The Tie That Binds

WASHINGTON - Is a federal program devoted to promoting marriage helping children escape poverty -- or are grants to pro-marriage programs a waste of tax dollars?

An eight-week marriage class in Washington, D.C., called "Together is Better," believes that raising children in a marriage between a man and woman, in a house with 'a pot of soup on the stove and a game of Monopoly' - is the kind of marriage that builds communities.

The class is run by the faith-based group East Capitol Center for Change, and it's funded by a grant from the president's "Healthy Marriage Initiative."

The program will provide marriage skills training for more than 700 people in a low-income community where single-parent homes are the norm.

Healthy Marriage coordinator Robert Jones said, "We hope people will have the information necessary to actually commit to a loving relationship, a loving marriage -- for the benefit of their child. Kids are less likely to enter the criminal justice system. They're less likely to enter the child abuse system when they're in a two-parent household, preferably marriage."

Watch the Wednesday edition of the 700 Club to see this report and learn more about the U.S. Government's efforts to protect children and families.

The president's "Healthy Marriage Initiative" plans to hand out $500 million over five years to groups that promote marriage. The premise is that by creating stable families, more children will escape poverty.

An instructor for the program says, "We are building intimacy together as a group."

Johnnie and Tyrone Hamilton, married for eight years, like the premise that stronger marriages will strengthen their community and protect at-risk kids.

"They're not getting out into trouble because they have role models to look after," said Johnnie. "'I have a mother and father, a nice family home, so why should I go to the street where it's not that type of home?'"

Single mom Rossalyn Parks said, "We need this. Mostly these are single-parent homes that these kids are being raised in, and they're teaching us to stay together."

Rossalyn says that the communication skills she learned carry over to all relationships. Her daughter Angel has seen the change.

"Because I had a phone call from school, and she talked to me about it and she was calm and collect and stuff…Angel said. "…I was scared to tell her, but she was just calm about it."

Mason Herbert and Breda Jackson are engaged to be married. Jackson has two children of her own.

Breda said, "I'm looking at that concept where being married makes the family stronger, you know, versus head of household, where one person is trying to be both the mother and father."

Participants dismiss critics who want to cut the program's funding, saying it pushes women to stay in violent relationships and question marriage education as an effective 'anti-poverty' pill.

"I would say, if not this, then what?" Jones asks. "Where do we say enough's enough and try something new? At what point do we cut our social losses? The jails are filling."

He added, "This is one more opportunity for people to empower themselves and take responsibility for their lives and their children -- and their children's futures. If you pull that away from a people who already feel hopeless and left out, what's left?"

As politicians dance around the issues, the couples in this marriage class are convinced that where families fail, communities suffer. For them, "Together is Better" has become more than a class, it's a movement for lasting marriages.

Congress approved the president's $500 million 'Healthy Marriage' request in October. Since then, 126 grants have gone out, totaling $77 million. The grants range from $130,000 to more than $2 million each.

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