The last two centuries have witnessed a massive transformation in the way human beings live, think, work, and arrange their lives. At the same time, the institution of the family has been under sustained attack, in turns dismembered and disabled by cultural trends, direct attacks, and subtle cultural shifts. Now, barely into the 21st century, we face the reality that the institution of the family is facing an even more fundamental challenge--the challenge to maintain a coherent definition of realities as basic as marriage, kinship, and the natural family.

Social revisionists habitually describe the family unit consisting of parents and their biological or adopted offspring as the "nuclear" family. This is not an inaccurate description, for this basic pattern of relationships, starting with the marriage of a man and a woman and extending to their offspring, does form the nucleus of the larger extended family.

Nevertheless, the social revolutionaries have now routinely dismissed the nuclear family as an artifact of a bygone era--represented by 1950s situation comedies and what liberals dismiss as the "artificiality" of the postwar baby boom.

In more recent years, some defenders of the family now refer to the basic family unit as the "natural" family. This term properly identifies the natural arrangement of husband and wife, plus their offspring, as the most identifiable and important family unit for protection, nurture, and social stability. This is a healthy development, for even as the concept of the nuclear family has become less useful, the focus on the natural family clarifies issues considerably.

Now, family advocates Allan C. Carlson and Paul T. Mero have released "The Natural Family: A Manifesto," a document that offers a comprehensive defense of the family, buttressed by an honest and insightful analysis of the threats now directed at the family as an institution.

The manifesto begins with a narrative of family life, beginning with a young man and a young woman who are drawn to each other and solemnize this bonding in the covenant of marriage. As Carlson and Mero explain, "The conjugal bond built on fidelity, mutual duty, and respect allows both of them to emerge into their full potential; they become as their Creator intended, a being complete."

Of course, this marriage now creates a new family, identified in the manifesto as "the first and fundamental unit of human society." This unit establishes a new economy as husband and wife "share the work of provisioning, drawing on each one's interests, strengths, and skills." As Carlson and Mero explain, "They craft a home which becomes a special place on earth. In centuries past, the small farm or the artisan's shop was the usual expression of this union between the sexual and the economic. Today, the urban townhouse, apartment, or suburban home are more common. Still, the small home economy remains the vital center of daily existence."

From the natural union of marriage "flows new human life." Children are not seen as accidental impositions on the self-actualizing potential of the parents as individuals, but are instead understood as the first and most important gifts given to the conjugal bond. As the authors put simply: "Children are the first end, or purpose, of marriage."