1.
The current situation of the family in Europe
In
our days serious changes in family-life take place. Happy family-life is an
important ideal of the European citizens, but the reality of family-life is
frequently complicated and difficultly manageable.
It is encouraging that
in last years the political interest in family-issues is growing. Dutch
government has at present a minister of family affairs. In recent years the EU
institutions published studies and agendas about demography and family matters.
An important result of this new interest was the Green Paper presented by the
European Commission in 2005, Confronting demographic change: a new solidarity
between generations.[1]
The European Commission indicated the unprecedented demographic changes which
the European Union is facing due to the fact that people in Europe live longer
and birth rates are declining.
Obviously, the growing
interest in family affairs is a good sign. This does not take away, however,
that a number of important developments remain sources of great concern.
1.
Divorce-rate is high and is increasing to 50%. In our country the number
of children who do not see or barely see one of their both parents as a result
of divorce is growing by 44 children daily. Divorce has a great impact on the
life or people. Research yields evidence that the life expectancy of separated
people is shorter and that their children have a significant shorter life
expectancy, too, and an increased number of divorces of their own marriages.[2]
2.
Emancipation of women is a positive development, because women get more
possibilities to develop their gifts, but a new balance in the relationships of
men and women has not yet been found. The care for the family is still mainly a
task of women. For many women the combination of the care for the family and
professional labour is a heavy burden.
3.
Employment burdens heavily the family. Because family and work are
separated in space, employment of man and wife implies that family members lead
separate lives. Whereas in traditional setting man and wife frequently ran
together an enterprise or a farm, they nowadays meet each other only at time
off. Moreover employers require more and more flexibility of their employees.
This flexibility also has social impact. People, learning that they have to
adapt continuously, may also permit themselves flexibility in their personal
lives, among which less durable relations with family and friends.
4.
Due to individualisation married people become more independent on
society, but also more isolated. They have to shape their married life on their
own; for this reason they need a very good mutual communication, because they
are less supported in doing so by family and friends. That is the reason why
communication problems are an important topic in contemporary married life.
5.
For centuries in the Netherlands - as well as in other European countries
- marriage, love, lifelong faithfulness, sexuality and reproduction were closely
linked with each other. This relationship, particularly between marriage,
sexuality and procreation, is no longer obvious, especially as consequence of
the introduction of hormonal contraception, considered by the Roman Catholic
Church as intrinsic evil (Humanae Vitae no. 11-14; Familiaris
Consortio no. 32), at the beginning of the sixties. In family law the idea
of self-determination became one of the leading principles. Concerning the so
called procreative rights of the woman self-determination is assumed as guiding
principle, too. The complete idea of self-determination is however incompatible
with family-life, because family-life is not only life of the self, but rather
life in relationships with others.
6.
Europeans do actually have less children than they would like to have as
their personal ideal.[3]
And the birth rate is not up to the birth rate which is necessary to maintain
the present number of the European population. In 2002, the fertility rate in
the EU was 1.47 children whereas a birth rate of 2.1 children a woman is
necessary to maintain the current population size. Recent statistic enquiries
indicate, however, that fertility rate, especially in wealthy families, is
increasing.[4]
2.
Fundamental structures of the human being and of the life of the family
In
order to reflect on family-life today, we need a clear view of the human being
and the family.
a.
What is a human being?
On
this question several answers are given; I mention some of them: a man or a
woman is a thinking and free being; a human being is a social being; according
to the Jews and the Christians a human being has been created in God’s image.
That the human being is an image of God, implies that he is a social being. For
God is in Himself a loving community of the Three Divine Persons. The human
being alone cannot fully realize the image of God. He does this in a personal
communion with fellow human beings. This is most intensely realized in the
personal communion of man and wife in marriage,[5]
but in a broader sense also in society (Gaudium et Spes nr. 24;
cf. nr. 12).[6]
However, it is of course not necessary to believe in God to be convinced that
people are social beings. By nature people tend to live in community.
That humans beings depend on each fundamentally is most evident from the fact
they do not take or make their own lives. Every human being
receives life. That we came into existence, did not depend on our own will.
In most of cases a child grows up in a family and receives in the family besides
life love, knowledge of values and the care which it needs to grow up. The
development of a human being is closely linked to the family; inversely, the
lack of an important person or an important quality in the family has impact on
the children. Experiences of the young child in the family are to a high extent
educational for the rest of his life. Anyhow, life is a gift. And the
essential role which the family has in transmitting this gift, makes it a
particularly valuable entity.
The conception and birth of a child asks for recognition: not only a legal
recognition, but also the fundamental recognition of the child as a human being,
whose existence is precious, and the practical recognition of the needs of the
child in daily life. A child who is growing up needs recognition in the form of
love, attention and care.
Basic to the fundamental recognition of an other person is the recognition of
his or her right to life. Unfortunately, this recognition is not always given –
among other reasons when self-determination of the woman is misunderstood as a
right to dispose of the life of the child, growing in her womb.
b.
What is a family?
The family is a community, based on consanguinity and carrying
a great load of meaning. The institute of marriage gives the relationship of man
and woman a permanent structure and insert them in a larger family-circle.
Parenthood makes man and woman more than only biological procreators of their
children; they are considered as father and mother with all moral and affective
dimensions which belong to parenthood. According to the English philosopher
Brenda Almond family bonds are
“the cement of social
existence and are not subject to construction or deconstruction by something as
fragile and volatile as individual choice"[7].
In
nearly all cultures the family is an important institute. The Dutch philosopher
of law Dorien Pessers pointed out that marriage is from an anthropological point
of view an extraordinarily intelligent institute.[8]
The family is the first place of education. The family is also the place where
people learn what love is. From early days familial relationships carry with
them moral obligations. Family members are expected to assist each other
mutually. Parents have the moral duty to care for their children and to educate
them. And of old family properties are a good which have to be passed to future
generations. This familial loyalty is based on a gift ethic. For a child
this gift ethic is very important, because it is dependent on the love and care
which it receives. If the child receives this love and care, it is not
socialised in the economic morality of the do ut des (I give so that you
gives), but in the morality of the gift: do quia mihi datum est (I give
because things have been given to me).[9]
3.
Recognition of the fundamental structures of the human existence
Recognition of the fundamental structures of human existence requires more than
only recognition by positive law. The point is whether people recognize the
basis of law or not. This basis can be more or less expressed in positive law.
If positive law would be the last foundation of law, then in the end there would
be no other criterion outside power, as Pope John Paul II points out in his
encyclical letter Centesimus Annus:
“If one does not
acknowledge transcendent truth, then the force of power takes over, and each
person tends to make full use of the means at his disposal in order to impose
his own interests or his own opinion, with no regard for the rights of others.
People are then respected only to the extent that they can be exploited for
selfish ends” (Centesimus
Annus, no.
44).
The
Universal Declaration of Human Rights[10]
also refers to what goes beyond law, i.e. what has to be respected by positive
law in order that this be right and is really based on the truth concerning the
value of the human person. Thus the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
declares all members of the human family do have inalienable rights. Therefore
human rights do not exist only because people grant these rights to other
people, but because they are given within the fundamental structure of the human
existence.
Among inalienable human rights the Universal Declaration of Human Rights proclaimed by the General
Assembly of the United Nations in 1948 enumerate the
rights of the family. The right to found a family is a fundamental right:
“Men
and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or
religion, have the right to marry and to found a family” (art.16,1).
Explicitly is formulated that
“Marriage shall be entered
into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses” (art.16,2).
Article 16,3 defines the family
as
“the natural and
fundamental group unit of society”
and as
“entitled to protection by
society and the State.”
The protection of the
family is developed in the Declaration on several points, for example: the right
to work implies:
“Everyone who works has
the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his
family an existence worthy of human dignity” (art 23,3).
Also is pointed out
that
“motherhood and childhood
are entitled to special care and assistance” (art.25,2).
And finally is
mentioned the right
of parents
“to choose the kind of
education that shall be given to their children” (art.26,3).
One can summarise the rights of the family in two rights: the fundamental right
to life (simpliciter)[11]
and the right to good life in accordance with the inherent dignity of the human
being.
Pope John Paul II gave in his Encyclical Centesimus Annus a very
interesting short list of the most important human rights. He mentions six
rights, four of which are related to the family:
1.
“The right to life, an integral part of which is the right of the child
to develop in the mother's womb from the moment of conception;
2.
The right to live in a united family and in a moral environment conducive
to the growth of the child's personality;
3.
The right to share in the work which makes wise use of the earth's
material resources, and to derive from that work the means to support oneself
and one's dependents.
4.
The right freely to establish a family, to have and to rear children
through the responsible exercise of one's sexuality” (Centesimus
Annus, no. 47).
Pope John Paul II observed in this Encyclical that also in nations with
democratic forms of government, though often showing lively attention to and
concern for human rights, these rights are not always fully respected. He
referred
“not only to the
scandal of abortion, but also to different aspects of a crisis within
democracies themselves, which seem at times to have lost the ability to make
decisions aimed at the common good. Certain demands which arise within society
are sometimes not examined in accordance with criteria of justice and morality,
but rather on the basis of the electoral or financial power of the groups
promoting them” (Centesimus Annus no. 47).
The great emphasize, laid on economic interests and the free market, threatening
to become even a “idolatry of the market” (Ibid. no. 40), are for instance the
source of nowadays requirements in the field employment, mentioned above as
factors burdening family life.
Speaking about rights, I do not intend to consider family life only as a matter
of justice. Love is closely related to right, as Pope Benedict XVI says in his
new encyclical letter:
“Not only is justice
not extraneous to charity, not only is it not an alternative or parallel path to
charity: justice is inseparable from charity, and intrinsic to it” (Caritas
in Veritate,
no. 6).
Love asks for recognition of other persons and of their rights and at the same
time love surpasses the right in the possibility of self-gift and forgiveness.
But justice is– as Pope Paul VI said and Pope Benedict XVI with him – the
“minimum measure”[12]
of love. So good legislation and proper political choices can promote life in
love in the families.
4.
Some action items
1.
Recognition of the inherent dignity of man is a fundamental
requirement for just positivist law and a condition for freedom. We should pay
special attention to the rights of the weaker members of the society: the
poor in Africa and the poor in every country or the world, the elderly and the
children including the unborn children. Restrictions of the right to live are
always arbitrary and dangerous. The political pressure put on some countries in
the European Union to allow abortion is therefore condemnable. Every life is a
gift and ultimately a gift from God. John Paul II wrote in Evangelium Vitae:
“It is impossible to further the common good without acknowledging and defending
the right to life, upon which all the other inalienable rights of individuals
are founded and from which they develop” (nr. 101).
2.
The guiding principle of current Dutch family law – and of many other
European countries – is relational, sexual and reproductive self-determination.
Self-determination, however legitimate unto a certain extent, is never absolute.
The human being is never living on his own, but always in relationships to other
people and with his Creator. Essential for the human being is that he is a
social being. That is why he can only do justice to himself if he does justice
to others.[13]
3.
Also when the parents of children are divorced of not married at all with
one another, not the freedom of the parents, but the good of the child
should prevail. Children are entitled to recognition, love, attention
and care. Children need good relationships with both parents. Because the
biological father is often absent after divorce, there is an urgency to look for
new possibilities to strengthen the role of the father in such situations.
4.
Being aware that it is fundamental for marriage to combine opposites and
to bring together the differences between men and women and between the
generations in a meaningful connection, one cannot possibly equate a homosexual
or lesbian relationship with marriage of men and women.
5.
Familial loyalty
is a great good. In our time, we need to rediscover the strength and the value
of this loyalty. The familial loyalty and love offer an alternative to the
individualism which harms the structures of our society. They make it possible
that people are not opposed to each other like enemies, but rather welcome each
other in love.
6.
“Prevention
of divorce
and separation (especially in situations where children are concerned) is
therefore an important task for politics at all levels as well as for the Church
and other actors in civil society.”[14]
Realizing these action points is necessary in order to guarantee the respect due
to human life and human rights concerning marriage and family.
Endnotes:
[1] See:
http://ec.europa.eu/employment_social/news/2005/mar/comm2005-94_en.pdf.
[2]
Manifest ‘Integriteit van het ouderschap’,
April 23, 2004, see:
http://www.conseo.nl/kindindeknel/2004/04/manifest-integriteit-van-het.php.
[3]
Eurobarometer 56.2, October-November 2001, see:
www.ucd.ie/issda/dataset-info/eurobarometer-details-2.htm.
[4] Shripad Tuljapurkar,
“Demography: Babies make a comeback,” Nature 460 (2009), August 6, pp.
693-694.
[5]
H. Urs von Balthasar, Theologik, Einsiedeln, 1985-1987, Bd.
II, p. 56; vgl. G. Greshake, Der dreieine
Gott. Eine trinitarische Theologie, Freiburg/Basel/Wien: Herder,
1997, pp. 259-266; A. Scola, “L’imago Dei e la sessualità umana. A proposito di una tesi originale della Mulieres
Dignitatem,” Anthropotes 1 (1992), pp. 61-75; Mulieris
Dignitatem nr. 7; Pauselijke Raad Justitia et Pax, Compendio
della dottrina sociale della Chiesa, Città del Vaticano: Libreria
Editrice Vaticana, 2004, nr. 111.
[6] Pauselijke Raad Justitia et Pax,
Compendio
della dottrina sociale della Chiesa, Città del Vaticano: Libreria
Editrice Vaticana, 2004, nr. 34.
[7]
Dorien Pessers, “Verdwaalde seksen. Over sperminators, metroseksuelen en
autocopieën,” Annalen van het Thijmgenootschap, 91 (2003), nr.4,
p.18
[8]
Ibid., p.13.
[9]
Ibid., p. 57.
[10] See:
http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/.
[11]
Cf. Universal Declaration of Human Rights, art.3: “Everyone
has the right to life, liberty and security of person.”
[12] Paul VI, “Address
for the Day of Development (23 August 1968),” AAS 60 (1968), pp.
626-627; Caritas in Veritate no. 6.
[13]
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, art.
29,1: “Everyone
has duties to the community in which alone the free and full development
of his personality is possible.”
[14]
COMECE (Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European
Community), Proposal for a Strategy of the European Union for the
Support of Marriage and Family, November 2007, particularly p. 3,
see:
http://www.comece.org/upload/pdf/secr_mariage_080408_en.pdf.
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