The 1970s saw changes great and small in American society. More women began to move into the workforce and began to define themselves as more than wives, mothers or girlfriends.

While men grew their hair and wore flowered shirts, children were listening to Marlo Thomas singing "Free to Be... You and Me."

Gender roles were changing. It was OK for Mom to be a doctor and Dad to be a nurse. It was also increasingly OK to leave behind the confines of marriage. The divorce rate, which had begun to climb in the 1960s, soared in the 1970s, as states began to adopt no-fault divorce laws.

"Confines of Marriage"? That seems distorted. What do we believe marriage is?

"We were a family. How'd it break up and come apart, so that now we're turned against each other? Each standing in the other's light. How'd we lose that good that was given us? Let it slip away. Scattered it, careless. What's keepin' us from reaching out, touching the glory?"

good friends of ours gave birth to their second child last night, in their home, by themselves. the midwives could not get there on time, so he (husband/dad) delivered the child. everything went fine.

why does that sound so foreign, so scary, or so stupid? what if birth and death were still commonplace in the home? if it were, would it make any difference in the relational holocaust of our time?