John Pinheiro: You are the Hungarian ambassador to the Holy See and the Sovereign Order of Malta. When ambassadors write books, we expect them to be about diplomacy, international law, cultural exchange among nations. What we don’t expect is a personal, Catholic defense of marriage. What led you to write Building a Wholesome Marriage in a Broken World?
Eduard Habsburg: I would say two main reasons. First and foremost, I was blessed with having a wholesome and numerous family myself, and experiencing firsthand how having many children and building your family on the right foundations is not only possible, even in today’s broken world, but a magnificent path to happiness. So you naturally want to share that experience and encourage many, many people to follow that path.
The concrete starting point was an event in the United States, where I spoke about Blessed Emperor Karl. After my talk, wonderful young ladies came up to me and asked how to concretely find a husband as wonderful as Blessed Emperor Karl today. They sometimes thought it was impossible. I began to realize that the principles that were self-evident to me might not be available or immediately present to people in this broken world. So I thought, “I need to write a book.”
And of course it certainly helps to be the ambassador of Hungary, a country which works hard to convince people to have large and happy families. My government, like me, believes that [large] families are the building block of a happy society.
In talking about the importance of experience and cultural continuity, you write in the book, “We learned how to live from our own parents.” What advice do you have for those who have grown up fatherless or in broken families—those who do not have examples of love and wisdom from within their own family?
That is, of course, a very good question and goes to the core of my book. If most people experienced family at home, the way I have, I wouldn’t have to write a Habsburg self-help book on building a family. I would say: Have hope! Your parents may not have given you the experience of a wholesome family, but you can begin such a family yourself. But try to build it on the foundations I have set out in my book. If you cannot draw strength from your own childhood, draw strength from your dream of a happy family. Ask yourself whether that’s what you really want—a lifelong, happy, and fulfilling family. And then begin to build it. Faith, of course, is a core building block if you read my book. Without faith, and for me it’s the Catholic faith, I can’t imagine how you can make it.
You counsel on the necessity of faith for a happy marriage and a happy family. “Family and faith are so intimately intertwined,” you write. But the family is the place where religion and culture are passed down from one generation to the next. What about those who have only bad examples of religion or no religion at home?
You are talking about a key element of our time. Family, the parish, the neighborhood, used to be the places where you were initiated into a strong and well-founded faith through all your childhood. Most of that seems gone today. Take hope from the fact that while the Church and its hierarchy seem to traverse a moment of weakness and helplessness, at the same time the number of people discovering the Faith, a real fiery faith, is skyrocketing. You, too, can find a path to the Faith; you just have to look for it. Some of the strongest voices on faith matters in the public square are converts. In the U.S., this is very visible; in Europe, a bit less, but we will get there eventually.
You say in your book that you are giving advice that may seem “old-fashioned or even reactionary.” True enough. But you also say that, while Americans may like the advice, “it will likely cause indignation, even anger, in most of Europe.” Why? Can you elaborate on the cultural divide that you see between America and Europe?
I have the impression that, due to its history, its roots, the United States is a place more used to a real exchange of ideas. You have your conservatives and your liberals; you have your agnostics and your outspoken believers. Both (still) have a right to express their ideas. In many countries in Europe, at least what you might call “western Europe,” this is not the case. You are basically only allowed to be liberal/progressive. And religiously neutral. Anything else and you are declared a religious extremist and right wing. In Central Europe, in places like Hungary, Poland, and neighbors, this is still different. The reason for that is that western European countries never had to fight for their Christian values like central Europeans had to, against the all-suppressing might of Communism.
“Chastity is the way to happiness.” Elaborate! This is so countercultural. It seems to me that chastity has become radical. Maybe it always was. Why is chastity before marriage the key to a happy marriage?
I haven’t studied sociology or anything, so I won’t point to studies proving that a chaste life before marriage will lead to a happy, long, and fulfilling marriage. I can only speak from observing my surroundings, and of course from experience. If you are not faithful to your spouse before the marriage, you won’t be faithful in the marriage. It’s as easy as that. If you got used to changing partners, to pornography and self-gratification, you will always search for something in sexuality that it isn’t. Chastity, to come back to your question, doesn’t mean no sex. It means sex where it belongs, the way God planned it for us. This is the way to happiness.
Of course, I know this isn’t easy today. I don’t think there ever was a time when we were so inundated with pornography, readily available at every second of the day. And we were never surrounded by so many men and women who have a totally different view on sex and relationships.
You can make a difference, and you can pass these things on to your children. One of the nice things in my book is that I give a few examples from Habsburg history, about emperors who were very chaste before marriage, and had an especially happy and long marriage. (And of course there were other examples in my family that didn’t live it that way, but thankfully not too many.)
Parents come in for some important criticisms in your book, for just giving in to the culture of promiscuity and death—as you put it, they “shrug and parrot the old cliche, ‘That’s just the way it is today.’” You say they should try harder and that they owe it to their children, as part of their parental duty, to encourage happy marriages by guiding their children in the right paths of life. Tell me about the rights and corresponding duties of parents.
I believe (like my Hungarian government, by the way) that sexual education is the prerogative of the parents. I believe that parents should begin, very early, to transmit the basic principles of man/woman relationships, of courtship and dating, of marriage and family, to their children. There is no “one size fits all” way of explaining the facts of life to all your children, because they are incredibly different, with different sensibilities. But the family is the place where you can shape the principles of the next generation. In a way, you do this quite automatically in a numerous family. The children learn that it is desirable to have a stable marriage, mom and dad living with each other, having many siblings. And they will watch what their elder siblings do.
I really get angry with parents who not only accept their children getting into intimate relationships far too early, e.g. in school, but who even might wink and say things like “Ah, let them have fun—you are only young once.” Argh, that makes me furious.
With every started and broken-off relationship of that kind, you damage your chance of a lifelong one. It’s a terrible path you put your child on. No, it is “not the way things are today.”
What does the sexual revolution of the 1960s have to do with the decline in marriage and fertility rates?
I’ve lived in Rome for nine years. I remember watching La Strada a few years ago—you know, that early Fellini movie with Anthony Quinn and Giulietta Masina, a neorealist black-and-white movie, semi-documentarian, about two circus performers circling the villages of Italy in the 1950. A beautiful and sad film. But what shocked me most was that, in every village where the two performed, there were children “on the horizon,” so to speak. Italy used to be the country par excellence for children.
Nowadays in Italy, you don’t see children. You don’t see pregnant women. Because the Italians have resigned themselves: “Having 1.5 children is the right thing to do; it’s reasonable.” They get Christmas eyes when they see a large family, but, alas, it is not for them. That’s the result of the sexual revolution and contraception, of dividing sexuality from procreation. We live in probably most prosperous and secure time ever in Europe—but we seem resigned that, alas, it’s impossible to have a large family.
Catherine Ruth Pakaluk, in Hannah’s Children, describes how in the midst of a historic “birth dearth” in the United States, 5% of American women are defying the demographic norm by bearing five or more children. According to Pakaluk, many countries have experimented with aggressively pro-natalist public policies, and all of them have failed. Hungary has been vigorous with its pro-natalist policies. Yet its birth rate is 1.51 children per woman, down from a high just four years ago of 1.59, according to a study in a recent issue of Fortunemagazine. You are the Hungarian ambassador to the Holy See, so I expect a diplomatic answer to this question. But your book points to the key importance of religion for happy marriages and large, happy families, and also argues in keeping with the Catholic tradition that the family is the smallest unit of society, a natural society where values and culture are passed down. How do you see the Hungarian policies interacting with a Catholic understanding of the family, especially given that they haven’t stemmed the birth dearth?
I agree with you that the Hungarian government has done enormous things to convince families to have more children. And there were quite a few good results over the last years, a growing number of marriages, falling divorces, falling abortion numbers, and a positive change in demographics. I am also very happy that the help for family was not only economic but also visible in the public space, e.g. by posters of “Hungary—Family-Friendly Country.” But I think that a long-term demographic change is only possible with an inner conversion. If you take a look at the central points of my book, you will see I believe that, in the long run, you will only opt for many children out of a faith conviction. Building a wholesome family requires common, lived faith. And a government cannot prescribe that.
Why shouldn’t men and women wait longer to get married, and wait even longer to have children?
I often hear that a young married couple should be reasonable, enjoy each other’s company for a while, earn a lot of money so they can afford a nice house, and then have children. I totally disagree with that. Children are the greatest gift the two spouses can give to each other, to the children, and to society. Children will make a couple happy and transform it into what God intended it to be. That is, of course, if you can have children. Many people put off having children for a long while, only to find out later that it has become more difficult. Many good reasons to begin immediately with having children.
What is your response to the argument that children are expensive and costly, that in our modern world both parents need to work and so they therefore can’t have more children?
This is a topic I have to tread very carefully on. In many places, it’s absolutely the norm for both parents to work. So many people feel they couldn’t afford even having a family without that. And I don’t want to encourage anybody to be unreasonable and foolish. Finally, I don’t want to criticize anybody who has to make tough decisions for economic reasons.
But it is a fact that people in “the West” have never had so much economic security as we have. Why does it seem impossible to have numerous children today, when it was normal and possible in the past? Of course, having a large family might mean that you can’t have every job, that life will be more expensive, but the gain in happiness and fulfillment trumps everything. That is why in my book I insist on couples talking very seriously about this topic before they even get engaged. If I am open to having five, six, even seven children, I must be ready to make a few very tough decisions.
And of course, I have to decide whether, as a mother, work is so important for me that I want to hand over education of my children at a very tender and early age.
You describe the Habsburgs, historically, as a “homeschooling family.” What do you mean by that?
I have to admit that that paragraph is a little bit tongue in cheek, and a bit provocative. Of course, the way the Habsburgs homeschooled was for centuries quite different than what we imagine today. Also, for quite a while, there were no public schools. But if you look at the curriculum my family used since the 16th century, the way Habsburg princes were raised at home was very similar to the everyday life of a homeschooled child today: very strict classes at home nearly every day of the week, languages, and sports. I give a few examples across the centuries. In places where it is legally possible, and where you believe that the public school system cannot give your child an education according to your values, homeschooling is a serious alternative.
You argue that parents ought to prohibit children from having mobile phones, computers, and social media for as long as possible. My Acton Institute colleague Michael Matheson Miller has written a book called Digital Contagion, about protecting one’s family from the surveillance state and the social manipulation that comes with social media. Right now, Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation is a bestseller. It connects an epidemic of mental illness among teens to overuse of technology, what he calls a “phone-based childhood.” Technology can spring from our co-creative capacities given by God to manage the scarcity of the earth’s goods and to promote human flourishing. But there is plenty of data, as both Miller and Haidt argue, to demonstrate the damage done to people by the immoderate use of digital technology. What is your recommendation for household rules about technology use?
I’ll begin my answer by stating that I love the internet, I love social media, and I love X, where I am very active. So that question is one that I have thought a lot about. The internet is a great place with fantastic opportunities for learning, improvement of the human condition, and even friendship. At the same time, we cannot look away from the pernicious influence it can have on children—but not only on children. My two rules are very simple. No. 1—keep your child phone-free as long as humanly possible. That doesn’t mean that your child will never handle a phone or computer, but not a personal one. In a large family, you get used to sharing everything, including computers and phones. So a big family is the ideal place to do this.
No. 2—introduce rules for phone-free zones, like no phones at the lunch or dinner table, no phones after 8 o’clock in the evening, no computers in bedrooms. It won’t solve every problem, but steps like that can help.
