Researchers at Penn State University recently published a study that shows new fathers are important to the developmental health of their children.
It was found that biological fathers who were warm and developmentally supportive of their 10-month-old often had a positive experience co-parenting the baby at two-years-old with the biological mother. Children raised in that family pattern were found to have better markers of physical health in their bloodwork at seven-years-old.
“The takeaway here is that for families with a father in the household, dads affect the environment in ways that can support — or undermine — the health of the child for years to come,” said Alp Aytuglu, a postdoctoral scholar in the Department of Biobehavioral Health.
Dr. Albert Mohler, president of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary who is a part of the Greater Than Campaign, spoke with Tony Perkins on “Washington Watch.”
“We've had the subversion in just about every arena of life and the culture, the subversion of fatherhood. So, it's fascinating that something like this appears as it does,” states Mohler.
He points to the academic speech tied to the lengthy title of the study: Longitudinal Associations Between Father- and Mother-Child Interactions, Coparenting, and Child Cardiometabolic Health.
“The bottom line is children at various stages who have their biological — and that's important here, the biological — father in the home have significant health gains over children, boys and girls, who do not,” explains Mohler.
Critics say that there is an effort to suppress this social science research, an effort extending 30 years. This is because the Left doesn’t want evidence that validates the truth.
Mohler notes that such research was important work at the time.
“Back then, what the sociologists wanted to deny was that having a father in the home, the biological father, was so important,” Mohler said. “Now, what we face are people who are arguing it doesn't matter if there's any father in the home.”
Because of the LGBTQ revolution, he thinks it’s all the more brave that this research has come out.
“I mean, here we're talking about some researchers, they actually dared to document, with scientific and academic depth and thickness, the fact that having a biological father in the home really does matter to children,” says Mohler.
He says it appears only Christian conservatives are talking about this.
“The Left will do everything possible. If it can't suppress it, it's just going to ignore it. So, you'd think that somebody — I don't know, the Today Show or somebody — would think it's interesting to look at this research, but we know why it's not interesting to the mainstream media,” states Mohler.
He mentions the mission of the Greater than Campaign, which is fighting for the rights of children, stating they deserve a mother and father. The contemporary moral challenge, he says, is no longer an absentee father, but rather a child being raised by same-sex parents.
The difference Dads make
Mainstream culture casts fathers as irrelevant.
“The mainstream culture has been arguing it doesn't make any difference, there's no evidence in the lives of children that it makes a difference. Of course, we know as Christians, you bet there is and will be. And now it's becoming undeniable,” says Mohler.
He says that he is glad to be a part of this movement.
“I think a part of what is shocking people is that we're saying things out loud. And I just want to say, if we as Christians don't say these things out loud, no one else is going to,” comments Mohler.
And the message he says they dare to say is that children deserve both a mother and a father.
“Now, due to all kinds of circumstances and tragedies, sometimes a child doesn't have one or the other, but we're living in a time in which the larger culture says it doesn't matter. We know that by God's design, it matters, and now we know in terms of the evidence that's right before our eyes, it really does matter,” concludes Mohler.
