Children’s ‘natural right to their biological mother and father’ is above adult needs, coalition says in push to overturn gay marriage 

A national coalition of conservative organizations is launching a campaign to overturn same-sex marriage, emphasizing children’s natural rights over adult desires. 

“The Greater Than campaign is the first-ever attempt, by any of the 38 countries that have redefined gay marriage, to take it back on behalf of children,” Them Before Us founder and President Katy Faust told The Lion in an interview Wednesday. 

The Greater Than campaign argues the legalization of same-sex marriage under the 2015 U.S. Supreme Court decision Obergefell v. Hodges not only redefined marriage but also redefined parenthood. 

“Once husbands and wives became optional, mothers and fathers became replaceable,” the campaign’s website states. “But for a child, their mother and father are never optional; they are essential. Children need both a mother and a father to provide stability, guidance and the unique love only a man and woman can give. No adult desire or ideology can change that.” 

Legally altering parenthood stripped children of their natural right to a biological mother and father, reducing children to “less than” adults’ desires, Faust said. The organization seeks to restore children as “greater than” adult agendas in the “marriage and family conversation” – the “building block of society,” she said. 

“For too long, the desires of adults have driven the policy discussion surrounding the homosexual and transgender agenda,” said Walker Wildmon, vice president of the American Family Association and a coalition member, in a release provided to The Lion. “It is time we refocus our attention on the needs of children. All children are created in the image of God and have a right to both a mother and father. This project is timely and necessary for the purpose of reestablishing this fundamental truth in society and government.” 

Stopping ‘child victimization’ 

The campaign’s main priority is a national return to defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman. The coalition of more than 40 allied organizations plans to defend children’s well-being through judicial and legislative avenues, work to persuade public opinion that gay marriage has created “child victimization” and transform churches – both Catholic and Protestant – into a “child-centric fighting force,” Faust said. 

Faust said Obergefell “erased all familial distinctions” from state and federal laws, including the use of mother-father language and the recognition of a child’s biological relationship to his or her parents. 

“We’ve created new pathways for adults to acquire children that bypass adoption and bypass biology,” she said. 

Faust also criticized the Respect for Marriage Act, which she referred to as the “Disrespect to Children Act,” saying the Biden administration policy “cemented” gay marriage into law as a civil right. 

“It was the entire legislative branch of the U.S. government saying a child’s own mother and father are optional in their development, in their identity formation and in regard to their safety,” she said. 

The removal of the biological parent-child relationship from law has contributed to the mass production and sale of embryos and has enabled sex offenders to acquire children, according to the campaign’s press release. 

Pursuing a legal strategy 

The effort is working with state legislators to re-establish what it calls the “centuries-old, common law understanding” of a child’s “primary, pre-political relationship” to his or her biological parents. If enacted, those child-protection laws would “trigger a constitutional challenge” from gay marriage activists, forcing policymakers and courts to choose between the well-being of children and adult desires, Faust said. 

“So, the tactic is actually very simple,” Faust said. “Simply require, through state legislation, that those contours of the natural family be recognized and encouraged in law. And if you can do that, the whole foundation of Obergefell is going to be unsustainable.” 

The campaign’s mission is not discrimination, Faust said, but protecting children’s upbringing and well-being as essential to the functioning of society. 

“Biology is the one that discriminates,” she said. “We are simply advancing the biological realities of the fact that it takes a man and a woman to make a baby. And both a man and a woman maximize child development by offering distinct and complementary benefits to child rearing.” 

Faust said Greater Than does not seek to impose a religious agenda. 

For years, conservatives have responded to arguments for gay marriage by emphasizing religious liberty and conscience rights. The campaign instead centers the debate on children’s rights, which Faust said even many who avoid the issue are inclined to defend. 

“If our lives are ultimately measured by how we love and protect others, then we must answer this question: ‘Did we create communities where children were loved, valued and protected – or did we allow cowardice and cultural confusion to leave a generation at risk?’” Christian author and speaker Lisa Bevere said in the press release. “I’m honored to be part of Greater Than, which is advancing the rights and well-being of children – the ultimate legacy and wealth of our nation.” 

Some of the campaign’s national and state allies include the Colson Center, Family Research Council and Focus on the Family. The organizations have worked on the issue for more than a decade and are now uniting to speak with “one voice” and “one message,” Faust said. 

“All of the partners in our coalition are saying children are the victims when we get this question wrong, and all of us are rising up to defend them,” she said.