Contact: Don Feder, 508-405-1337, don@worldcongress.org; The Howard Center for Family, Religion & Society, 815-964-5819, media@worldcongress.org

ROCKFORD, Ill., June 27, 2013 /Christian Newswire/ -- World Congress of Families has long been the leader of international efforts to protect marriage and the natural family.

Reacting to yesterday's Supreme Court decision striking down a section of the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), WCF Managing Director Larry Jacobs declared: "By ruling that part of DOMA is unconstitutional -- and federal benefits must be paid to 'partners' in states where same-sex 'marriages' were contracted -- the Supreme Court has struck a blow against marriage not only in the United States, but worldwide, given the tendency of many nations to follow our foolish lead on social engineering and a radical redefinition of marriage and family."

Jacobs said the fight to maintain the integrity of marriage and the natural family will continue.  Internationally, World Congress of Families and its 40 Partners in 15 countries have been in the forefront of that struggle.  The National Organization for Marriage has led defense-of-marriage efforts in the United States, ably assisted by Alliance Defending Freedom.  Both are WCF Partners.

In the United Kingdom, Christian Concern, another WCF Partner, has fought the redefinition of marriage.  Maxime Lagorce, a representative of the French group La Manif Pour Tous (The March for All), spoke at World Congress of Families VII in Sydney, May 15-18.  La Manif Pour Tous is still bringing upwards of a million people to the streets of Paris to protest the imposition of the travesty by the nation's socialist government.  In Spain, Ignacio Arsuaga, head of HazteOir -- a WCF partner and host of WCF VI Madrid, has been fighting to promote "natural marriage" since the Spanish redefinition of marriage in 2005.

WCF Australian Partners -- Australian Family Association, Endeavour Forum, and Dads4Kids (Fatherhood Foundation) -- helped to defeat a homosexual "marriage" bill before the Australian Parliament last year. Family First New Zealand headed by Bob McCoskrie has led the defense of natural marriage in that nation.

World Congress of Families Founder and International Secretary, Dr. Allan C. Carlson, was one of 20 prominent pro-family scholars who helped author a friend-of-court brief supporting DOMA,

"AMICI CURIAE BRIEF OF SCHOLARS OF HISTORY AND RELATED DISCIPLINES IN SUPPORT OF PETITIONERS."  The Brief was submitted by William Duncan, head of the Marriage Law Foundation and editorial board member of "The Family In America: A Journal of Public Policy" another project of the Howard Center for Family, Religion & Society.

The Madrid Declaration of World Congress of Families VI, adopted unanimously on May 27, 2012, states in part: "The World Congress of Families reaffirm(s) the truth that 'the family is the natural and fundamental group unity of society and is entitled to protection by society and the state' (Article 16 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights).  This natural family is inscribed in human nature and centers on the voluntary union of a man and a woman in the lifelong covenant of marriage." 

"Governments -- including courts -- can't create new human rights endowed by God.  They can only affirm or deny these rights from the Creator often choosing to favor adult desires and preferences while denying the human rights of defenseless children, as in the human rights cases of homosexual marriage and abortion," Jacobs concluded.  "The struggle for the God-given human rights of children to be born and raised by a mother and a father, and the rights of all people to natural marriage, the natural family, and the sanctity of human life -- which are indissolubly linked -- will continue."

World Congress of Families VIII will be held in Moscow, the Kremlin, September 10-12, 2014.  Click on: www.worldcongress.ru for more information.  For more information on World Congress of Families, please visit www.worldcongress.org. To schedule an interview with Larry Jacobs, contact Don Feder at 508-405-1337.

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.