What makes you think that would be the result of “the Catholic Church [getting] its way?” It seems to me that if all the Catholics out there took seriously the Church’s teachings and viewed married life as a vocation (requiring discernment) there would be 1) a heck of a lot more people hearing the call to religious life (and thus celibacy), 2) fewer people having children (and thus sex) premaritally, so the current trend of having children later would probably continue as young people pursued education and financial stability beforing committing, and 3) judicial use of NFP to space children when the situation warrants. Remembering that not all couples have the same level of fertility, you would not likely see Catholics all breeding like rabbits – it’s obvious from reading papal writings that that isn’t the goal anyway.

NB: Even prior to the advent of modern birth control, when all of the Christian churches rejected it, it was still true that wealthier nations had lower birth rates, because they tended to marry later and have shorter reproductive lives.

6. This sort of thinking is deeply “static;” it assumes that problems can’t be solved, and assumes that things will always be as they are.

7. Anti-population thinking never imagines that people may be a SOLUTION. A Catholic should especially beware of this, since the Church, which is in dubious shape in America and in decline in Europe, is growing like mad in Africa and Latin America. Most of the world’s Catholics are now in the Global South.

I couldn’t have stated my own thoughts any better.

It seems to me that the greatest ‘natural resource’ we have are human beings themselves. The more the better.

http://www.envoymagazine.com/backissues/2.3/coverstory.html

http://www.envoymagazine.com/backissues/2.3/coverstory.html

One pertainent point I seldom see brought up in these discussions is that the Catholic Church not only encourages large families, it also calls some individuals to forsake having families at all, to live lives of consecrated celibacy.

How many children from large families go on to become priests, religious brothers or nuns? In St Therese’s family, for example, all the children who survived to adulthood entered convents. Those large faithful Catholic families also tend to be those who encourage their children to consider vocations to religious life.

In fact, for the Church one of the tragedies of the contraceptive culture has been an decrease in larger families and a tragic shortage of priests and religious.

Would we be experiencing a vocations crisis now if more Catholics were still having large families? I have heard stories of families with only one son whose mother cried when he said he wanted to be a priest. By contrast, historically parents rejoiced when their younger sons discovered vocations.

the Church calls all men and women to fatherhood and motherhood, but some of us are called to live this vocation in the spiritual dimension rather than by marriage and children.

Just some thoughts about a different side of the issue.

Big families are on the cover of “Christianity Today” this month!

Here’s the link: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2006/008/15.26.html