Yelled at for Defending Fatherhood at the United Nations. He Felt Compassion Instead of Anger.

Picture a room full of diplomats, activists, and policy leaders at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. A professor from a small university in Idaho stands at the front presenting research on why fathers matter in the lives of their daughters. The room does not receive it warmly. The pushback is not polite disagreement. It is hostile. The message from the crowd is clear: fatherhood as an institution needs to go, all men are toxic, and anyone defending the traditional family is part of the problem.

Dr. Tim Rarick felt his natural man rise up. He wanted to argue this person into the dirt. He wanted to win. But something else took over. Instead of anger, he felt compassion. He looked at the person yelling and thought, this person has been wounded by their father. It is no wonder they are pushing against the very idea of fatherhood. That recognition did not come from discipline or self-control. Elder Bednar has taught that we do not possess charity; rather, charity possesses us. In that moment, Dr. Rarick understood what that felt like in real time.

Dr. Rarick is a professor of Home and Family at BYU-Idaho. He teaches human development, parenting, and family advocacy. He has spoken at the United Nations more than 20 times and has been married to his wife Jody for 25 years. They are raising four children together. Nick Leyva invited him onto the Epic Marriage Podcast to talk about what the family proclamation actually asks of Latter-day Saint couples and why defending the family requires both backbone and a soft heart.

 Peacemaking Is Not Peacekeeping   

The experience at the United Nations taught Dr. Rarick is a distinction that applies to every marriage. There is a difference between peacekeeping and peacemaking. Peacekeeping is the avoidance of all conflict. A peacekeeper wants everyone to stay calm, even if that means no one says what needs to be said. A peacemaker still speaks the truth. The difference is that a peacemaker is not trying to stir the pot or win the argument. A peacemaker is trying to stand firmly without demeaning anyone in the process.

Most couples default to one extreme or the other. Some avoid every hard conversation and let resentment build quietly for years. Others charge into every disagreement determined to prove they are right, and they leave emotional wreckage behind every time. The middle path is peacemaking. You say what needs to be said. You say it with clarity. And you refuse to let winning become more important than understanding.

Dr. Rarick is honest about the fact that this does not come naturally. The urge to dominate a conversation, to pin someone down with logic, to make sure they know you are right, that urge is real and it is strong. But charity is not a skill you develop through practice. It is a gift that possesses you when you let it. And when it shows up in the middle of a conflict, whether at the United Nations or at your kitchen table, it changes everything.

 A Spoon and a Fork Both Feed a Child   

One of the first questions Nick asked Dr. Rarick was about the difference between a mother's love and a father's love. Nick admitted he sometimes wonders if a father's love runs as deep as a mother's. Dr. Rarick offered an analogy that reframes the entire conversation. A spoon and a fork both feed a child, but one is better for yogurt and the other is better for chicken. They serve different purposes. Neither is less important.

That distinction matters because a growing number of voices insist that mothers and fathers are interchangeable. Dr. Rarick encounters this pushback regularly at the United Nations. When he presents research on father-daughter relationships, critics argue that there are no meaningful differences between what mothers and fathers contribute. His response is grounded in developmental science. Difference does not equal deficit. A father who tries to love his children the way a mother does will likely fall short, and the same is true in reverse. The goal is not sameness. The goal is for both parents to bring what they are uniquely designed to offer.

This principle extends directly into marriage. Husbands and wives do not need to become copies of each other to build a strong relationship. They need to understand and respect what each person brings to the partnership. When couples stop competing over who contributes more and start recognizing that their differences are complementary, the entire dynamic of the home shifts.

 Why "Nurture" and "Preside" Trigger So Many People   

Nick shared a memory from a BYU classroom where students raised their hands and said the prophet used the wrong word in the family proclamation. The word "preside" makes people angry. The word "nurture" makes some women feel boxed in, as though their only sanctioned role is the kitchen.

Dr. Rarick has heard the same objections at the United Nations, often in stronger terms. One leader at the UN stated that for many women in the world, the kitchen is a prison and the bedroom is a torture chamber. The proposed solution was to get women out of the home and into high-visibility, high-salary positions. Dr. Rarick does not dismiss the real suffering behind that statement. In some countries and cultures, that description is painfully accurate and needs to be addressed. But franchising that experience across all women everywhere and using it to dismantle motherhood and homemaking as institutions is a leap that the evidence does not support.

The word "nurture" does not mean what the world has turned it into. Its actual definition is simple. To nurture means to help things grow. That is it. When couples start from the premise that nurture means a woman must be a stay-at-home mom or she is failing her family, they are interpreting a sacred word through a worldly lens. Dr. Rarick offers a framework that applies broadly. Something can be understandable but not justifiable. The frustration people feel about these words is understandable given the cultural noise around them. But allowing that frustration to override the actual meaning of the proclamation is not justified.

 The Real Family Advocates Are at Home   

Dr. Rarick has an unusual perspective on family advocacy. He has spoken at the United Nations, met with diplomats from dozens of countries, and is preparing to spend a semester in New York working with Church Public Affairs on family policy and diplomacy. And he says the whole experience is overrated.

Not the mission. The stage. He is quick to point out that the people he admires most are not the ones standing at podiums. They are the husbands and wives who teach the family proclamation in their homes every day. They are the parents who help their children understand every side of difficult issues. They are the couples who soften their hearts, pray over their families, and do the unglamorous daily work of building something that will outlast mortality.

Dr. Rarick lays out a priority hierarchy that every couple can adopt. Your heart comes first. Your marriage comes second. Your children come third. Your church callings and community involvement come after that. And if you do anything beyond those things, that is gravy. President Oaks has taught that there is no area of parental action more needful of heavenly guidance or more likely to receive it, than the decisions parents make in raising their children. Dr. Rarick has lived that principle and watched it prove itself again and again.

 A Document That Has Not Changed One Word   

The family proclamation read the same way in 1995 as it reads today. It was met with shrugs and polite nods when President Hinckley first delivered it. People thought it was stating the obvious. Three decades later, those same sentences provoke heated arguments. The document did not move. The world moved around it. That is exactly what prophetic counsel looks like. It does not make sense until you need it, and by the time you need it, you are grateful someone wrote it down before the noise got too loud to hear clearly.

President Ballard called the family proclamation a modern-day title of liberty and invited every member of the Church to hold fast to it. President Oaks called it the test for this generation. Dr. Rarick felt that call settle into his bones when he began teaching family advocacy at BYU-Idaho in 2011, and it has not let go of him since.

For couples who feel overwhelmed by the cultural pressure to redefine marriage, family, and parental roles, the proclamation remains a steady anchor. It does not ask you to be perfect. It asks you to hold fast. And the place to start holding fast is not a conference hall or a government building. It is your own home, with your own spouse, on an ordinary Tuesday night when no one is watching.

Listen to the full conversation with Dr. Tim Rarick on the Epic Marriage Podcast to hear his journey from grad school to the United Nations, why dozens of countries are hungry for pro-family research, and what it feels like when charity possesses you in the middle of a fight. Visit YourEpicMarriage.com for resources created for temple-sealed couples who want their marriage and family to reflect its eternal significance.

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