William G. White, M.D.
The following is an address presented at the Annual Meeting of the National Federation of Catholic Physicians’ Guilds, Augusta, Georgia, November 11, 1994. The author is a family physician in Franklin Park, Illinois; a past president of the National Federation of Catholic Physicians’ Guilds; and president of Seton Academy in Villa Park, Illinois, a Montessori school

I am a family physician, not a researcher, an author or a professor. Therefore my talk today will be of necessity a family physician’s talk, not an academic talk. My orientation is towards the practical rather than the theoretical. I find that whatever help I can give my patients in the area of family life comes less from the medical literature than from helping them discover what they already know, or almost know, because it is written in their hearts. I just help them translate it.

The subject “father and child” has received less attention in recent years than the subject “mother and child.” For example, much has been written about the bond between mother and infant. And more is being learned about the need for full-time mothering of young children. On the other hand, we know that in those segments of society where family life has deteriorated, where illegitimacy is more prevalent than marriage, where the children of teenaged mothers are raised by their grandmothers (if they are fortunate), that men are marginalized and that alcoholism, drug abuse and crime are rampant. It has also been observed that there may be an association between absent or emotionally distant fathers and difficulties in the achievement by both boys and girls of mature sexual identity.

So fathers do seem to be important, but how? Certianly they are not co­mothers. Most attempts at unisex within the family have been dismal failures. The women’s sections of the newspapers are full of lamentations about the demands on “supermoms” in which full-time working women find themselves also responsible for housekeeping and child-rearing. However competent women are in the workplace, men seem to be generally less competent than women around the house.

The roles of men and women, of fathers and mothers, although both important, appear to be different in kind. Lacking conclusive experimental evidence of precisely how the family should be structured, where do we look for insights into the roles of men and women in the family? As a family physician, faced with the immediate problems of the here and now, I need to help my patients search for the truths of human nature which apply to their situation. This search carries us to history, literature, anthropology (descriptive as well as experimental), nature, revelation, Catholic doctrine, and even to that great source of wisdom, the common sense of lived experience.

Turning first to nature, we find that every species has a characteristic mode of reproduction. Amoebas cleave, plants pollinate, fish spawn, mammals mate. But reproduction is not successful unless the young reach maturity and are able themselves to carry on the propagation of the species. In the human species, the young remain immature for a long time. Raising young human beings to maturity requires a tremendously complex educational process, not only in the skills necessary to earn a living in the modern world, but even more importantly, in how to interact with other human beings, especially in courtship, marriage and child-rearing. Historically, the only successful environment for carrying out this complex, prolonged process of cognitive, affective, social and moral education has been the stable family: the nuclear family supported by an extended family. The characteristic mode of successful reproduction in the human species is the family.

Since the goal of the family, biologically, is the rearing of the young, the biological constitution of both mother and father is oriented to this end. But human beings are not merely animals; they are spiritual animals, i.e., persons.Therefore, marriage and family also meet personal needs. There is a fundamental compatibility between the unitive end of marriage, which is the good of husband and wife, and the procreative end of marriage, which is the preservation of the species. But procreation also has a personal dimension. A particular marriage is not ordered merely to the good of the species, but to the particular good of its own members: mother, father and children, each of whom is a person,each of whom has infinite spiritual value. It is for this reason that marriage, to fulfill both its biological and spiritual purposes, must be exclusive, permanent and open to life. It must, that is, be a community of love: unconditional, committed, indissoluble.

In looking at the complementary roles of husband and wife in the family, then, biological differences are not merely physical, but also reveal truths about the person. We are not neuter souls inhabiting accidentally sexed bodies; we are male or female persons (the only such persons in creation). Just as the woman has a connaturality with the infant, and is especially suited physically, emotionally and psychologically to the care of young children, she also, as a person, finds her fulfillment in this vocation. The man, physically, emotionally and psychologically, is suited to be a protector and provider for his wife and children, and he, too, as a person, is fulfilled in his vocation of fatherhood. (Celibates also are called to be mothers and fathers, though not physically.) Dr. John Billings of Australia points out that Eve was taken not from Adam’s head- to rule him – not from his feet -to be his slave – but from his side, to be protected by his arm, and to be his heart’s companion. And, I would add, to give him someone to lean on. Now it is said that in today’s world, the specifically masculine traits of physical strength, speed and aggression are unnecessary. Perhaps. Although strenuous physical effort is less often necessary today than in the past, it is sometimes needed. Even if it were not, life remains a battle. All of us here today, for example,