The Gift of Life, a Gift to Cherish
What if there were no children? What if there were no smiling babies, no rambunctious toddlers, no agile teenagers playing soccer or the violin, no young adults marrying and starting their families?
The birth rate in the United States in 1950 (the Baby Boom era) was 24.2 births per 1000 women. In 2024 it was 12 births per 1000 women and is likely to be below that figure in 2025. The fertility rate per woman in 1950 was 3.1 children; in 2024 it was 1.6, down almost 50%. The replacement rate to keep the population even is 2.1 children per woman. (Statistics from HCH stats, Oct 4, 2024, and Macrotrends, no date). West Virginia reflects these trends, having the highest percentage of population loss by state in the 2020 census.
Rather than rehearse all the reasons for this dramatic decline in the birth and fertility rates, let’s focus on the actual effects of that decline. The accumulation of millions of individual decisions not to have children or to abort those already conceived has already led to a shortage of workers (e.g., nurses, restaurant workers), a shrinking base of workers to support those living on Social Security, a strain on our health care system as the aged need more and more services, a push for euthanasia and assisted suicide to eliminate the elderly, and fewer children to adopt, which forces many couples to go to other countries to adopt or turn to in vitro fertilization (IVF), an expensive and morally problematic procedure that separates parents from the conception of their child while leaving excess embryos frozen or discarded.
More broadly, we can be sure that, having eliminated tens of millions of children by abortion and an untold number by contraception, we have deprived ourselves of many human beings who would be contributing to the welfare of our people, were they alive. Growth is healthier than decline. We are hurting our nation by having fewer and fewer children.
God’s will for us is clear: Be fertile and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it (Genesis 1:28). Having created us, God wants us to flourish. Because we are mortal, we have to reproduce or there will be no smiling babies, rambunctious toddlers, agile teenagers and young married couples. Each of us received our life as a gift from God and our parents. It is up to us to cherish that gift and share it with the next generation. Apart from those whom God calls to a celibate life – mostly priests and religious but some lay people as well – the normal vocation of God’s children is to marry and have a family.
Those who favor abortion and contraception often speak of “reproductive freedom.” We need to speak of reproductive responsibility. God’s command to be fertile and multiply calls for a generous
response by His people. There are indeed reasons why a married couple may feel compelled to avoid a pregnancy at a certain time: the number of children they already have, the sickness of one or both spouses, the loss of a job or other economic hardship. The Church leaves that decision to the couple. But the couple should not use their freedom to be selfish. An openness to life is a sign of faith in a God who continues to be faithful to His people. Married couples should trust God to help them have and raise their children with a sufficiency of what they need. People are more valuable than things.
When a couple decides that having another child at this time would be irresponsible, they must consider the means to achieve that goal. Not all means toward a good end are themselves good. Thanks to our provident God, there are modern natural means for family planning: the symptom-thermal method, the Billings method, the Creighton model, all of which reveal to the couple when they are fertile and when they are not. Instruction is needed but it is needed to learn how to drive a car, use a computer or kick a soccer ball correctly. All these methods require some sexual abstinence by the couple, but it is temporary. Catholics rightly expect celibate priests and religious to abstain from sexual relations for their entire adult lives. I do not think it is too much to ask that married couples abstain from their sexual union for a few days during the wife’s fertile period when they must postpone a pregnancy. Abortion is the killing of an unborn child who has no defense against the scalpel or the chemicals. It is sad that so many people ignore the injustice and cruelty of this act. But why is contraception wrong? After all, no child exists so no child is harmed. Yet something is harmed: the couple’s relationship with God. There is no friendship without respect. A married couple ought to respect the way God has allowed the reproductive capacity of human beings to evolve.
When the unitive or love-making dimension and the procreative or child-creating dimension of the one sexual union of the man and woman are both present, as they are periodically, their co-presence should be respected. Jesus’ words, What God has joined together, no human being must separate, also apply to the nature of the bodily union in which they are no longer two but one flesh (Mark 10: 8-9). The moral evil of contraception is that it forcibly separates what God has joined together: the unitive and procreative dimensions of the sexual act.
God has already provided a natural means for postponing a pregnancy in the relatively short period of time in which the woman is fertile. For most of human history, society needed couples to have as many children as they could, because so many died before maturity. Because of advances in health care, the mortality rate for young children drastically declined in the late 19th and 20th centuries and some pressure began to be felt to allow longer intervals between pregnancies. In His providence, God arranged for effective methods of natural family planning to be discovered in the 20th century. For those who desire to honor God in their lives, this is the way to exercise reproductive responsibility when there is need to avoid an untimely pregnancy.
Men and women, young and old are marching in Washington, DC, today to affirm the value of the unborn child’s life and to say they are ready to help women who need support in order to carry their babies to term. They will recommit themselves to working in their states to convince their friends and neighbors to join them in a renewed respect for human life in our land. We must all remember that our lives are God’s gift to us, a gift to cherish and a gift to share. May our faith in the Lord inspire us to trust him and bear good fruit by generously receiving new generations of children with love.
Sincerely in Christ,
+Mark E. Brennan
Bishop of Wheeling-Charleston