Embrace the Limit: And the Limit Shall Set You Free 

In our work of promoting traditional family values and marriage, we are often forced to remind “older” scholars and policymakers that relationships, both romantic and familial, cannot be repaired unless we restore a proper view of the human person. While we push slogans we believe in like “get married young” or “have a lot of kids” with good intentions, they are bound to be unsuccessful—or to even cause more damage than good—if they are not grounded in an honest account of the human person. For real change to take place, and for it to be in the right direction, it is imperative for younger generations to first accept some simple truths that older generations took for granted: the truths that lie at the basis of any healthy and flourishing relationship, but that are now alien to the modern way of thinking.  

Some of these truths are simple: one’s existence is much more than a collection of individual pleasures, and our reproductive capacity is not a mere instrument to be used if and when we decide to, but an integral part of who we are as human beings. At the core, what needs to be corrected—first within ourselves, then to be taught to the younger generations—is that the great gift of human freedom is not about absolute license. Contrary to the current mindset, true freedom lies in accepting certain natural limits and choosing good over evil within those limits.  

Recovering marriage and family cannot be done through economic incentives; in fact, these often feed the existing ills. What needs to be corrected is the profound anthropological shift that took place over the last sixty years. Aided by contraceptive technologies, the old-as-humanity error of Gnosticism has taken hold of our cultural imagination. Most recently, its consequences were displayed by the transgender movement that reduces our sexual nature to something that is infinitely malleable. Long before that, the mistaken belief that our life is an inconsequential series of instant and never settled choices—choices that may affect ourselves but ultimately nobody else—disrupted our view of work, of leisure, and, of course, of our family life.  

For example, consider no-fault divorce. The choice of marrying someone forever affects the meaning and value of our word. By “undoing” a marriage, we communicate the idea that our promises are temporary, and that we cannot commit to anything that does not—even if just for a time—affirm our subjective and ever-changing feelings. Things get even worse, of course, when children are involved. Years of “feel good” articles (and movies) have tried to convince us all that “good divorces” can be good for kids, suggesting that stepparents or siblings may even add value to their lives.  

I remember thinking that firsthand when my parents divorced: “Wouldn’t it be cool,” I thought, “to ‘acquire’ the sister I never had, or to see my mother marry a man who would finally and truly care for her, so that I could stop worrying about her lonely weekends?” I admit that I did believe some things may have been better, at least for a while. But based on what I know now—not only from my own experience, but also from accounts of my friends who share family histories similar to mine, as well from serious studies on the effects of divorce on children, which I continue to examine and see confirmed in our current research projects—I know that my parents’ breakup shaped my brain and heart in ways that do not lead to genuine altruism, trust, or commitment. As most children of divorce do, I learned to view my parents as individuals rather than as a couple. I learned to lie to them from a very young age, mostly to protect them from pain. I inherited the idea that looking or sounding like one of the two would have bothered, not endeared me to, the other. I accepted that men were, by nature, unreliable and women vulnerable. Because of this, my unconscious mind, fueled by the need to love, understand, and forgive my father, decided all males were wired and destined to choose bodily pleasure over family integrity, unable to sacrifice for things that do not feel right. As a young girl, I never believed the young men who told me they loved me. Or I knew that love would not last forever.  

Of course, I now know that’s not true. It took decades to accept that good and virtuous men do exist, and that my father’s failings were his own. A child needs to make sense of her own story while preserving it. Speaking frequently with Austin’s young adults, I continue to witness how, just like I did, children of divorce won’t blame their parents for not being up to the task. Rather, they understand and often even commend them. While seemingly a good thing, this understanding is far from true forgiveness. To forgive is to acknowledge wrongdoing. Empathizing with an error is different from denying its existence.  

These young adults have accepted the lie that marriage is not forever. They see it as a temporary and emotional bond, severable at whim. This is what needs to be corrected, not the number of children they will beget. Decades of no-fault divorce taught us all that all sorts of relationships, including our most primal ones, are a matter of retractable choice. Nothing is further from the truth. At age forty, I still celebrate Christmas with my divorced parents.  

The same principle—that our actions have consequences, and that we cannot run away from them—applies to all areas of life. Today’s culture of mobility expressed through ease in changing careers, city, or social circles reinforces the illusion that we have endless opportunities for fresh starts. Dating apps, where anonymity and lack of common friends are the norm, add fuel to the fire. 

In Western culture, the lie about our unbounded, independent, and always reshapeable existence is reinforced by our nomadic lifestyles. Be it for school or work, children move far away from their parents at a young age—and rarely come back. Families relocate with much greater ease than ever before, putting an end to friendships and to neighborhood relationships that are an integral part of a flourishing life. We treat powerful habits like having a fixed church, a favorite playground, or even a restaurant for the great occasions with a tone of meaninglessness that we must change. With few and rare exceptions, Americans do not grow up visiting their grandparents’ graves on the weekends—provided they even know where they are resting. They do not hear stories about their ancestors, nor do grandkids speak with the same accent as their parents, let alone engage in the same line of work or family traditions. Our world of social media isolation and personalized meals caught us at one of our weakest points—after our ties to the past had already been severed and while we were all craving something we no longer knew existed.   

Without a grounding in a meaningful past, ideas about one’s future are equally fluid. We shape our lives with the implicit understanding that our wishes and desires are all that truly matters, and that anything that does not “feel right” is a burden. Whatever binds us or limits us, we believe, is an obstacle to our flourishing. Anything, really, is an obstacle unless we choose it ourselves—from our sex to the shape of our nose, to our temperament, our country of origin, our religion.  

These limits are far from restraints to our happiness. Consider some examples, starting from the most basic tool: language. Being bound by an alphabet and a common language, one we did not invent but inherited, we can communicate and learn, including from the past. We can ask for help and laugh at someone’s jokes, we can sing, scream, and pray. But for all this to happen, there are rules to follow and grammar to learn. Anything short of correct—anything we choose on a whim—will lead us to ignorance.  

Or we can think of our body, voice, and personality, as faulty as those may be, with our pounds to lose and annoying obsessions: these unique inherited traits allow us to build and maintain human relationships, relationships that are unique to us. Bound by discipline and rules, not by wishes and feelings, athletes win the Olympics, teams their match. Being bound is a gift, not a curse.  

And now let’s think of our ties to others: our romantic others, our partners. Have we all seen where the contraceptive and pornographic mentality have led us? Have we all read not only the accounts of the increased violence during sexual intercourse, but, most strikingly, the continuous drop in real-life sexual encounters? Contraception taught us sex has no consequences. Porn thrived on this idea and then suggested, aided ever more by modern technology, that to have sex we do not need anyone but ourselves. The scenario in front of us is dreadful. Rather than urging teens not to have unprotected sex, parents are now worried that their children will never touch another person, let alone experience what it’s like to be truly loved.  

We are living in a posthuman world where we think of ourselves as unbounded souls that inhabit accidental bodies. It is this crisis of human formation that urgently needs to change before we can talk about the length of maternity leaves and other policy solutions.  

For pro-family slogans to work, we must first accept that we can’t change the limits of who we are—and that within those limits lies the remedy for the modern world. We can’t choose the rules of marriage, friendships, or parenting. But we can choose to be good or bad spouses, good or bad friends, good or bad parents. That’s where our freedom lies.  

My hope for 2026 is that we start using it fully again.  

Image licensed via Adobe Stock.