Fabrizio Piciarelli
We anticipate the translated text of Prof. Malo’s lecture,
Family or Families? Toward a Better Understanding of Humanization and
Generativity
, given on February 5 th in Budapest during a conference
organized by the Pázmány Péter Catholic University of Hungry.
It’s a compelling anthropological reflection on the cultural battle taking
place in the West that can change the face of the family with countless
damaging repercussions for persons involved. The family is the place for the humanization of the person. It’s written in its DNA.
But it cannot just be triggered or programmed automatically.
The 1994 international conference about population and development in Cairo
tried to replace the “family” with the concept of “families”. The attack
was blocked, but only partially because the chapter dedicated to family
completely ignored the institution of marriage. Furthermore, instead of
recognizing the family as a natural and universal institution, they
explained that “various forms of the family exist in difference political,
legal, social, and cultural systems” and “the composition and structure of
the family” can change with the evolution of society.
It’s clear that in order to modify the family, you have to wipe out
marriage: a destructive process happens first by weakening and trivializing
the institution until finally abolishing it completely. The first step of
this strategy is obviously recognizing de facto unions and above all, same
sex marriages.
One may think that changes in the family and its foundation- marriage- are
not that serious. It’s thought that on one hand, technology allows for
continual production of human beings, and on the other hand, new forms of
sexual relationships constitute a suitable environment for the growth and
education of children.
The author of this essay argues against this pretense because, as he amply
demonstrates, the family is the first place for the humanization of the
person due to its capacity to generate and regenerate persons and their
relationships, and because donation and gratuity arise precisely from
marriage and family.
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