and satisfies the longings of the human heart to give and
receive love. The family informs the human person's original
attitude toward such fundamental matters as identity, security,
responsibility, love, morality and religion. In personal and
intimate ways that no self-defining entity could, the natural
family cares for its children and provides for their spiritual,
physical, psychological and moral growth. Policy should promote
the definition and permanence in family relationships that
create the stability and security in family life children need.
The
Family and Sexuality
The complementary
natures of men and women are physically and psychologically
self-evident. These differences are created and natural, not
primarily socially constructed. Sexuality is ordered for the
procreation of children and the expression of love between
husband and wife in the covenant of marriage. Marriage between a
man and a woman forms the sole moral context for natural sexual
union. Whether through pornography, promiscuity, incest or
homosexuality, deviations from these created sexual norms cannot
truly satisfy the human spirit. They lead to obsession, remorse,
alienation, and disease. Child molesters harm children and no
valid legal, psychological or moral justification can be offered
for the odious crime of pedophilia. Culture and society should
encourage standards of sexual morality that support and enhance
family life.
The
Family and Life
The intrinsic worth,
right to life and sanctity of life of every human person exists
throughout the continuum of life, from fertilization until
natural death.
Every human life is a
gift to the person, the family and society. Loving families
cherish and serve all their members, including the weak, aged
and handicapped. Taking innocent human life through abortion and
euthanasia is wrong; respect for human life demands that we
choose the life-protecting options of adoption and palliative
care. The destruction of embryonic human beings, lethal human
embryo experimentation and abortifacients also involve wrongful
takings of human life. All experimentation and research on human
beings should be beneficial to the particular human subject.
Trafficking in the organs and limbs of aborted children and
other human beings, cloning humans and human-genetic engineering
treat human life as a commodity and should not be allowed.
Animal-human genetic experimentation is a crime against
humanity. Policy should respect the inherent dignity of human
life.
The
Family and Population
Human society depends
on the renewal of the human population; the true population
problem is depopulation, not overpopulation. Many nations are
experiencing below-replacement fertility, arising from
widespread abortion, birth control, lack of interest in marriage
and declining family sizes. People are living longer, increasing
the size of elderly populations, while there are proportionally
decreasing numbers of taxpayers to support their elders'
retirement incomes and health care. Because just governments and
creative human enterprise and charity offer the best hope for
addressing the problems of poverty, hunger and disease, no
country should be coerced to accept policies of "population
control." Efforts to assist developing countries should
focus on promoting family self-sufficiency, not dependency.
The
Family and Education
Parents uniquely
possess the authority and responsibility to direct the
upbringing and education of their children. By its nature,
education is not only technical and practical, but also moral
and spiritual. The family is the child's first school, parents
the first and most important teachers. Love of community and
loyalty to nation begin in the family. The state usurps the
parental role when it monopolizes and mandates the educational
system, and deprives parents of their intrinsic authority over
their children's education. Nor should government schools or
health clinics treat minor children's health without parental
approval.
School curricula
should not undermine the right of parents to teach their
children moral and spiritual values. Parents have a duty to
their children and to society to provide their children an
adequate education. Parents should be free to spend their
education resources, including tax money, on the schools of
their choice, such as sending them to a religious school or
educating their children themselves in the home.
The
Family and Economy
Economic policy, both
corporate and governmental, should be crafted to allow the
family economy to flourish; what is good for families is good
for the economy.
Family economy
centers on the pursuit of meaningful employment to fulfill one's
personal vocation and to provide for the present and future
needs, obligations, and desires of the family -- such as food,
shelter, education, health care, charity, recreation, retirement
income, taxes and the intergenerational family estate.
Healthy families
produce good citizens and workers, competent consumers and
innovative entrepreneurs. Employers should allow workers
flexible family and maternity leave. Corporate philanthropy and
national and international funding for economic development
should strengthen the natural family. Such funds should not be
used to support organizations whose programs harm the family.
Commerce in products that appeal to addictions, such as harmful
drugs, gambling and violent and pornographic media, undermine
the family and should be opposed.
The
Family and Government
Government should
protect and support the family, and not usurp the vital roles it
plays in society.
When the state or its
agent attempts to exercise a right or responsibility that
belongs to the family, albeit with good intentions to address a
vexing social problem, its effect is to undermine and displace
the family and make matters worse. Government policies should
not create pressure for mothers to enter the workplace when they
would prefer to care for their families full time. Government
should secure an orderly, lawful and just society that allows
families freely and responsibly to: form in the covenant of
marriage and bear children, pursue meaningful work, provide for
their material and health needs, direct the education and
upbringing of their children, participate in charitable, civic
and recreational activities, care for elderly family members,
build estates for their present and future generations, and
practice their religion.
The
Family and Religion
Parents have the
right to teach their religious and moral beliefs to their
children and to raise them according to their religious
precepts. Based on, and consistent with, the human right to
religious liberty, families have the right to believe, practice
and express their religious views in love. Religious
institutions should not accommodate cultural trends that
undermine the created nature of the family. One need not hold
religious views to recognize that the family is part of human
nature and the fundamental social unit. Religious institutions
have the crucial cultural-leadership role of affirming that: the
natural human family is established in creation and is essential
to a good society; life and sexuality are gifts from the
Creator, to be enjoyed respectfully and wholesomely; the family
is sacred and has the unique authority, responsibility and
capacity to provide for its members' education, health care and
welfare; and all social institutions should respect and uphold
the institution of the family.
Call
to Respect the Family
We exhort all
persons, families, social organizations and governments
throughout the world to respect and uphold the institution of
the natural human family, in accordance with the principles of
this Declaration, for the good of present and future
generations.