Ruth Institute Blog

Great article by a Ruth Institute Academic Advisory Board Member.

By Jennifer Lahl, CBC National Director

Newsweek recently reported a story about a 51-year-old man, who between 1980 and 1994 donated his sperm twice a week in order to make cash for medical school and to nurture his altruistic desires to help infertile women. Kirk Maxey states, “I loved having kids, and to have these women doomed to wandering around with no family didn’t seem right, and it’s easy to come up with a semen donation.”

Don’t get me started. Read more…

Such a nice article. I did see the Superbowl, as I’m sure many of you did too. The very end when winning quarterback Drew Brees held up his son was truly the highlight. Seeing a picture of it even now brings tears to my eyes. This article is a great perspective on the significance of that moment.

The poster says, “Life. Better than lifting the Lombardi.”

by Kathryn Jean Lopez

This Super Bowl MVP would rather hold his son than the Lombardi Trophy.

‘Don’t you live for that moment right there?” Read more…

More example of how children are affected by the poor decisions of their parents. Seems they are so often the last ones to be thought of.

Carolyn Moynihan

We are used to the sad stories of children who have never known their fathers, and of those whose fathers become estranged through divorce; but there are a growing number of children who risk losing the only father they have ever known because he discovers he is not their father after all. Read more…

Here is a fantastically put together document on all of the far-reaching negative effects of pornography. I knew the stuff was bad, but, wow. (This article originally appeared at FamilyResearchCouncil.org.)

by Patrick F. Fagan, Ph.D. and Ruth Institute Academic Advisory Board Member

Pornography is a visual representation of sexuality which distorts an individual’s concept of the nature of conjugal relations. This, in turn, alters both sexual attitudes and behavior. It is a major threat to marriage, to family, to children and to individual happiness. In undermining marriage it is one of the factors in undermining social stability. Read more…

from the National Catholic Register’s story on military chaplains during the Christmas season in Afganistan and Iraq:

Father Michael Duesterhaus has been deployed to combat areas three times, including Fallujah, Iraq, in 2006. The Navy chaplain said “close teamwork, mission focus and personal deprivations [can] deepen one’s faith” and recounted how “one Marine, who I baptized, confirmed, and gave first holy Communion to in the Al Anbar Province told me one night, ‘Catholicism is a tough religion. … Have to believe that the Eucharist is truly Jesus and not a symbol. And confession — whoa, there’s a challenge. Yeah, it’s tough. But I’m a Marine. Who wants a wimpy faith?’”

I just found this lovely article by a young Catholic priest, about his father, his deceased brother, and hunting. (No, the brother didn’t die hunting.)  It is about the ways in which Father Figures help the development of young men through their time together in the wild. wordlessly. Fr. Patrick tells this story about himself as an eight-year-old. Read more…