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Pillar

Sexuality & Family

The second pillar of a decent society is the institution of the family, which is built upon the comprehensive sexual union of man and woman. No other institution can top the family’s ability to transmit what is pivotal—character formation, values, virtues, and enduring love—to each new generation.

The Radical Deficiency of Elon Musk’s Pronatalism 

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IVF

IVF Provider Immunity in Alabama: A Challenge to National Conservative Unity on Pro-life Issues

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The new Alabama IVF provider immunity law, recently praised by former President Trump, will have pernicious national consequences on parents’ rights to hold IVF providers accountable and will negatively affect Republican unity over pro-life issues.
Brad Wilcox

Get Married: An Interview with Brad Wilcox

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Demographer Lyman Stone projects that, on the current course, as many as one in three young adults in the United States might never marry and as many as one in four will never have kids. That’s a lot of kinless Americans. Given the importance of marriage and family for what Jefferson called “the pursuit of happiness,” this would be a tragedy. So let’s find new ways to make it easier and more appealing for young adults to get married.
couple holding hands

Of Mice and Alpha Men

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I won’t resort to the “be yourself!” platitude or argue that anyone should unleash the waterworks on a first date. However, I will suggest that the relationships (particularly romantic ones) that alleviate despondency cannot be cultivated while adhering to manifestos and maintaining derogatory views of the opposite sex. And that applies to both women and men. 
mother and baby

Artificial Wombs Will Compound the Harm Reproductive Tech Inflicts on Children

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What should be at the forefront of everyone’s mind is the question, “How does all this technological tinkering affect the kids?” We are only beginning to be able to answer that question.
newborn

The Miracle That Saves the World

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Inviting people into joy, both then and now, means also inviting others into possible pain. We must embrace the joys with the sorrows to lead full, rich lives as human beings.
ethics advice column

Ask Chris Tollefsen: An Ethics Advice Column

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The parallel to vital conflict cases is clear: do not too quickly assume that death is inevitable. Do not too quickly assume that active rather than passive harm needs to be inflicted, even as a side effect.
FemWars

Why Antifeminism Isn’t Enough

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AntiFems face a dilemma. On one hand, they want to affirm, protect, and promote the distinctiveness of women. On the other hand, they oppose what at present seems like the only viable strategy for achieving that end, the recovery and extension of an authentic feminism. 
pregnancy

What “Abortion Hurts Women” Meant to the Early Feminists

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The early women’s rights advocates sought to challenge, accompany, encourage, and support their sisters in the pursuit of the good life, in choosing good and rejecting evil. They sought to help them understand that they did not have to be the slaves of necessity, but that they could virtuously choose to undertake difficult but worthwhile endeavors, including the hardships of motherhood.
chastity

How to Think about Chastity

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Chastity is a way of being more holistically directed toward our happiness regardless of the desires and attractions we experience.
pregnancy and fertility

Problematizing Fertility, Normalizing Disease

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Our bodies cause great inconvenience. Nothing about menstruation, ovulation, or having children is convenient, after all. But it’s the way we were created, and there are better ways to respond to the sexual asymmetry of men and women. What are we losing out on if we suppress it?
newborn baby

Assigned at Birth?

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To assign is to flail and thrash about as we try to exert control over the uncontrollable. But to wait in the ultrasound office or in the delivery room to find out, to then share with others in this first discovery of our child’s identity, to delight equally in male and female, is to recover our fundamental vulnerability to the gifts given to us.
gender confusion

What’s at Stake in Sexual Difference? A Review of Trouble with Gender: Sex Facts, Gender Fictions by Alex Byrne

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Until everyone, including Byrne, sees that the point of gender ideology is to change our understanding of human being, our arguments and clarifications will ultimately be impotent.
Holistic feminism

Cultivating a Holistic Feminism

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Feminism has never been a phrase without its detractors—many men in the 1800s very much did see women as “skin and bones.” But today, Catholics seem to be split over the virtues and vices of the word “feminist” more than ever before.
gender dysphoric child

It’s “Time to Think” about the Irreversible Damage of Shoddy Sciences: A Review of Hannah Barnes

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Barnes repeatedly emphasizes the many parents or clinic employees who had tried to sound the alarm but whose warnings were ignored by clinic authorities. But Barnes is loath to draw any firm conclusions from these stories. Her cautious wording and frequent qualifiers undermine some of the book’s most important points and questions. 
the end of feminism

The End of Feminism: A Response to Rachel Lu

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Writer Rachel Lu recently penned an essay in these pages that engages my book as an example of what she calls “anti-feminist” work. Lu draws some surprising conclusions about my book that, I think, are not representative of my work. She makes four overarching points to which I would like to respond.
Pregnant woman holding her belly

Disability Requires Protection in the Womb

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If Ms. Cox is unwilling to parent a disabled child, she should terminate her parental rights upon birth, giving others the chance to show charity to a small but greatly treasured life. To hold that child’s hand as he or she drew a final breath would be to sit on hallowed ground.
anti-feminism

The End of Feminism

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In reality, the initial question of “Should we reject feminism?” is reductive to the point of making little sense. It invites no clear “yes” or “no” answer because the term “feminism” has no clear and consistent definition, and “feminism’s” effects have been both good and bad in ways that are now deeply intertwined. 
papal blessing

Fiducia Supplicans and the Authority of Bishops

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This is not an easy time to be a bishop, especially as the DDF fosters confusion, but every bishop is called to lead the faithful into a deeper relationship with Christ through the Church. This requires heroic charity that embraces the sinner while being truthful to the Gospel. Jesus never blessed sin, and neither should the Church. His love for each of us is a love that calls us out of sin, which requires a recognition that some things are incompatible with the blessing of the Church.
let's talk about the mental load of motherhood

Let’s Talk about the Mental Load

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Approaching conversations about the mental load with gratitude rather than resentment is the first step toward a more joyful home. Even if we want our spouse to take more responsibility, we can begin by thanking him for the things we see him do. We can discuss what’s going on beneath the surface when something feels amiss. And we can apologize for, and seek to change, our own selfishness, no matter how it manifests. 
working moms

Flourishing in Work and Family Life: Considerations for Young Women 

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Six panelists share how they structure their lives in a way that allows them to pursue creative, intellectually inspiring work, while remaining open to life and faithful to the good work of the home.
relationships

A Requiem for Relationships

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Our culture’s sexual lens distorts the raison d’etre of society, leading teenagers to believe that the body and mind have no tie. 
modern couples

The Truth about Men, Women, and Sex

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Recent revelations about sexual harassment, assault, and abuse underscore certain blunt realities about men, women, and sex. How can we confront those realities in a way that leads to less sexual violence?
Public Discourse

Public Discourse at 15: Resisting Evil without Losing Our Souls

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In the past fifteen years, we’ve published articles on the moral, cultural, religious, and political issues of our time, including the most controversial and sensitive; but we have done so in a manner of which we can be proud, respecting the intellect and personhood of our readers, interlocutors, and intellectual contestants.
Ivf embryo transfer

Procreating Alone

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If sexual attraction is one powerful force that God built into the world to counteract the individual’s inclination to self-absorption, then the combination of technological and cultural assaults on this urge doesn’t threaten only the formation of families, the basic unit of society. It also threatens something even more foundational: the nature of the person as a social being.
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