Essay

What a Mother and a Father Each Give

You may have heard that love is what makes a family. You may also have heard that if adults are loving and committed, children can do equally well with two fathers, two mothers, one parent, or other family arrangements. So you may sincerely be wondering: If people truly love a child, why does God still teach that children should be raised by a mother and a father? Why would the gender of a parent matter? And why doesn’t the Church simply adjust its teaching as society’s understanding of family changes?

Those are sincere and important questions, especially when they touch people you know and love. They become easier to understand when you look more closely at what you may have learned from culture and what God’s love reveals about marriage. Our Heavenly Father’s teaching about mothers and fathers grows out of what He has revealed about who we are, where we came from, how He created us, and what family relationships are ultimately meant to become.

So let’s look at those truths one by one and see how they help explain why God’s plan for the family includes both mothers and fathers.

Jesus Went Back to the Beginning

When the Pharisees questioned Jesus about marriage, He did not begin with the customs or assumptions of their day. He took them back to Creation. He reminded them that God had made humanity “male and female” and that a man would “cleave to his wife” so the two could become one (Matthew 19:3–6). In other words, Jesus taught that the union of man and woman is not merely a social arrangement that each generation is free to redefine. It is part of the way God created His children and part of the order He established from the beginning.

That same Creation account helps explain why mothers and fathers matter to children. In Genesis, God creates male and female and then gives them the command to bring children into mortality. The Family: A Proclamation to the World follows that same pattern: marriage between a man and a woman, the sacred power to create life, and then the distinct and shared responsibilities of mothers and fathers toward the children entrusted to their care. These teachings are connected because, in God’s plan, marriage, the creation of life, and the nurturing of children were never meant to be understood as separate ideas.

For Latter-day Saints, though, this pattern begins even earlier than Eden.

The Pattern Begins with Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother

One of the most beautiful truths of the restored gospel is that you did not begin here. The family proclamation teaches that every person is a beloved spirit son or daughter of “heavenly parents.” Our theology about a Mother in Heaven explains this even more directly: we have a Heavenly Father and a Heavenly Mother.

That matters to the question of mothers and fathers on earth. Fatherhood and motherhood are not simply social roles that human beings happened to develop over time. Male and female are part of our premortal, mortal, and eternal identity, and the doctrine of Heavenly Parents places those differences within an eternal family setting. We know enough to understand that this is “the divine pattern established for us as children of heavenly parents.”

President Dallin H. Oaks expressed it simply: “Our theology begins with heavenly parents. Our highest aspiration is to be like them.” Men and women need one another in God’s eternal plan.

So when the family proclamation teaches that children should be raised by a mother and father, that teaching fits within a much larger pattern: Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother, male and female created in God’s image, Adam and Eve joined in marriage, and mothers and fathers bringing and nurturing children within that union.

How Can Cultural Messages Slowly Change the Way You See This?

Once you understand the doctrine, it becomes easier to notice one assumption underneath many modern conversations about family: if adults genuinely love a child, the gender of the adults should not matter.

There is something important and compassionate in that message. Children deeply need love, and many people sincerely believe that different family structures can provide what children need. Yet the restored gospel of Jesus Christ asks us to consider more than the sincerity and love of the adults involved. It asks us to consider a child’s relationship with both male and female, the meaning God has given to our creation as men and women, the way mortal life itself comes through a man and a woman, and the eternal family pattern revealed through Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother.

When Jesus Christ visited the Nephites, He asked for their children to be brought to Him. He took them “one by one,” blessed them, prayed for them, and then told the adults, “Behold your little ones” (3 Nephi 17:11–24). That scene is tender because Christ did not treat children as an afterthought in the lives of adults. He saw each child individually, with divine worth and needs that deserved the loving attention and responsibility of those around them.

Satan often works through partial truths because they can sound especially persuasive and compassionate. Love matters enormously. But when love becomes the only principle used to define marriage and family, other revealed truths can quietly fade from view—covenant, sexual complementarity, motherhood, fatherhood, procreation, and a child’s place within the generations.

Samantha’s Story: Loved by Two Dads and Still Missing a Mother

Samantha spent important years of her childhood living with her father and his male partner. In telling her story, she also describes a deep and lasting longing for a mother—and the ways that absence has affected her life.

Her experience helps us see why God’s pattern matters so much. Children need the love and influence of both a married mother and father—a pattern that reflects something eternal about our own identity as sons and daughters of Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother.

What Research Shows

Good research can help us better understand why God places such a high value on children having both a mother and a father. In a 2023 BYU Studies review titled “It Takes Two: What We Learn from Social Science about the Divine Pattern of Gender Complementarity in Parenting,” family researcher Jenet Jacob Erickson examined a large body of research on the distinct contributions of mothers and fathers.

In this short clip, Erickson explains the remarkable science behind the bond between a mother and her baby—and why that relationship begins much earlier than we sometimes realize:

Watch Jenet Erickson on the mother-child bond

She also explains how a father’s love and involvement can protect children in ways we may not always recognize, helping us see why a father’s presence can make such a meaningful difference in a child’s life:

Watch Jenet Erickson on a father’s protective influence

These research perspectives add greater meaning to the wording of The Family: A Proclamation to the World. The proclamation teaches that children are entitled to be raised by a father and a mother who are faithful to one another. That word matters. The focus is not only on what adults hope to receive from family life, but also on what God desires children to receive through the complementary love and influence of both a mother and a father.

President Henry B. Eyring described this as “the eternal pattern, the pattern of happiness.” Mothers and fathers are distinct, yet their differences are meant to work together in ways that bless children and reflect something eternal about God’s design for the family. (Read “The Family.”)

What If My Family Does Not Look Like This?

Maybe you were raised by a single mother or father. Maybe your parents divorced, one parent died, or someone you needed was largely absent. Maybe you were adopted or grew up with two mothers or two fathers. Or perhaps you are now raising a child in circumstances you never expected and are doing your best with a situation that feels very different from the family life you once imagined.

None of those circumstances changes your divine identity or your worth to God.

In fact, the proclamation itself recognizes that “disability, death, or other circumstances may necessitate individual adaptation” and asks extended families to help when needed. Heavenly Father understands the difference between circumstances we choose and circumstances we inherit, endure, or simply cannot control. His revealed pattern for the family is meant to guide us toward His purposes, not to make faithful people feel condemned for circumstances they did not create.

If loving people cared for you in a family that did not match the revealed ideal, you do not have to diminish that love in order to believe the doctrine. You can be genuinely grateful for the people who sacrificed for you, recognize the good you received from them, and still allow God to teach you what He wants you to understand about marriage, motherhood, fatherhood, and the family you may someday build.

And if you are a single parent doing everything you can for your children, this teaching is not a judgment on your devotion or your efforts. The Lord sees what you are carrying, including the things no one else sees. Receive help where you can—from grandparents, extended family, ward members, and other trustworthy people who can add strength and goodness to your child’s life. Jesus Christ is able to work with us in circumstances that are far from what we hoped for, and no faithful person will lose eternal blessings because of circumstances beyond his or her control.

A Few Questions Worth Thinking About

When I hear that the gender of parents does not matter as long as a child is loved, where did I learn that idea, and have I compared it carefully with what Jesus Christ has revealed about male and female?

What does knowing that I have both a Heavenly Father and a Heavenly Mother help me understand about why motherhood and fatherhood matters so much?

Have I begun looking at questions about family mainly through what adults want, or have I also tried to see them through the needs and eternal identity of a child?

Can I honor the goodness and sacrifice I see in families whose circumstances differ from the ideal without concluding that God’s revealed pattern therefore has no meaning?

Am I preparing to become the kind of husband, wife, father, or mother who could help children return to Heavenly Father?

What Can You Do This Week?

Read The Family: A Proclamation to the World again, but this time notice how often it connects identity, gender, marriage, motherhood, fatherhood, children, and eternity. Then read the Church’s essay “Mother in Heaven.” Ask Heavenly Father to help you see how those teachings fit together.

When you are in the temple, pay attention to how consistently God’s plan points toward creation, covenant, men and women together, children, and eternal family relationships. Those truths place the family proclamation in a much larger setting.

The doctrine of mothers and fathers is ultimately part of the doctrine of where you came from and where Jesus Christ is helping you go. You are a child of Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother. Through Christ, you can make covenants, become more like Them, and help build the kind of family relationships God intends to continue into eternity.