If there is one clear lesson from social history it is that families are the worst way in which to raise a child – except for all the other ones that have been tried. There is no limit to the number of books written by people who were damaged by their own families, but there are no books at all of joyful reminiscence of orphanage life. It’s a pity, then, that religious defences of marriage so often involve palpable falsehoods.
There was a conference in Rome last week on the family, organised by conservative forces in the Vatican, where Southern Baptists, Mormons, and even the former chief rabbi here, Lord Sacks, joined forces to proclaim their devotion to the traditional family, and to the “complementarity” of man and woman. This last is a phrase invented really to make gay marriage seem impossible as well as undesirable. It is by no means the worst of the crimes against biology in conservative rhetoric.
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