Who is the Center of Our Society?

Years ago, I was at a dinner with a group of gentlemen who were working to advance a conservative fiscal agenda, but who did not even want to talk about social conservatism.? As I was introduced, several of them announced proudly that while they were ?fiscal conservatives, they were also ?social liberals?.
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Sadly, that disconnect is a major reason for the continued progress of those who seek to redefine the basic structure of our society.? They understand that they need fiscal resources to shape their new societal order.? But it?s the new social order that is their ultimate goal ? the fiscal policies they advocate simply provide the means to attain that end.
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And what is that end?
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A redefinition of the central unit of our society.
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The cornerstone unit of American society has traditionally been the family, defined as those related by blood, marriage, or adoption.? This definition has been both flexible enough to allow for two-parent families, single-parent families, blended families, and extended families, and stable enough to survive the challenges of life.
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Families tie their members together with bonds of love and respect and commitment.? In a traditional family, bonds are considered permanent, so members experience unconditional love and acceptance.? These bonds cross generational and ethnic lines, span time and distance, and do not recognize economic classes.? They allow for individual movement and growth while providing family members with a constant home base to which they can return for refuge, assistance, advice, and encouragement.?
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When a crisis occurs, family members pull together to face it.? Like the fingers on your hand, individual family members work together to become stronger than each individual member.? Each member supplies his or her individual gift, whether that is wisdom, time, or financial support, in a shared effort to deal with the situation.? Members do not measure the amount of help each provides, and do not stop their efforts at an arbitrary cut off point ? they remain focused and committed until the situation has been resolved.
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Families prepare their members for independence.? Children grow up knowing that they will leave their parents? homes to start their own generation of family, and begin the cycle of life and love once again.
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Families acknowledge a higher power.? They understand the worth and value of each member, from the youngest to the oldest; and they recognize that they are the custodian, not the Creator, of life.? Most families pray together, asking the Creator for His blessing and assistance, and thanking Him for answering those prayers.
If society were viewed as an old-fashioned wagon wheel, with a central hub and spokes out to the rim, families would be a bright center to the wheel.? They generate life ? both biological and economic, which flows from them into the larger society.? Family members produce and consume goods and services.? They accumulate wealth, which they pass on to future generations, ensuring continued economic life.?
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Families feed the societies where their centrality is recognized and supported ? to the benefit of both the family and the society.
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In the new social order being promoted in America today, family is replaced by government as the central unit of society.?
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Under this structure, family would just be any group of people who come together in a supportive environment, however temporary that group may be.? The traditional family ties of blood, marriage or adoption would either be discarded or diluted to allow for any group of individuals to self-define as a family.
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In this structure, individuals would be connected to the government.? Government cannot love, so it needs to create a different kind of tie.? Government ties people to it through conditions of dependence and regulation and ignorance.? People do not bond to the government, so they must be tied to it.? These conditions create that tie.?
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Government needs people to interact individually with the state.? So government programs and policies separate the members of a family from each other, like spreading the fingers on your hand.? Then the state can put barriers between the fingers, creating isolation and forcing each individual to work directly with the state.? Government is not compassionate, so individuals must deal with the might of the state when problems arise, even if ?might? is not the most appropriate response to the problem.
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Government does not acknowledge a higher power.? In a society where government is the central entity, not only does government see itself as the highest authority, it seeks to prevent citizens from recognizing a divine Creator.? Hence, in every major confrontation in our society between believers and non-believers, the ?theology? of the non-believers has prevailed.
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If we use our wagon wheel analogy, government is a dark center.? It produces no life.? It creates no goods or services.? It generates no wealth.? Instead, it pulls life and wealth from the larger society down the spokes of the wheel with an insatiable appetite.?
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In a government centered society, the government will eventually devour everything in its ever increasing reach ? destroying itself and the larger society in the process.
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While it?s easy to get lost in the myriad of individual issues, the real question before us is, do we want to be the center of America?s society to be the family or the government?? The answers to the issues will flow from our answer to that single, central question.