Chesterton Tells: 'The Story of the Family'

Laurie J. Schmitt reviews Dale Ahlquist's newly compiled collection of essays by G.K. Chesterton.

When I was a teen, my only dream was to have a big family: to be a mom of many, as many as the Lord would give, and to live a simple, homespun sort of life. Decades later, I thank God continually for the gift of my children—seven biological and two adopted, along with two sweet souls looking down from heaven, and lost through miscarriage.

Parenting is not for the weak and wimpy. It’s always been a challenge, but now the battle is making the headlines, taking a barrage of forms—strained economy, senseless education, and poisoned politics—with each aiming for the destruction of the family. Sterilization, abortion, and contraception; divorce and remarriage and divorce and remarriage; the ruining of authentic fatherhood and beautiful motherhood. Together these form a conspiracy, working together, creating a void as the family is eaten alive from the inside out. 

Evil’s onslaught against the traditional family is nothing new. Moses allowed divorce because his “stiff necked” people were not only that, but thick headed and cruel hearted as well. And the glorious Roman empire, for as educated and influential as it was, traded the fame of its powerful infantry for the shame of infanticide. And eons before these? The perfect made-for-each-other couple, Adam and Eve, living in a vacation spot-paradise, tossed truth and peace and life aside for the taste of a lie. They let sin slither in.

Sin separates and works to destroy every relationship: man with God, with himself, with others, and with the world. Can we get back to the garden? Is it too late? 

G.K. Chesterton, in the early 1900s, wrote extensively on marriage and family, defining these as the basis for a healthy society, and warning that when these crumble, civilization does, too. The Story of the Family: G. K. Chesterton On the Only State That Creates and Loves Its Own Citizens, a collection of thoughts and essays by Chesterton, assembled by Dale Ahlquist, reminds us who established families in the first place, and why.

The articles in The Story of the Family are grouped together: In the sections covering “The Family and the World,” “Love and Sex,” “Marriage and Divorce,” and “Babies and Birth Control,” Chesterton raises motherhood to its rightful place, gives fatherhood a punch in the arm, agrees that marriage is difficult, going so far as to call it “a duel to the death.”

The chapter on “Parents and Public Education'' covers the vital role parents have in educating their children, teaching them, among other things, life skills, common sense and core values. The chapter on “Home and Work” deals with the importance of loving one’s neighbor, strengthening the economy, literally, by shopping locally and supporting small, mom and pop businesses, and expounds on the wholesomeness of homesteading and small-scale farming. The Story of the Family is both a timely and timeless read. Read it slowly, bit by bit, chewing thoroughly. (Overall, it is quite filling.)

Mom is on our side! Our Lady of Fatima, our greatest ally, offering the perfect example of holy motherhood, said specifically that the final battle will be against marriage and family. Today’s forceful pull against the family through bizarre political policies, economics pitted against sound economy, and social nastiness that tears at our spouses and children, our parents and peers, is literally hell bent on destroying the family. The pure, the innocent, are trampled underfoot. The chaste are chased with picket signs.

Sometimes we are tempted to doubt. What more can we do? Did we do enough, give enough of ourselves? Are the forces of evil greater than the family bond?

Our world is suffering from broken homes and broken hearts. But Mary, our perfect Mother, promises that we shall obtain all that we ask for by prayer, especially the Rosary. Let’s fast and pray for the restoration of families, including our own, pleading with Christ’s own prayer, “that I should not lose anything of what he gave me” (John 6:39).

Copyright 2022 Laurie J. Schmitt
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