Recognizing the rights of children in the fight for marriage

Jennifer Johnson, director of the Ruth Institute’s Children of Divorce Project, is the author of Marriage and Equality: How Natural Marriage Upholds the Ideal of Equality for Children, a short book that presents
the case for natural marriage based on equality. It is one of two new books by Catholic authors on the subject of divorce and its effects on children;
CWR also interviewed Leila Miller, author of Primal Loss: The Now-Adult Children of Divorce Speak, about her book.

CWR: In your book you lay out the case that in the fight over same-sex marriage, the arguments most often presented in favor of traditional
marriage, although not wrong, did not win the day because they did not appeal to people’s sense of justice. Can you explain?

Jennifer Johnson: Our movement is beset with internal contradictions that worked against us. We tried to make an argument about children
by saying things like, “Kids need a mom and a dad.” This is a perfectly true statement, but given our sexually lax culture, it takes too much for
granted. For example, from the point of view of the child, what is the difference between the following two scenarios? A child living in “two homes”
where the mom and step-dad are in one home, and the dad and step-mom are in the other home; a child living in “two homes” where the mom and lesbian
lover are in one home, and the dad and gay step-dad are in the other home.

Both situations fulfill the slogan “Kids need a mom and a dad.” So the complementarity of the sexes is present in the child’s life, at least in principle.
So simply saying that “kids need a mom and a dad” does not account for divorce, remarriage, out of wedlock childbearing, and anonymous sperm and
egg donation. Why should children raised under those scenarios go along with the argument for complementarity of the sexes when their own experience
of complementarity has been diluted or harmed without protest from social conservatives?

CWR: Can you describe the inspiration for developing your argument?

Johnson: I have a devotion to the Holy Family and I pray from time to time for wisdom in defending marriage and the family. One day
I was looking at an image of [the Holy Family] and I saw a triangle between all of their heads. And I thought, “Wow, the family structure is a
triangle!” There are a lot of details that I explain in my book, but the short version is that I saw how the Sexual Revolution has meant that more
and more children are not raised inside of their own “triangle” of mother, father, children. I like being able to use the triangle to explain our
argument, since it makes the argument very visual and easy to understand.

CWR: I know we can’t do it justice in this brief interview, but in a nutshell, how does natural marriage uphold structural equality
for children?

Johnson: “Structural equality” is a phrase I use to describe what historic Christian sexual ethics provides to children. We don’t
have to quote any Bible verses to understand how natural marriage provides a legitimate form of equality for children, and how the inequalities
among children multiply when a culture disregards natural marriage and historic Christian sexual ethics. I list a number of structural inequalities
in my book drawn from my own life experiences as a child of divorce. For example, there is a structural inequality when it comes to grief. Kids
raised outside the marriage of their own mother and father are not permitted to openly grieve that loss. They are required to endorse whatever
family arrangement their parents have chosen and are not permitted to feel anything about it other than what the parents want them to feel.

Another form of structural inequality among children who are raised outside the marriage of their own mother and father is that they have to pretend
that half of themselves does not exist. For example, a child of divorce must pretend that his mother does not exist when he is in his father’s
home, and he has to pretend that his father does not exist while in his mother’s home. In each home, family photos won’t show the child’s full
family. This is confusing in its own right, but it gets compounded because the parents don’t have to do that same thing—family photos on
display in the home will show the parents mothers and fathers, and those corresponding family members (aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.). There is
no home where the child’s full family is on display.

Looking at the photos on the walls is a good way to see the kind of dynamic the child is living under.

CWR: You are a child of divorce yourself, more than one time over. There is a poignant scene you paint in your book in which you have
the epiphany that your family isn’t like other families. Can you tell us about that?

Johnson: There were two times that I had painful realizations about my family structure, and they are related. The first was when
I was 12. I was standing in the driveway at my mom’s home and I had a realization that something was terribly wrong with how my family was structured
but I couldn’t put my finger on what it was. My mother had remarried and had a new child with this new husband. I could see that what this child
had and what I had were two different things.

The other painful realization proved to be the answer to the first one. It was when I saw the triangle between the heads of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph,
that I mentioned above. I was in my late 40s when this happened. I went home that evening and applied the triangle concept to my situation by drawing
it all out. I had no idea what to expect, but ended up being extremely shocked and saddened by what I saw. My family structure was not the simple
triangle that I had seen. It looked more like a malformed spider’s web. It was ugly and I felt ashamed of it. Later in the book, I explain the
way that God used this image to show me other important things about what the radical Left is doing to marriage and family. So God had a plan,
even though at the time I had no idea what it could be.

CWR: In my interview with Leila Miller,
she talked about adult children of divorce being afraid to tell their parents how they felt about the divorce. You refer to this as “disenfranchised
grief,” another form of inequality. Can you explain this phenomenon?

Johnson: There is a socially-approved divorce narrative that everybody follows. It goes like this, roughly speaking: “Kids are resilient.
Babies are blank slates. They don’t care about their family structure. They don’t care if their mother is in bed with somebody who is not their
father. They don’t care if their father is in bed with somebody who is not their mother. They don’t mind shuttling back and forth between ‘two
homes.’ They don’t mind when their parent spends more time with a new love interest and new children than with them. They don’t care about subsequent
divorces. Any problems they have after the divorce are due to their own character flaws or mental disorders, and are thus avoidable or treatable.
In no way are post-divorce problems due to the divorce. If you question divorce and remarriage, you will be labeled with a psychiatric disorder.”

This narrative is profoundly anti-science. The social science data is very clear that divorce is a huge problem for children, and it dramatically elevates
many risk factors for negative outcomes. [But the narrative is upheld] in the face of the data because our culture is more concerned about sexual
happiness for adults than about what happens to kids because of the pursuit of that sort of happiness.

CWR: You write that natural marriage creates structural equality for children. When children are raised without the protection of
natural marriage, these inequalities multiply. Can you explain how that happens?

Johnson: I have identified a number of inequalities. Two of them are best described as horizontal inequality and vertical inequality.
Horizontal refers to siblings or peers. Vertical refers to parents. When the horizontal form of inequality is present among siblings, they are
treated differently from each other with respect to how their family is structured. It is present with half-siblings and step-siblings, not full-blooded
siblings. For example, one half-sibling may live in a unified home with both his mother and his father who are married while another half-sibling
is living in “two homes.” This was the arrangement that I had as a child.

For the vertical form, it means that parents have created a family structure for their children that is worse and more chaotic than what their parents
created for them. For example, the parents may have been raised with their own married parents in a unified home, but as adults they are not raising
their children with the children’s other genetic parent, and the children [may be] living in “two homes.” They are treating their children worse
in this respect than how their parents treated them.

CWR: Your argument not only applies to children of divorce, but also children of same-sex marriage and third-party reproduction. What
are some examples of inequality in those cases?

Johnson: In many respects, the inequalities are similar in all three of those situations; it is what happens when genetic parents
reject each other. One genetic parent is excluded from daily life for the child of divorce, the child of same-sex parenting, and the child of third-party
reproduction. The child must pretend that this half of himself does not exist, since it is unwelcome. This half of the child’s family won’t be
seen in family photos in display in the home.

In the case of third-party reproduction, these kids have some of the same issues that adoptees face, such as wondering who they look like and, by law,
not having access to their full genetic family tree. They have the added burden of not knowing how many half-siblings they have, and whether or
not they might meet one, date one, or marry one. In this respect, it is actually worse than polygamy. In polygamy, at least the kids know who their
half-siblings are.

CWR: Who would benefit from reading Marriage and Equality?

Johnson: I think it is good for anybody interested in family policy issues, anybody raised outside of the marriage of their own mother
and father, and anybody who believes that equality is an important ideal.

CWR: Not only are you a child of divorce, but you are also a divorced parent. You write that like post-abortive parents and doctors,
those who have participated in family breakdown should realize the harm done, and speak out for positive change. What suggestions do you have for
a divorced parent who reads your book, or Miller’s book, and wants to make amends?

Johnson: The child’s other genetic parent is half of who the child is, so always make sure that the child knows that you have not
rejected that half of them. If possible, try to make amends with that person and to develop a relationship with them. At an age-appropriate time,
ask the child how they feel about the arrangement under which they were raised and make sure they can speak openly and honestly. Be prepared to
hear things that you might not like to hear, and always apologize for assuming things that were not true (“Babies are blank slates,” “Kids are
resilient,” etc.). Be willing to have the child’s other genetic parent be part of family events and family photos, since they are half of who the
child is. Finally, become an advocate for just family structures for children.