By Michael P. Farris

Madame princess, fellow panelists, and ladies and gentlemen: Today I have been asked to address a subject that is necessarily far more personal than my normal topics for speeches. I have been asked to talk about reclaiming the large family ideal.

For today’s topic, I have an essentially pragmatic claim to expertise. As you have heard, my wife and I have nine children. And we are in earnest prayer that the coming of our next child will be delayed until at least next week. My wife is due to deliver child number ten on April 4. [Editor’s note: Peter James Farris was born on March 29.]

Of all the things that are contained in my resume, the one statement that always brings the strongest reaction from audiences in the United States is the fact that I have nine—soon to be ten— children. For example, last week I was on a nationally televised program called Politically Incorrect. When I mentioned my nine children in passing, both the audience and the movie and TV stars on the show with me broke out into loud and sustained laughter. No one laughed when a hot movie actor announced that he believed in reincarnation and that it was possible to give birth to Hitler once again, but my announcement of a large family brought this modernistic audience to the flash point of mirthful ridicule in a nanosecond.

The lesson was immediately apparent. It is acceptable to have bizarre notions like reincarnation of Hitler, but only a truly insane person would have nine or ten children.

I did not always hold my current views about the desirability of a large family. In the spring of 1971, a scant four or five months before we were married, my wife-to-be sat in the audience as I, a student, gave a speech that had won the annual Whitman College speech contest. My speech openly and strongly advocated Zero Population Growth. And perhaps it is important to say that when I gave that speech in 1971, I was active in a Baptist church and currently attended an independent church in the evangelical and Baptist tradition. I have never changed denominations.

But in the next ten years after that speech, many things did change in my life: I became far more serious about my Christian faith; I was changed from the politics of flaming moderation to an outspoken and reasoned conservatism; I became a lawyer involved in a number of public causes; and I became the father of three daughters.

Zero Population Growth was no longer a burning passion, but I still felt that three children were indeed quite enough. But God and my wife had other ideas. My wife gave me a book to read which advocated allowing God to do your family planning, and we attended a seminar that advocated the same position. All the arguments raised by these large-family advocates fell off me like water off the back of a duck. They were easily rejected by my logical processes. Well, all of the arguments except one, that is.

The one idea I could not dismiss was a simple but profound declaration in Psalm 127 that children are both a blessing and a reward from the Lord. I realized that all of my reasons for wanting to limit my family size boiled down to the idea that children were not a blessing nor a reward. I remained both uncomfortable and a little fearful of the future if I let God be God in the area of the size of our family. But I was a lot more uncomfortable and genuinely afraid of living my life upon the premise that God was wrong in what He caused to be written in Psalm 127.

With hesitation and trembling, I agreed with my wife that we should obey the word of God and live our lives in accordance with His truth that indeed children are a reward and a blessing and that we would accept all of the children He chose to send our way.

In those early days, my wife would remind me of what a miracle it was to give birth and that it was unlikely that we would have more than five, maybe six children. I was comforted by her assurances. But God, in His magnificent wisdom, decided that He would not be skimpy when it came to rewarding and blessing the Farris family. We are at ten children now, and the end is not yet in sight. It is a development in my life that I neither planned nor initially welcomed. But without a doubt, it is the most profoundly important thing I have ever done in my adult life.

My main point I wish you to all know is that after 21 years of child-rearing and facing at least another 18 before my wife and I will possibly face an empty nest, I can confirm from the crucible of experience that indeed children are a blessing from the Lord. And a very big family equates with a very big blessing.

Without a doubt there would be some from the ZPG crowd and perhaps other quarters who would accuse me of selfishly wanting greater blessing for myself in a way that is truly irresponsible in light of the impact of ten children on the environment and the world.

There is a superficial answer to that charge and a more in-depth answer. Superficially, I believe it is clearly more selfish to unreasonably and unnaturally limit the size of one’s family. A large family means you drive a 15-passenger van instead of a sports car. Having a large family means you wear a cotton sweater rather than a cashmere sweater. Having a large family means you eat soup rather than caviar. Large families require a sacrificial attitude, rather than the consumer-based selfishness made possible by intentional childlessness.

But let’s face the question of societal responsibility more directly. I believe the big picture of the large family ideal involves a way of living that promotes even greater responsibility that is indeed very good for society as a whole.

At a basic level, a large family teaches a child a kind of lifestyle that is fundamentally responsible. A child who has to share with a brother or sister is more likely to share as an adult. A child who has to wear hand-me-down clothing is less likely to be caught up in the ravages of the excessive side of using material things for emotional gratification.

Every society is better off when it lives according to the maxim that each family will be responsible to handle its own needs and desires. It is not the job of society to feed my children. That is my job. It is not the job of society to clothe my children. That is my job. It is not the job of society to educate my children. Again, that is my job. Health care? I should pay for it. Caring for my elderly parents? Society’s job? No. That responsibility falls by moral obligation squarely on my shoulders, together with the shoulders of my one brother and two sisters.

Although very few of my aunts and uncles or cousins have large families, my mother came from a very large family; she was one of 11 children. And today, my 93-year-old grandmother lives in a very nice care facility for the elderly that is paid for not by the government, but by the collective action of about five or six of her 11 children. That is the true entitlement of one who devoted her life to the raising of a large family.

Society has proven itself to be an inadequate educator of children. Church schools do far better. Home schools do even better. Social and medical programs to take care of the poor and elderly have expanded to the point that they threaten to bankrupt the most successful economy in the history of the world—that is, of course, the United States of America. Families do this job more economically and with more integrity. When society displaces the family, the result is that all in society eventually are losers in the process.

We all recognize the need for large numbers of people to take care of social needs like education and poverty programs and elder care. Large families taking care of their own makes a lot of sense.

There are two other aspects of our family’s life and practices that the world finds almost as radical as our decision to welcome children into our family. First, we home school our children. Second, we prepare our children for marriage using a courtship rather than a dating model.

We are not alone in the U.S. as home schoolers. Home schooling is a major movement in the United States, with an estimated 1.23 million children receiving their education at home. Hundreds of thousands of families are taking responsibility for educating their own children.

There are three main reasons why parents educate their children at home. First, we believe, and the statistics support our belief, that home education is academically superior—for all. Regardless of family income, parent education level, teacher certification, or the degree of government regulation, the scores of home-educated students significantly exceed those of public school students. In a recent nationwide study of U.S. home school students, the home schoolers outperformed their public school peers by 30 to 37 percentile points on average across all subjects.

Critics of home schooling often claim only parents with teaching credentials can effectively home school. We find that the data suggests otherwise. Achievement test scores reveal a differential of only a few percentile points between students taught by parents who have ever been certified and those whose parents were never certified. Math and reading scores for minority home schoolers show no significant difference when compared to whites, but a similar comparison for public school students demonstrates a substantial disparity.

The second reason I believe that home schooling works is that it is morally superior. I believe the word of God commands parents to train their children by the principles and precepts of the Bible. Proverbs 22:6 states, "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it."

Another passage which lays out our responsibility as parents to teach our children is found in Deuteronomy 6:6-7, which instructs: "And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in shine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and thou shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thy risest up." I am convinced that God has uniquely designed and created each parent with not only the capacity, but the duty to train, disciple, and instruct their children.

The third reason we home school is that it strengthens the family unit. It causes us as parents to grow closer to children. It causes our children to honor and appreciate their parents, and it gives siblings a genuine love for each other.

The other area that I believe is at least as important as home schooling and having large families, and that is far different than what the world offers, is the method that we use to prepare our children for marriage. We call it courtship as opposed to dating. By dating I mean going out with someone in a serial fashion. Although our society—at least in the U.S.—has embraced dating as an acceptable method of finding a spouse, there are some serious pitfalls in the dating process.

First, dating invites sexual sin. Today many people who date eventually engage in sexual sin at a physical level. All people who date (at least all males) engage in mental sexual sin which Jesus told us is just as sinful as physical sin.

Second, dating involves emotional promiscuity, because those who date give away pieces of their hearts to each of the people they go out with.

Last, dating promotes divorce. It basically allows a person to say "I love you until . . . " a better person comes along or until times get tough.

If we have found a better way of preparing our children for careers (for example, home schooling), why should we follow the same old, faulty way of preparing our children for marriage?

We follow three main principles of courtship in our family:

Courtship principle #1: Courtship should wait until both parties are in the season of life when they are prepared for marriage. For our family, that means that young men are prepared when they are ready to work and support a family, able to maintain a home, and ready to be a father. My daughters are ready when they are prepared to be a mother, ready to teach their children, and ready to be a homemaker.

Another sign of readiness is spiritual maturity. Both young men and young women need to be able to make wise decisions without supervision.

Courtship principle #2: Young people should not consider any person for courtship unless he or she meets the spiritual standards they have established with their parents. We discuss these standards with our children far in advance so that a spiritual frame of reference is front and center at all times.

Finally, courtship principle #3: Young people should only court a person they find to be interesting and attractive. Most people engage in dating based solely on the third criteria. It is on our list, but it is last.

As parents, it is important to help our children understand these basic principles from the beginning. From the very earliest ages, we raise our children with the understanding that the whole area of boy-girl relationships is to be reserved for the time of life just prior to marriage.

The vast majority of parents want their children to abstain from sexual relationships until marriage. However, we have failed to see that abstinence should include emotional abstinence as well. In other words, if we permit our children to develop boyfriend-girlfriend relationships before they are ready to get married, we are simply asking for sexual temptation, and in many cases, sexual trouble. The pressures of society today no longer affirm sexual restraint; rather, these pressures push children toward full sexual intimacy. We ask too much of our kids to restrain their physical involvement while they are engaged in emotional romance.

Fathers, it is up to you to set the standards for your family. You can ensure that your children escape the dangerous trap of premature emotional and physical romance. Train them up with the home-based culture and expectation that romantic love (a boy-girl relationship) is reserved for the time of life just before marriage.

In conclusion, God’s ways work best, and God loves children and calls them blessings. God commands us to teach our children. We ought to take that command seriously. Christ taught us to have faithful hearts and fruitful bodies as the foundation for marriage. Let us train our children accordingly.

Michael P. Farris, attorney, is the president and founder of the Home School Legal Defense Association, a membership organization that provides legal and educational counsel to home-schooling families. He has tried cases before the United States Supreme Court and authored a number of books and articles on home schooling and the law, child rearing, and the family. He is an ordained minister in the Baptist Church.