Marriage Briefings and Strategy Sessions Throughout California

Promote Marriage Positively in Any Situation
Join Lay Catholics to Evangelize Culture for Marriage and Family

Concerned about attacks on marriage and the family?  Concerned about family members and friends that support redefining marriage?  Concerned about the increasing attacks on Catholics and others who oppose the agenda to redefine marriage, family, and human sexuality in schools, work places, and in the popular culture?

Attend or organize a Stand with Children briefing, presentation, or workshop in your community.

When asked where Catholics should go for trusted leadership in the defense and promotion of marriage, Bishop Cordileone of Oakland said, "Stand with Children, a marriage advocacy program started in California by Catholics for the Common Good, is a great place for lay Catholics to begin."

Stand with Children regional teams are organizing local marriage briefings and strategy sessions throughout California. Participants tell us that what they learn about marriage in the Stand with Children seminars fills a gap they have been experiencing—the need for language and skills for talking about marriage with friends and family members, particularly young adults.

A participant at a recent seminar in Long Beach exclaimed, "This approach fits so well with what we do in Couples for Christ, but we have never put it into these words before. This language can be used even with people who are not Catholic or who are not even religious! What a wonderful way to explain God's beautiful plan for men and women."

Another participant from San Diego shared an experience so many can relate to. “We have five kids who each had a Catholic school education.  Four are living together but are not married. They seem lost and we need to know how to help our kids. Our grandkids won't have both a mom and a dad.  We want to help them.”

So often we struggle when faced with attacks on marriage.  We desperately seek positive language to talk about the reality of marriage without appearing judgmental or discriminatory. Stand with Children’s programs and unique reality-based approach offers new insights about marriage, family, and human sexuality that express a transcendent reality—one that is beyond religious and cultural bias and that resonates directly with the inherent understanding of love and relationship each person knows to be true.

Stand with Children events focus on providing tools that can be used immediately to positively discuss marriage in any situation—with family, colleagues, even related to public policy.  In addition, Stand with Children stresses the need for on-going organized formation in the reality of love, marriage, family, sexuality, and Christian personalism.  Promotion of marriage is not about a strict set of answers to questions, but a transformation of each and every person from the relativistic effects of the culture to an integrated understanding of God’s plan for creation

Teaching on a positive, proactive message, Stand with Children positions the marriage issue as one of social justice focused on the rights of the child and steers conversations away from opposition to any particular social group.  In this way, we stand in solidarity with children, all of whom have a natural right to know and be cared for by their mother and father, in marriage, as far as possible.  

Mobilization for Marriage Taking Place in Faith & Action Circles

Faith & Action Circles, the formation and action program from Stand with Children, offers a unique opportunity for small groups to grow in faith, community, and love while actively participating in the marriage movement. End the isolation that so many are feeling. These become support groups where participants get support for working out problems discussing subjects related to marriage, family and human sexuality with family members, friends, and co-workers.

A regional leader from Folsom, CA told us she expected to jump right into stuffing envelopes, handing out flyers, or other traditional community activities. There is some of that to do, but instead, she was asked to lead a Faith & Action Circle. She says of her experience, "I came to realize that being formed in the reality of love, marriage, family, and communion is in fact the true 'work' of the marriage movement right now. Before we can go out to speak with the community, we must first become transformed in this reality. We must become equipped for action."

Faith & Action Circle participants throughout California have expressed similar sentiments. One regional leader from San Diego shared that she and her husband started the Circle with mixed expectations. A few weeks in, they realized just how much the formation was affecting them individually and as a couple, and what it was offering them in language and understanding with which to talk to their young adult children about marriage, family, sexuality, and love.

In the effort to mobilize lay Catholics to defend and promote marriage, beginning in their own families, teams are organizing regionally to plan briefings and strategy sessions all over California.  Faith & Action Circles are meeting regularly and more are forming everyday. 

For additional information, see the Faith & Action Circle page or contact Kathleen at (213) 291-3580.