I am the director of a Catholic worker womens shelter. Recently a friend asked me how I felt about a guest ( homeless woman) becoming pregnant shortly after leaving shelter. Admittedly I was frustrated, as she already had 2 kids and no stable partner. But after wrestling through it, I said " this life is God's harvest. I have to trust that it's easy to make babies for a reason. our work is to water and weed and tend the soil of these lives. God plants the seed and God will gather them in." I'm comforted by knowing that it's probably never a good time for any of us to add babies in, if we consider war and climate change and the work already to be done, but we keep falling in love and the babies keep coming. If hard times were meant to stop them, I imagine they'd stop coming. I know this sounds simple but I have to hold that I'm not God, and life is good, or the despair of this work might take me under.
Much of this reminds me of Le Pichon's gorgeous essay "Ecce Homo" on how what makes humanity (sociologically/anthropologically) unique is capacity to reorganize our collective life around the most vulnerable -- to make them the center of a human community.
The first time I read the essay I just sat at my desk and cried for 10 minutes after at the beauty of his vision -- which is, of course, the Lord's vision -- and how far we are from fulfilling it.
I love that last quote. Our lives *are* full of little apocalypses, un-plans. Trying to twist ourselves and our world to narrow notions of respectability can and does do so much damage.
But I think it's worth noting that a lot of that -particular- damage right now is masquerading as pro-life. Asking neighbors to turn in neighbors (for getting an abortion, for supporting a trans child), sure does not look like accepting "the incredible, radical, bigness of life all around us." I'm very concerned with these laws, and these general trends toward remaking our country into something more rigid, more "Christian".
I haven't found data that people who attend church more (vs a synagogue or a mosque or a temple) have more babies. I have found data that 'higher religiosity' corresponds to higher birth rates. But at the same time, not really all that much higher!
I am the director of a Catholic worker womens shelter. Recently a friend asked me how I felt about a guest ( homeless woman) becoming pregnant shortly after leaving shelter. Admittedly I was frustrated, as she already had 2 kids and no stable partner. But after wrestling through it, I said " this life is God's harvest. I have to trust that it's easy to make babies for a reason. our work is to water and weed and tend the soil of these lives. God plants the seed and God will gather them in." I'm comforted by knowing that it's probably never a good time for any of us to add babies in, if we consider war and climate change and the work already to be done, but we keep falling in love and the babies keep coming. If hard times were meant to stop them, I imagine they'd stop coming. I know this sounds simple but I have to hold that I'm not God, and life is good, or the despair of this work might take me under.
Much of this reminds me of Le Pichon's gorgeous essay "Ecce Homo" on how what makes humanity (sociologically/anthropologically) unique is capacity to reorganize our collective life around the most vulnerable -- to make them the center of a human community.
The first time I read the essay I just sat at my desk and cried for 10 minutes after at the beauty of his vision -- which is, of course, the Lord's vision -- and how far we are from fulfilling it.
I love that last quote. Our lives *are* full of little apocalypses, un-plans. Trying to twist ourselves and our world to narrow notions of respectability can and does do so much damage.
But I think it's worth noting that a lot of that -particular- damage right now is masquerading as pro-life. Asking neighbors to turn in neighbors (for getting an abortion, for supporting a trans child), sure does not look like accepting "the incredible, radical, bigness of life all around us." I'm very concerned with these laws, and these general trends toward remaking our country into something more rigid, more "Christian".
I was curious about the claim that Christians in general have more children, and found some fun research using 2020 data, summarized here: https://religionunplugged.com/news/2021/10/4/the-future-of-american-religion-birth-rates-show-whos-having-more-kids
Quick summary - Mormons top births, followed closely by Muslims. Catholics have .03 more children than those who identify as "Nothing in Particular".
This is data where I think you get different results when you disaggregate by church attendance, not just self-ID
I haven't found data that people who attend church more (vs a synagogue or a mosque or a temple) have more babies. I have found data that 'higher religiosity' corresponds to higher birth rates. But at the same time, not really all that much higher!