Our Fathers

            Tomorrow is Father’s Day, a day when Americans traditionally honor their fathers. However, my thoughts in recent days have been on Heavenly Father, the Father of our spirits. I find it interesting that He chooses to be called Father when there are so many other names that He could have chosen. I am grateful for my knowledge that He lives and that He knows each one of His children. I am grateful to know that He has a plan for us as a whole to return to His presence when our lives on earth are over. I am also grateful to know that He has a plan for me as an individual and that He helps me to make the best decisions to enable me to succeed with His plan.

            My thoughts have also been with my earthly father. He passed away in 1995 at age 88, so I have been without him in my life for more than 14 years. I miss him greatly, and I try to live my life pleasing to him. I know that if I am pleasing my earthly father, then I am pleasing my Heavenly Father – and vice versa. I know that they both love me and want me to succeed.

            I am grateful for my husband, the father of my children. I am grateful for his willingness to provide for our family and to allow me to be a stay-at-home mother. I am grateful that he developed the necessary skills to earn good wages and that he made wise investment decisions, which are blessing our lives at the present time.

            I am grateful for my sons by birth and marriage, the fathers of my grandchildren. I am grateful that they are willing to provide for their families and allow their wives to be at home with the children. I am grateful that they recognize the importance of being in the lives of their children and that they take their fathering experience seriously. I am grateful for their abilities to be the breadwinners in their families as well as for the way that they interact with their children. I can see from these actions that they recognize that being a father to their children is much more important than anything that they can do in their careers.

            I take this opportunity to wish “Happy Father’s Day” to all the fathers in my life and the lives of my children and grandchildren as well as all other fathers. I hope that you are all treated royally because you deserve it!

Father's Day

Father's Day is a special day set aside to honor our fathers and to express our gratitude and appreciation for our fathers and to them. It became an official national holiday in 1972 when President Richard M. Nixon signed Father's Day into law.

Credit for the adoption of a day for fathers in the United States is given to Sonora Louise Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington. After listening to a sermon on Mother's Day in 1909, she got the idea for a day to honor her father, William Jackson Smart. Sonora's mother died in 1898, and her father raised the six children by himself. Through Sonora's efforts, Spokane celebrated the first Father's Day on June 19, 1910. Father's Day is now an official holiday celebrated on the third Sunday in June.

I am grateful for the fathers in my life: my own father, my father-in-law, my husband who is the father of our six children, and my sons and sons-in-law who are the fathers of my grandchildren. I especially love to watch my sons and sons-in-law being fathers to their children. It touches my heart in a way that nothing else does! To all of these special fathers, I say thank you and Happy Father's Day.

A father holds an important position in a family. He has the responsibility to 1) preside over his family in love and righteousness, 2) provide the necessities of life for his family, and 3) protect his family from all harmful influences.

Ephesians 6:4 reads, "And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord."

Gordon B. Hinckley, a modern-day prophet, said, "The father is the provider, the defender, the counselor, the friend who will listen and give support when needed. Who better than an exemplary father to effectively teach children the value of education, the dead-end nature of street gangs, and the miracle of self-esteem that can change their lives for good?" (See Stand A Little Taller, p 169.)

Just as being a mother is more than simply giving birth, being a father is much more than simply fertilizing an egg. The most important thing that a father can do for his children is to love their mother and to insist that the children show proper respect to his wife and their mother. A recent study of the effect of marriage on poverty (1929-2008) shows that children have a much lower chance of growing up in poverty if their parents are married. The break down of the family in recent years emphasizes the important role that father fills in a family. In 1963, 93 percent of American children were born to married parents. Today the number has dropped to 59 percent. Children are fortunate if they grow up in a home that functions properly with father as the head of the family and mother as the heart. Fathers and mothers working together for the good of families are very important in establishing and maintaining a strong society.

Married fathers in the home gives stability to the entire family. Broken societies come from broken homes. Fatherless homes also are a principle reason for poverty. Fatherhood has not only "social or cultural consequences; it is a menacing national security threat. The collective social pathology of the fatherless presents a great obstacle to Liberty and the survival of our republican form of government as outlined by our Constitution.
"Father's Day should thus be a call to action. Indeed, the majority of social entropy afflicting our nation today originates in homes without fathers, which definition includes those without functioning or effective fathers." (Mark Alexander, publisher of The Patriot Post) [patriotpost.us/alexander/2011/06/16/who-needs-a-father]
I want to wish a happy Father's Day to all fathers and especially to those fathers who recognize the value of father being in the home and taking an active part in the family.

Married Fathers

Many people and organizations are concerned about children living in poverty in the United States, and a large number of these individuals and institutions think that the answer to the problem is more government handouts. A recent study of records from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and American Community Survey emphasizes that the main problem is the fact that two out of three poor children are living in single-parent households and the fact that when the single moms married the fathers of their children almost two out of three children are taken out of poverty. An article posted by Ken McIntyre on June 18, 2010, in Family and Religion and sent out by The Foundry linked to an article written by Robert Rector and published as a Web Memo by The Heritage Foundation and the twelve charts on marriage and poverty accompanying the article I found the articles and charts very interesting. One chart points out that the percentage of children born out of wedlock in 1930 was about 3 percent and rose to 40.6 percent in 2008. Another chart illustrates that the percentages of children born to married parents decreased from over 95 percent in 1930 to 59.4 percent in 2008. Still another chart shows that 71 percent of poor families with children are not married. Some people might think that these percentages are caused by sexually active teenagers - but they would be mostly wrong according to the chart that shows births to teenagers as 8.0 percent and all others ages at higher percentages. The statistic that I found most interesting is that "being married has roughly the same effect in reducing one's poverty as adding five to six years of education. On average, high school dropouts who are married have a far lower poverty rate than do single parents with one or two years of college." Rector wrote, "The effect of married fathers on child outcomes can be quite pronounced. For example, examination of families with the same race and same parental education shows that, when compared to intact married families, children from single-parent homes are: More than twice as likely to be arrested for a juvenile crime; Twice as likely to be treated for emotional and behavioral problems; Roughly twice as likely to be suspended or expelled from school; and A third more likely to drop out before completing high school." He continued, "The effects of being raised in a single-parent home continue into adulthood. Comparing families of the same race and similar incomes, children from broken and single-parent homes are three times more likely to end up in jail by the time they reach age 30 than are children raised in intact married families. Compared to girls raised in similar married families, girls from single-parent homes are more than twice as likely to have a child without being married, thereby repeating the negative cycle for another generation." He concluded, "Finally the decline of marriage generates poverty in future generations. Children living in single parent homes are 50 percent more likely to experience poverty as adults when compared to children from intact married homes. This intergenerational poverty effect persists even after adjusting for the original differences in family income and poverty during childhood." In 1963 President Lyndon Johnson launched the War on Poverty by trying to solve the problem with government programs and entitlements. The facts in these articles and charts show that marriage matters. Anyone who truly wants to wage war on poverty must teach the importance of marriage and the need to support marriage and families by enacting "policies that encourage people to form and maintain healthy marriage and delay childbearing until they are married." .

Father's Day

Father's Day is a special day set aside to honor and to express gratitude and appreciation to our fathers. It became an official national holiday in 1972 when President Richard M. Nixon signed Father's Day into law. Credit for the adoption of a day for fathers in the United States is given to Sonora Louise Smart Dodd of Spokane, Washington. After listening to a sermon on Mother's Day in 1909, she got the idea for a day to honor her father, William Jackson Smart. Sonora's mother died in 1898, and her father raised the six children by himself. Through Sonora's efforts, Spokane celebrated the first Father's Day on June 19, 1910. Father's Day is now an official holiday celebrated on the third Sunday in June. I am grateful for the fathers in my life: my own father, my father-in-law, my husband who is the father of our six children, and my sons and sons-in-law who are the fathers of my grandchildren. To all of them, I say thank you and Happy Father's Day. A father holds an important position in a family. He has the responsibility to 1) preside over his family in love and righteousness, 2) provide the necessities of life for his family, and 3) protect his family from all harmful influences. Ephesians 6:4 reads, "And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." Gordon B. Hinckley, a modern-day prophet, said, "The father is the provider, the defender, the counselor, the friend who will listen and give support when needed. Who better than an exemplary father to effectively teach children the value of education, the dead-end nature of street gangs, and the miracle of self-esteem that can change their lives for good?" (Stand A Little Taller, p 169.) The most important thing that a father can do for his children is to love their mother and to insist that the children show proper respect to his wife and their mother. A recent study of the effect of marriage on poverty (1929-2008) shows that children have a much lower chance of growing of in poverty if their parents are married. The break down of the family in recent years emphasizes the important role that father fills in a family. In 1963, 93 percent of American children were born to married parents. Today the number has dropped to 59 percent. Children are fortunate if they grow up in a home that functions properly with father at the head of the family and mother at the heart. Fathers and mothers working together for the good of families are very important in establishing and maintaining a strong society. I want to wish a happy Father's Day to all fathers and especially to those fathers who recognize the value of father being in the home and taking an active part in the family.