Amen. We are expecting the birth of our fifth child, in all likelihood a little brother for four boys. The testimony of the families at my school is quite remarkable: in my classroom alone, I teach two students from families of 11 children, plus many more from "oversized" familes, at least by American standards. The children themselves are the joy--- and I remember reading somewhere that children are God's opinion that there is still reason for hope.
Let us not forget the duty of the human race not to overpopulate the planet. I see it claimed that the chief cause of the Irish Famine of the 1840s was precisely overpopulation, and we see countless instances of such tragedy today as well.
"Let us not forget the duty of the human race not to overpopulate the planet."
There is no such duty, just as there is no duty for the human race to stop walking all their ceilings all the time -- it makes no sense to forbid something that can't be done. Even if it could be done, we're probably at least a few thousand years away from doing it. Right now the problem we have is depopulation, not overpopulation -- and a very serious problem it is, too. Anyway, and most significantly, nowhere in Scripture, Tradition, or Magisterium over the past 2,000 years can any such "duty" be located.
"I see it claimed that the chief cause of the Irish Famine of the 1840s was precisely overpopulation, and we see countless instances of such tragedy today as well."
You mean it had nothing to do with the potato blight? Funny how you refer to "the Irish Famine of the 1840s," whereas everyone else knows it as "the Irish POTATO Famine."
Perhaps the depopulationists would claim that if there had been fewer Irish in the 1840s, the failure of the potato harvests would not have been as serious a problem. Perhaps so -- but a nation that tiny could hardly maintain itself on an island that size.
Catholics believe that the solution to poverty and social inequity is Christian charity. Depopulationists such as yourself believe that the solution is to eliminate human beings. Catholicism wants to eliminate sin. Depopulationism wants to eliminate sinners.
It is a common misperception that the Catholic Church is indifferent to the problem of population control, e.g. http://www.population-security.o....org/
phil95.htm
In fact, Gaudium et Spes 5 says: "The human mind is, in a certain sense, broadening its mastery over time -- ... over the future by foresight and planning. Advances in biology, psychology, and the social sciences not only lead man to greater self-awareness, but provide him with the technical means of molding the lives of whole peoples as well. At the same time the human race is giving more and more thought to the forecasting and control of its own population growth... The destiny of the human race is viewed as a complete whole, no longer, as it were, in the particular histories of various peoples; now it merges into a complete whole".
This is the Council's effort to read, in a positive light, the signs of the times.
As to the Irish famine, of course it had to do with potato blight; to suggest otherwise is to show a poor grasp of the overpopulation thesis (to which I do not necessarily subscribe). Note that it was the landless laborers, "poor devils", who died in their millions. The population sank from 8 million to 4 million.
Gaudium et Spes 87 also says: "The government has, assuredly, in the matter of the population of its country, its own rights and DUTIES, within the limits of its proper competence, for instance as regards social and family legislation... Some men nowadays are gravely disturbed by this problem; it is to be hoped that there will be Catholic experts in these matters... Since there is widespread opinion that the POPULATION EXPANSION OF THE WORLD, or at least of particular countries, should be kept in check by all possible means and by every kind of intervention by public authority, the Council exhorts all men to beware of all solutions... which transgress the natural law..... Since the parents' judgment presupposes a properly formed conscience, IT IS OF GREAT IMPORTANCE THAT ALL SHOULD HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO CULTIVATE A GENUINELY HUMAN SENSE OF RESPONSIBILITY WHICH WILL TAKE ACCOUNT OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF TIME AND SITUATION... People should be discreetly informed of scientific advances in research into methods of birth regulation..."
By the way the "depopulationist" I was quoting is the great scholar of Neoplatonism, John M Dillon (grandson of Land League agitator and head of the Irish Parliamentary Party, John Dillon; and great-grandson of the Young Irelander John Blake Dillon). He admits of course that laissez faire capitalist ideology and British indifference were major causes of the Famine as well.
I had no idea "Spirit" would succumb to such uninformed, Culture of Death knee-jerk reactions, but I guess I didn't realize he was moonlighting as chaplain for Planned Parenthood. Yes, I know the population explosion panic has been a prevalent cultural myth in the West since Malthus. But so's the opinion that the medievals believed the earth was flat. All that Irish Potato famine rot. Even an appeal to Gaudium et spes! Heavens! What's the latest demographic data? I think something like the following: that if you took every family in the world, there would be room for each to have one square acre of land in the state of Texas and for the grain belt in the US to feed all of them. Something like that. The "overpopulation problem" is largely one manufactured by political greed. Read Anthony Burgess' The Wanting Seed. If someone didn't compensate for the negative population growth of the metrosexual Queer-Eye for the AIDS epidemic crowd, the whole Western world would be dominated by Muslims within fifty years.
There are 262,000 sq miles of land in Texas, and 640 acres/sq mile. So there are 168 million acres in Texas. 2.2 billion acres in the entire U.S.
Father O'Leary:
Do you seriously believe that the Church has taught us that we have a moral obligation to have fewer children?
"It is a common misperception that the Catholic Church is indifferent to the problem of population control."
No, the Church is not indifferent to the sin of population control, nor to any other sin or violation of human rights.
'Let us not forget the duty of the human race not to overpopulate the planet.'
That is some scary, Orwellian stuff.
Coming from a Catholic priest??!!
Father, I appreciate some of your comments on this blog. However, with all due respect, your comments concerning homosexuality and unborn human life are disturbing.
Dave, please read Gaudium et Spes on the duty of the human race to show foresight in order to avoid the foreseeable tragedies resulting from overpopulation.
The Church does not regard population control as a sin, but rather as an ethical duty.
The Church teaches responsible family planning, using natural means. It explicitly teaches that parents should be free to follow their conscience on this, but that it must be an informed conscience, and it strongly suggests that to produce children without regard to concrete circumstances is morally irresponsible.
Pertinacious, your argument is not with me on this but with Gaudium et Spes, i.e. with the Catholic Church gathered in a Council.
As to the Irish Famine of the 1840s, we in Ireland never refer to it as the potato famine or the Irish potato famine but simply as the Famine.
Paul VI, Populorum Progressio, 37. It is true that too frequently an accelerated demographic increase adds its own difficulties to the problems of development: the size of the population increases more rapidly than available resources, and things are found to have reached apparently an impasse. From that moment the temptation is great to check the demographic increase by means of radical measures. It is certain that public authorities can intervene, within the limit of their competence, by favoring the availability of appropriate information and by adopting suitable measures, provided that these be in conformity with the moral law and that they respect the rightful freedom of married couples. Where the inalienable right to marriage and procreation is lacking, human dignity has ceased to exist. Finally, it is for the parents to decide, with full knowledge of the matter, on the number of their children, taking into account their responsibilities towards God, themselves, the children they have already brought into the world, and the community to which they belong. In all this they must follow the demands of their own conscience enlightened by God’s law authentically interpreted, and sustained by confidence in Him.[39]
Humanae Vitae
2. The changes which have taken place are in fact noteworthy and of varied kinds. In the first place, there is the rapid demographic development. Fear is shown by many that world population is growing more rapidly than the available resources, with growing distress to many families and developing countries, so that the temptation for authorities to counter this danger with radical measures is great. Moreover, working and lodging conditions, as well as increased exigencies both in the economic field and in that of education, often make the proper education of a larger number of children difficult today. A change is also seen both in the manner of considering the person of woman and her place in society, and in the value to be attributed to conjugal love in marriage, and also to the appreciation to be made of the meaning of conjugal acts in relation to that love.
Finally and above all, man has made stupendous progress in the domination and rational organization of the forces of nature, such that he tends to extend this domination to his own total being: to the body, to psychical life, to social life and even to the laws which regulate the transmission of life.
10. conjugal love requires in husband and wife an awareness of their mission of "responsible parenthood," which today is rightly much insisted upon, and which also must be exactly understood. ..In relation to physical, economic, psychological and social conditions, responsible parenthood is exercised, either by the deliberate and generous decision to raise a numerous family, or by the decision, made for grave motives and with due respect for the moral law, to avoid for the time being, or even for an indeterminate period, a new birth.
... In the task of transmitting life, therefore, they are not free to proceed completely at will, as if they could determine in a wholly autonomous way the honest path to follow; but they must conform their activity to the creative intention of God, expressed in the very nature of marriage and of its acts, and manifested by the constant teaching of the Church [10].
23 ...We are well aware of the serious difficulties experienced by public authorities in this regard, especially in the developing countries. To their legitimate preoccupations we devoted our encyclical letter Populorum Progressio. But with our predecessor Pope John XXIII, we repeat: no solution to these difficulties is acceptable "which does violence to man's essential dignity" and is based only on an utterly materialistic conception of man himself and of his life. The only possible solution to this question is one which envisages the social and economic progress both of individuals and of the whole human society, and which respects and promotes true human values [26]. Neither can one, without grave injustice, consider divine providence to be responsible for what depends, instead, on a lack of wisdom in government, on an insufficient sense of social justice, on self
justice, on selfish monopolization, or again on blameworthy indolence in confronting the efforts and the sacrifices necessary to ensure the raising of living standards of a people and all of its sons [27].
24. We wish now to express our encouragement to men of science, who "can considerably advance the welfare of marriage and the family, along with peace of conscience, if by pooling their efforts they labor to explain more thoroughly the various conditions favoring a proper regulation of births" [28].
The Holy See has issued a document on water supplies, which has an opening quote from Deus Caritas Est (the first time I have seen this encyclical officially cited). http://www.zenit.org/show/visual...glish&
sid=86299
The language of "preferential love and consideration for the poor", scoffed at by neocons, is still upheld by the Vatican.
Nothing in the quoted documents suggests that the Catholic Church sees "overpopulation" per se as leading to tragic consequences. The Church acknowledges the problems involved with rapid demographic development and slow economic growth. Yet the Church has NEVER suggested that there are "too many people" in the world. Even when demographic growth outstrips available resources, the Church welcomes every new human being.
"Let us not forget the duty of the human race not to overpopulate the planet."
I still find this to be a chilling statement. It causes me to envision the Chinese mandatory abortion policy applied on a global scale.
It seems to me that the Church says that the amount of children a couple decides to have is a moral decision, and that blind trust in natality, as in the traditional huge Catholic families, is morally irresponsible.
The Church is indeed critical of drastic population policies like that of China, but it recognizes clearly that over-population is a problem for many countries and even for the planet as a whole.
Gaudium et Spes 5 says: "The human mind is, in a certain sense, broadening its mastery over time -- ... over the future by foresight and planning. Advances in biology, psychology, and the social sciences not only lead man to greater self-awareness, but provide him with the technical means of molding the lives of whole peoples as well. At the same time the human race is giving more and more thought to the forecasting and control of its own population growth... The destiny of the human race is viewed as a complete whole, no longer, as it were, in the particular histories of various peoples; now it merges into a complete whole".
87 "The government has, assuredly, in the matter of the population of its country, its own rights and DUTIES... Since there is widespread opinion that the POPULATION EXPANSION OF THE WORLD, or at least of particular countries, should be kept in check by all possible means and by every kind of intervention by public authority, the Council exhorts all men to beware of all solutions... which transgress the natural law..... People should be discreetly informed of scientific advances in research into methods of birth regulation..."
Populorum Progressio, 37. The size of the population increases more rapidly than available resources.. It is certain that public authorities can intervene... by favoring the availability of appropriate information and by adopting suitable measures... It is doe the parents to decide, with full knowledge of the matter, on the number of their children, taking into account their responsibilities towards God, themselves, the children they have already brought into the world, and the community to which they belong."
'[The Church] recognizes clearly that over-population is a problem for many countries and even for the planet as a whole.'
No, the Church merely recognizes that there is a WIDESPREAD OPINION to that effect. The Church takes a holistic view of population growth, economic development, and personal moral decision, and does not focus on the bogey of so-called over-population.
Pertinacious, your argument is not with me on this but with Gaudium et Spes, i.e. with the Catholic Church gathered in a Council.
I beg to differ, my friend. My quarrel is with your interpretation of the council at every turn. Granted, it's not hard to misinterpret a document as written on a tide of optimism so ebullient as Gaudium et Spes. Yet, your notion of what is 'responsible' puts the shoe on the wrong foot, like that of the 'safe sex' advocates in the public schools, to offer an analogous example.
You quote the following from Humanae Vitae: "... In the task of transmitting life, therefore, they are not free to proceed completely at will, as if they could determine in a wholly autonomous way the honest path to follow; but they must conform their activity to the creative intention of God, expressed in the very nature of marriage and of its acts, and manifested by the constant teaching of the Church [10]."
But the thrust of this is that 'responsibility' calls us to fruitful procreation according to God's plan, not to autonomous designs according to our own wills. Thus, too, I think you end up misreading the encyclicals and Vatican II documents you cite.
Again, you write:
"It seems to me that the Church says that the amount of children a couple decides to have is a moral decision, and that blind trust in natality, as in the traditional huge Catholic families, is morally irresponsible."
Now this is true, strictly speaking. But look: realistically speaking, where do you honestly think the danger lies in the majority of rank-and-file Catholics today? Do you think it is their blind headlong rush into overpopulating the world? C'mon! Even the Maryknoll Sisters are passing out condoms in South America, for crying out loud! The danger today is that Catholics are blindly and hedonistically contracepting God out of their lives and themselves out of existence. Where do you think the danger of moral irresponsibility really lies in the world today? Let's have some honesty and realism here.
I simply made the point that the Church, as the French bishops said in 1961, is not "natalist at any cost". The US bishops in 1959 recommended cooperation with underdeveloped countries in "plans to deal with the problem of rapid population growth".
Cardinal Ottaviani of the Holy Office, 11th of 12 children, said at Vatican II: "The freedom granted by the schema (schema 13, preparatory for Gaudium et Spes) to married couples to determine for themselves the number of their children cannot possible be approved." He was overruled.
Population growth remains a very serious problem in many countries (with consequences for the whole planet).
The current world population is over 6 billion and could pass 9 billion within 50 years. Since 1960, when the "optimistic" Fathers of Vatican II started to worry about the issue, world population has multiplied more rapidly than ever, and -- it is predicted -- more rapidly than it will ever grow in the future.
World population reached about 300 million by A.D. 1.
760 million in 1750
1 billion around 1800
1.6 billion in 1900
a billion people were added between 1960 and 1975 15 years
another billion were added between 1975 and 1987 12 years
"Between 2000 and 2030, nearly 100 percent of this annual growth will occur in the less developed countries in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, whose population growth rates are much higher than those in more developed countries. Growth rates of 1.9 percent and higher mean that populations would double in about 36 years, if these rates continue. Demographers do not believe they will."
"The more developed countries in Europe and North America, as well as Japan, Australia, and New Zealand, are growing by less than 1 percent annually."
'Cardinal Ottaviani of the Holy Office, 11th of 12 children, said at Vatican II: "The freedom granted by the schema (schema 13, preparatory for Gaudium et Spes) to married couples to determine for themselves the number of their children cannot possible be approved." He was overruled.'
Did Ottaviani really say that? Would everyone on this blog agree that such a statement is outlandish? It certainly jars against my sensibilities.
I've been reading Ottaviani's famous "intervention" concerning the reformed liturgy. Ottaviani seems to be a quite intriguing figure. Can anyone direct me to sources of additional information about him?
I simply made the point that the Church, as the French bishops said in 1961, is not "natalist at any cost".
That's absolutely right, Father O'Leary: Jacques Maritain and his wife Raissa covenanted to live the rest of their lives after converting to the Catholic Faith without having sexual intercourse, to consecrate themselves more fully to Christ. It certainly is possible not to be "natalist at any cost," and I'm glad to see you affirm that possibility.
The opposite of natalism in the discourse of the French episcopacy and the Vatican is not primarily virginity or celibacy or Josephite marriages but responsible family planning.
The concern for responsibility and foresight on this plane is counted by Vatican II among the positive "signs of the times" in relation to which the Gospel is to be articulated. Vatican II is very opposed to the inbred self-sufficient church-centred discourse that ignores the world or merely condemns the world.
It is not correct to say the Council merely observes this sign of the times. It positively stresses that government has "in the matter of the population of its country, its own rights and DUTIES" and adds that "IT IS OF GREAT IMPORTANCE THAT ALL SHOULD HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO CULTIVATE A GENUINELY HUMAN SENSE OF RESPONSIBILITY WHICH WILL TAKE ACCOUNT OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES OF TIME AND SITUATION... People should be discreetly informed of scientific advances in research into methods of birth regulation..." Paul VI insists that "too frequently an accelerated demographic increase adds its own difficulties to the problems of development" , adding that "public authorities can intervene...by favoring the availability of appropriate information and by adopting suitable measures" and that "it is for the parents to decide, with full knowledge of the matter, on the number of their children, taking into account their responsibilities towards God, themselves, the children they have already brought into the world, and the community to which they belong."
Father Joseph, if a Catholic married couple in the Third World eschews the contraceptives distributed by the Maryknoll Sisters and chooses to be open to the creation of new life, and thus produces (in co-operation with God) four, five, six children, are they committing a sin in the eyes of the Church?
Here's how I read the Church documents cited by Father Joseph. The Church is saying that Catholic married couples may in good conscience limit the size of their families by licit means and giving due consideration to all surrounding circumstances. The Church does NOT suggest that indviduals or governments have a MORAL DUTY to limit the number of children who are brought into this world.
Dr. Blosser (and others on the "conservative" wing), I'm still curious to hear reactions to Cardinal Ottaviani's comments.
The church calls on people to inform their conscience and practice responsible family planning. It refers to the duties of states to tackle the problem of overpopulation in a morally responsible way. So yes, it could be sinful to irresponsibly multiply one's offspring if one has no way of giving them a decent human life or if the community is already suffering from difficulties in feeding and rearing a huge number of children.
See Karen Armstrong in today's Guardian on the desructive impact of an idolatry of Life at the expense of other values:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/
commen...1739244,00.html
Fr. O'Leary [paraphrase]: Too many children are sinful.
Blessed Teresa of Calcutta: [paraphrase] one can no more speak of too many children than one can too many flowers.
You choose: a servant of God or Father O'Leary.
No, the choice is between an alleged quote from Blessed Teresa of Calcutta, perhaps an obiter dictum taken out of context (just as the view attributed to me is a distortion; what I said was that blind natalism that makes not attempt at responsible family planning is morally irresponsible), and the explicit teaching of the Catholic Church.
http://friendsoflanef.blogspot.com/
First Article on "The Culture of Selfishness Must Die"
Father Joseph, if a Catholic married couple in the Third World eschews the contraceptives distributed by the Maryknoll Sisters and chooses to be open to the creation of new life, and thus produces (in co-operation with God) four, five, six children, are they committing a sin in the eyes of the Church? [Question]
yes, it could be sinful to irresponsibly multiply one's offspring if one has no way of giving them a decent human life or if the community is already suffering from difficulties in feeding and rearing a huge number of children. [Answer]
If you can "afford them" surely they aren't too many, Father. Therefore, "too many children" is sinful. I didn't misquote you, or take you out of context. The consequence of your line of reasoning is, at least to me, alarmingly clear. By your standard, only the wealthy should have children, but as study after study shows, the more income goes up, birth-rate goes down, and further that, in most cases, as education goes up, income does also. I think I see that only the poor, regardless of where they are, should not have children, and that the rich are too smart to have many. What does this add up to, except species suicide?
Chris: your point is well taken. The article I linked to addresses some of this. The BBC has just done a series on the problem of "birth dearth".
Again, I suggest that instead of inventing fake dilemmas and fake dangers, you study what the Catholic Church actually teaches about our responsibilities in regard to population.
Which of my dilemmas is fake? Which danger is fake?
1. fake dilemma: "only the wealthy should have children, only the poor should not have children" -- both should have children in a responsible fashion.
2. fake danger: "species suicide" (the population of the planet has soared at an unprecedented rate since 1960; over-population is rather to be seen as one of the threats to the species)
Because you ignore church teaching and Catholic thought on this matter you fall victim to fatalism. You seem to see any limit on the number of children (la Ottaviani or possibly Mother Teresa) as human disobedience to God and to scoff at the idea of limitation of births as a form of moral obedience.
The empirical fact that affluence decreases natality and poverty increases it is fatalistically taken an an immutable datum -- whereas in fact responsible parenthood is catching on in poorer countries, as Vatican II urged, so this datum is not immutable.
"The empirical fact that affluence decreases natality and poverty increases it is fatalistically taken an an immutable datum -- whereas in fact responsible parenthood is catching on in poorer countries, as Vatican II urged, so this datum is not immutable."
A) I think Jesus covered this already in his parable about the rich man. Men who have great temporal wealth tend to become effective idolaters. And children are seen as a drain on that which they love first and foremost: STUFF and MONEY. Temporal goods become an end in and of themselves rather than a means to an end, like say, raising up children to love and serve the Lord.
B) It is not true that poor countries are readily embracing the contraceptive mentality. It is being forced upon them from the outside by the rich countries of the West. This is precisely one of the points of contention between Muslim countries and organizations like International Planned Parenthood (and even Christians in Africa).
"Being responsible" in having children is subjective and such determinations are rightly within the discretionary purview of parents. The Church has taught nothing authoritatively as to what constitutes appropriate family sizes....and it never will.
The Church does have a teaching on the responsibility of parents and governments in regard to birth control (pursued by methods in accord with human dignity and natural law). How that doctrine may further develop in light of future circumstances is something I would not care to be too sure about.
Surely those who can afford more children should have them, since the population of the "first world" is on the precipice of a collapse.
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