Keniston suggests that many of the agencies ostensibly ministering

OFFICIAL EXPLANATION[/textarea]


One key to this sentence is the word ostensibly, which means allegedly, seemingly, or purportedly. ,

Irony is involved: agencies that are supposed to help people should not be succeeding at making parents' lives more difficult.

Succeeded = done well at, done a good job of.
The agencies are supposed to help. They don’t help. In reality, the agencies have only “done a good job” of underminining the role of parents.

Another important word, obviously, is only.

Only should be placed right before the word, phrase, or clause that it modifies.
→ when a two- or three-word verb is “split,” and we want to stress the verb (succeeded), we place the word only after the first helping or modal verb.
(To understand what I mean by a “split” verb, see my post here.
→ Agencies have only succeeded in making things worse.

Shorten the prompt a bit.
Many agencies ostensibly ministering to the family have only succeeded in undermining the role of parents.

THE OPTIONS


• This sentence is both grammatical (no errors) and logical (it makes sense)
• Although agencies allegedly (“ostensibly”) take care of the family, in reality they have only achieved a bad result—have only made things worse for the family.
KEEP A


• too many words! Why would we say in the undermining of when in undermining means exactly the same thing?
• the meaning is illogical.
→ Now succeeded is not ironic. The sentence implies that the agencies’ mission was to undermine the role of parents.
Meaning (wrong!): Agencies that minister to the family have failed at almost everything; they have only succeeded at undermining the role of parents.
→ Notice that I did not say “Option B changes the meaning of option A.”
→ It is okay to change the meaning of option A, which is not sacrosanct.
Option B is incorrect because it is not concise and it is illogical.
ELIMINATE B


• this sentence is just a clearer version of option B. Option C is also illogical
• we lose the contrast between ostensibly ministering and having only succeeded in making things worse
• logically, agencies that minister to families should not be described as hurting families with some success. That sentence is silly.
ELIMINATE C


• this one is a bit more nonsensical than options B and C, though D’s logic is bad
→ ostensibly gets lost.
Like the bad logic in B and C, helping a family should not logically include getting praised for having “some success” at harming a family.
→ The phrase with some success makes almost no sense
Remove with some success.
-- Now the sentence makes sense: Many agencies that seem to minister to the family are [in reality] only undermining the role of parents. Unfortunately, this correct sentence is not what we have in option D.
ELIMINATE D


• in that means for the reason that or because
• This option botches the irony between ostensibly and successfully undermining the role of the parent
• (E) is illogical
-- The agencies are only successful? They do not fail?
-- Worse, the agencies are only successful because they undermine the role of the parent?
No. Epic fail.
ELIMINATE E

The answer is A.

COMMENTS

anthien128 , yet again, welcome to SC Butler.

Everyone, I am quite impressed; this sentence should be really hard for non-native speakers, and option B might catch native speakers, but you all handled the subtlety pretty well.

A couple of you could explain a bit more.

These answers range from good to excellent. Nicely done!