Contact: Don Feder, WCF Communications Director, 508-405-1337, dfeder@rcn.com; The Howard Center for Family, Religion, & Society at 815-964-5819, media@worldcongress.org, media@profam.org

ROCKFORD, Ill., Oct. 22, 2013 /Christian Newswire/ -- A World Congress of Families leadership team was in the Ukraine for two days of meetings and events prior to the International Planning Meeting for World Congress of Families VIII held in Moscow, October 15-17.

The team consisted of WCF Communications Director Don Feder, Alexey Komov (WCF Representative in Russia and the CIS and organizer of WCF VIII), Srdjan Nogo (a leaders of the Serbian pro-family group, Dveri, a World Congress of Families Partner) and Fabrice Sorlin, a WCF Representative in France.

On October 13, the delegation met in Kiev with representatives of parents groups from all over the country.  The meeting was organized by Alexandar Skvortsov, co-chairman of the umbrella group, All Ukrainian Parents Committee.

The Ukrainian leaders expressed concern about the pressure brought to bear on their nation to accede to the homosexual agenda (including "gay marriage") as a condition for membership in the European Union. They also noted the moral decline in society reflected in pornography (of which the Ukraine is one of the leaders internationally) and prostitution.

They complained about sexual indoctrination in the schools -- in the guise of teaching sex education -- and showed the WCF leaders a booklet used for this purpose that's graphic in both content and illustrations.

On October 14, the WCF team met with Vlad Lukyanov, a pro-family leader of the Ukrainian parliament or Rada, and held a well-attended press conference with Skvortsov and other leaders of the All-Ukrainian Parents Committee, which sponsors an annual Ukrainian Parents Forum. This year's forum, which included a discussion of home schooling and the rights of parents, was addressed by Pavel Parfentiev, WCF Representative to European Institutions, and attended by several prominent Ukrainian politicians.

The same WCF leaders were in Belgrade on September 28, for a rally and family march, including as many as 10,000 participants, according to an AP report.

World Congress of Families Managing Director Larry Jacobs commented: "Besides our World Congresses and regional events, WCF is increasingly active in promoting pro-family initiatives all over the world."  Internationally, World Congress of Families has taken the lead in defending Russia's frequently misrepresented child-protection law, with its new revisions adopted in June.

World Congress of Families VIII with the theme "Every Child A Gift: Large Families, the Future of Humanity" will be held in Moscow, September 10-12, 2014.  The opening session of WCF VIII will be in the Congress Hall of the Kremlin Palace.  A special WCF parliamentary session will also be held in the Russian Duma.  For more information visit the Russian websites at www.worldcongress.ru and www.familypolicy.ru.

For more information on World Congress of Families, visit www.worldcongress.org. To schedule an interview with Larry Jacobs, contact Don Feder at 508-405-1337 or don@worldcongress.org.

What is the Howard Center and World Congress of Families? The Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society (www.profam.org) is located in Rockford, Illinois and is an independent, non-profit research and education center that provides sound scholarship and effective strategies to affirm and defend the natural family, thus renewing a stable and free society.  The Howard Center is the publisher of the journal, "The Family In America" and is also the organizer of the World Congress of Families (WCF) project which is an international network of pro-family organizations, scholars, leaders and inter-faith people of goodwill from more than 80 countries that seek to restore the natural family as the fundamental social unit and the 'seedbed' of civil society (as found in the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1948).  The WCF was founded in 1997 by Dr. Allan Carlson, President of The Howard Center.  To date, there have been five World Congresses of Families -- Prague (1997), Geneva (1999), Mexico City (2004), Warsaw, Poland (2007) and Amsterdam, The Netherlands (2009).  World Congress of Families VI was held in Madrid, Spain in May 25-27, 2012.  World Congress of Families VII was held in Sydney, Australia, May 15-18, 2013, www.wcfsydney2013.org.au.  WCF VIII Moscow 2014 will be held September 10-12 in the Kremlin. www.worldcongress.ru