Conservative NGOs Convene Rare Pro-Family Seminar at UN Headquarters

By Austin Ruse

     (NEW YORK – C-FAM)  A broad-based coalition of UN Member States and non-governmental organizations convened a pro-family seminar at UN headquarters in New York City today. Called "Church, Synagogue, Mosque: Solutions for the Modern Family," the conference presented the latest social science data that claims to refute liberal social and family policy as practiced in the industrialized west over the past few decades.

     Conference chairman Dr. Patrick Fagan of the Washington DC-based Heritage Foundation said, "Most contemporary social policy as it relates to the family can be replaced by the very simple notion of an intact family living under one roof and worshipping regularly." "Our purpose," said Richard Wilkins, director of the World Family Policy Center, "is to ask the diplomats of the developing world not to take the advice of policy-makers from the industrialized west. Their policies have nearly ruined the western family."

     Seven scholars spoke to a packed audience of UN diplomats and bureaucrats, and activists from the pro-family movement. Fagan presented research demonstrating strong linkages between religious faith and happiness, family stability, and physical health. Fagan strongly suggested that "one of the most powerful of all factors in preventing out-of-wedlock births is the regular practice of religious belief.It has long been known that intensity of religious practice is closely related to adolescent virginity and sexual restraint and control."

     Dr. Harold Koenig, professor of medicine and psychiatry at Duke University, presented material from his forthcoming book "Religion and Health: A Century of Research Reviewed," which explains in more than 1000 pages the connection between religious practice and health.

     Dr. Joseph McIlheney, president of the Medical Institute of Sexual Health in Austin, Texas, explained that in the last few years the percentage of teens committed to remaining virgins has increased "for the first time in thirty years." McIlheney calls this the "new sexual revolution" and he urged national and international policy makers to encourage its growth.

     Also appearing were Dr. Maria Sophia Aguirre, Professor of Economics at Catholic University of America, Ruksana Ayyub, Chairman, Family Services Committee, Islamic Center of Long Island, Dr. Wade Horn, former US Commissioner for Family, Youth and Children in the Bush Administration, and Al-Haah Ghazi Y. Khankan, Director of Interfaith Communications, Islamic Center of Long Island.

     The conference was sponsored by the Permanent UN Observer of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, the governments of Argentina and Nicaragua, along with the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute, the Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society, the Catholic Archdiocese of New York, the World Family Policy Center, and the Islamic Center of Long Island. This diverse group reflects the ongoing efforts by conservative groups to intercede in controversial UN concerns including population control, and women's rights.

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