Ruth Institute Blog

by Patrick B. Craine

TORONTO, Ontario, December 1st, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – All of Ontario’s Catholic and public schools will be required to set up gay-straight alliances if students request them, Ontario’s education minister said Thursday as Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal government unveiled its new bill to crack down on homosexual bullying. Read more…

Christine Armario – Associated Press

MIAMI - The number of students attending charter schools has soared to more than 2 million as states pass laws lifting caps and encouraging their expansion.

The National Alliance for Public Charter Schools released new figures Wednesday showing a 13 percent growth in enrollment. That’s the equivalent of about 200,000 students. More than 500 new charter schools opened for the 2011-12 school year. Read more…

by Carolyn Moynihan

Canada comes out as the least inhibited country when it comes to sex education, an international survey shows. But even there, the majority of adults think that the job belongs first and foremost to parents.

Two-thirds of Canadians (69 per cent) and Britons (67 per cent) as well as four-in-five Americans (81 per cent) believe the parents or guardians should be primarily responsible for teaching sex education to children and teens. Read more…

Up front in choir performances at church, my sons have done it all as 5-6 year olds: yawning, wiggling, picking their nose, not participating, mouthing the words in an exaggerated manner.  One particularly wiggly demonstration led me to feel more embarrassed than usual until a older man behind me said,…

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by Carolyn Moynihan

A leading British headmistress is worried that it is not just today’s schoolchildren who lack values and good standards of behaviour but also their parents. Dr Helen Wright, president of the Girls’ Schools Association (GSA), does not blame the parents because she believes they themselves were failed by the education system at a young age. In a speech Dr Wright said: Read more…

My baby girl had a strange, red, raw area on the back of her neck. When it didn’t go away after a couple of days, I took her to the doctor. After a multitude of exams, including x-rays, the doctor said, “I have no idea what it is, but she seems to be okay.” A few days later I discovered the source of this strange malady.

Keep reading.

I was riding the ski lift with one of my pupils, a little girl of roughly seven years. She could not keep her eyes off me. I thought it was really sweet, having a crush on her teacher, as it were.

When we reached the top and the ski lift stopped, she finally spoke to me, and what she said was magical:

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by Carson Holloway

November 17, 2011 http://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2011/11/4311

The Supreme Court has helped to foster a culture that encourages the sexual exploitation of children.

The child sexual abuse scandal now engulfing Penn State has given rise to much commentary on how people’s values can be distorted by the desire to protect a successful and venerated football program. The point is well-taken. Nevertheless, we also should consider another distortion in our values even more directly related to the kind of abuse in question. The roots of this distortion are in the decisions of an even more venerable and authoritative institution. Specifically, we must consider the role of the Supreme Court in fostering a culture that encourages the sexual exploitation of children. Read more…

By Cheryl Wetzstein

In the eyes of children, is it paramount that they were “planned” and “wanted”? Or does the family structure of their home matter more?

These are two of the many thought-provoking questions about donor-conceived children and “diverse” family forms in a report released Thursday from the Commission on Parenthood’s Future at the Institute of American Values (IAV). Read more…

This is nuts.

by Christine Dhanagom

JERUSALEM, November 10, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – “Wrongful life” lawsuits, in which doctors are held liable for not discovering fetal abnormalities that might have prompted parents to abort their child, have become so common in Israel that the government has set up a committee to investigate the issue, New Scientist reports. Read more…

I was pulling wet wipes out of the container and the wipes had kinda balled up at the bottom. One of my boys seeing me struggling, says, “Kinda hard, Miss C, huh? Just about as hard as pulling a….

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Repeal of DOMA Hearing Rescheduled to Nov. 10th

Bishop Salvatore Cordileone, Catholics for the Common Good episcopal adviser and Chairman of the U.S. Bishops’ Promotion and Defense of Marriage Subcommittee, wrote a powerful appeal to the members of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee asking them to reject efforts to repeal DOMA. It is a must read. Read more…

by TERESA S. COLLETT

For instance: Sex leads to children, and children need intact biological families.

My friend and colleague, Mark Osler, gives good advice in his recent commentary “May inevitable year of debate be constructive” (Oct. 15).

He counsels Minnesotans discussing the marriage-protection amendment (commonly misidentified as the gay-marriage amendment) to avoid insulting those they are in conversation with, and to “argue toward the principles the other side professes.” Read more…

Way to go Britain! Why don’t we do more of this here?

by Carolyn Moynihan

The latest move in Britain’s clampdown on the sexualization of children is a warning to broadcasters to keep offensive lyrics off the radio waves at times when children are likely to be listening. Read more…

My parents uncovered a test I took in, I think, 3rd grade. Here are my stellar answers to the two essay questions:

16. Name two animals that are endangered. Explain how they became endangered. Tell what you would do to keep them safe. Keep reading.

by Denyse O’Leary

It is mainly religious people who raise children, and more women in America are religious.

First, the context: Modern political science — which readily understands imperialism, resistance, and clash of competing interests — does not similarly understand “the wasting away of nations.” That, says David Goldman, author of How Civilizations Die: (and why Islam is dying too), is because political scientists tend to assume that people will follow their rational self-interest. In fact, they often don’t. Read more…

W. Bradford Wilcox, who consults on U.S. demographics, is the director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia.

The long-term fortunes of the modern economy depend in part on the strength and sustainability of the family, both in relation to fertility trends and to marriage trends. This basic, but often overlooked, principle is now at work in the current global economic crisis. Read more…

by Charlie Butts

Gardasil, a vaccine used to inoculate young girls against a form of cervical cancer, is now being recommended for boys ages 11 to 12. Some sources consider that to be a bad idea and not cost-effective. Read more…

by rnewman

I’d like to start off by thanking Elizabeth for inviting me to be a guest blogger. For those who don’t know me (most of you) my name is Rickard Newman, I’m a recent transplant to New York and I’m engaged to Alana S. Since I met Alana I went from knowing nothing about the fertility industry to being knee-deep in near constant immersion in the topic. A year ago I didn’t even know there was such a thing as a fertility “industry”. Today I’m making my own documentary about it. Thank you for letting me share some of my thoughts with you. Read more…

By Stan Gould,�Editor Read more…