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Tearing Down The House


The wise woman builds her house, but with her own hands the foolish one tears hers down. (Proverbs 14:1)
                In the ancient Jewish culture, the man was the public or business face of the household, but the woman was really the master of the home. She was expected to manage the estate, no matter what its size. The success of the home was her responsibility. I don’t think the proverb is any less true today. Neither do I think it any less true if it is expanded to include both men and women, and both houses and societies. Put simply, a wise person builds, and a foolish person destroys, the things they claim to hold dear.
                I suppose it’s been going on forever, but for the last sixty years at least, there has been a concerted effort to fundamentally transform. That requires that everything, down to the smallest social unit, be other than what it was. That requires that what was be torn down, torn apart… and the goal was to replace it with political units. In such a society, families are no longer necessary.  It is a meaningless label attached to anything anyone wants it to be, because their real relationship is with government. Friendships are those individuals who cheer us on as we ricochet off obstacles in life like a ball in a pin ball machine. They are anyone who at least pretends to agree with everything we do.
                Research shows that the best, healthiest, most stable, and most prosperous social unit is an involved, invested male/female marriage with offspring. Individual examples may not perform to the standard, but it is functionally the most logical model on which to base a society.  Certainly, there are also cases of individuals who don’t fit that model. My family is a case in point, as I’m a never-married living with my father. The existence of other models does not invalidate the effectiveness of the nuclear family any more than a broom invalidates the effectiveness of a vacuum. So for anyone to suggest that the nuclear family is not necessary, or that a family is whatever you want it to be, or that other models should be treated as equal with the nuclear family is just plain foolish.
                Granted, there are people who don’t fit the traditional model. I’m not saying to treat them as less than people. But I am saying that if we tear down the traditional model or pretend that other models are its equal, we are fools and we will end up sitting among the ruins.

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