Pope Francis: Pets Can't Replace Children

Townhall.com ^ | June 10, 2014 | Dennis Prager

[Kaslin]

Pope Francis said something so important last week that it will either be widely ignored or widely disparaged.

The pope criticized "these marriages, in which the spouses do not want children, in which the spouses want to remain without fertility. This culture of well-being ... convinced us: It's better not to have children! It's better! You can go explore the world, go on holiday, you can have a villa in the countryside; you can be carefree. It might be better -- more comfortable -- to have a dog, two cats, and the love goes to the two cats and the dog."

He is right. More than ever before, young men and women in most affluent Western countries (and Russia) have decided not to have children. Instead, many shower love and attention on dogs and cats. Ask many young women -- married or single -- if they have any children, and if they do not, you are likely to be told, "I have two cats" or "I have two dogs." There are authors whose book jacket photo shows them with their dog or cat.

In much of the West, animals are the new children.

The pope made this declaration for two reasons: one demographic and one religious and moral.

The demographic reason is that the populations of European countries such as the one in which he lives -- Italy -- are gradually disappearing.

--Italy's birth rate is approximately 1.41 children per woman, making Italy 203 out of 224 countries in terms of its fertility rate.

--LifeSiteNews, a religious-oriented news website, reported that Italian demographer Giancarlo Baliga said last year that by 2041, "The age group most represented in the structure of the Italians will become the 70s."

--According to Fred Pearce in the Guardian, "Italy has the world's second oldest population."

--According to population statistics website GeoHive, Italy will have two and a half million fewer people at the end of this century than it had in the beginning. And the only reason it will not far fewer is that so many Italian citizens will be foreign-born immigrants.

--According to Professor Peter McDonald, president of the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population (2010-2013) and a fellow of the Australian Academy of Social Sciences, if Italy remains at its current fertility levels and does not compensate with foreign immigrants, it will lose 86 percent of its population by the end of the century, falling to 8 million compared with today's 56 million.

The pope knows that Italians and other nations are slowly disappearing.

The question is: Why? Why do so many people prefer to parent pets than children?

Throughout history, there were three primary reasons people had many children: Lack of contraception, economic necessity and religion.

All three reasons are gone.

Thanks to modern contraception, couples can have all the sex they want without conceiving.

Regarding economic need, most people in welfare states no longer need children to care for them in old age because the state will do that.

And with the demise of religion in the developed world, there are no values-based reasons to have children.

What this means is that because of contraception and the welfare state, the one compelling reason to have children is that one's values demand it.

Those values overwhelmingly come from religion. The dominant religions of the Western world, Judaism and Christianity, demand marriage and children. Consequently, the people in affluent Western countries most likely to have more than two, and certainly more than three, children are Orthodox Jews, Evangelical Protestants, religious Catholics and active Mormons.

But secularism is now dominant in the West, which ends the values-based reason to have children.

One might argue that there is a fourth reason to have children -- a desire to raise and love children and have a family. But one shouldn't put too much stock in that argument. Without religion, even those who want children almost never have more than two. And more and more secular individuals find that their desire to nurture is fulfilled by loving cats and dogs.

That was the pope's point.

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

Read this one:

” A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behavior, given to hospitality, apt to teach.”

Timothy 3:2

[Mrs. Don-o]

All those other problems are certainly relevant

• economic growth negligible,
• unemployment very high,
• young adults living at home with there parents

But these conditions have been that bad, and worse, at many other points in U.S. and European history. People were far poorer, materially, at many points in our history: most of us need only look back to our parents and grandparents' say.

Speaking for my own family tree: My mother came from a cohort of 5 siblings, my father 4 siblings.

My grandparents: 5 and 4 and 4 and 5.

My great-grandparents: 9 and 2 (died young) and 4 and 7.

All of these past generations were poorer, materially, than we are.

The same could be said of many Italian generational cohorts in the past.

But now, many couples will remain childless or reproduce at below replacement, while owning more than one house, while vacationing abroad annually, while spending more on restaurant dining than my parents had for their entire income.

My parents squrreled away money to own their own home by remaining single, working and scrimping for 20 years of their adult life. They married in their mid-30's.

Is the internet full of ads for "How to save money so you can own your own home in 10 years"? Or is it full of "Two fabulous weeks in Cancun!"

[sitetest]

What is lacking is not money or good jobs or a vibrant economy, but rather, faith in God.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I have never heard the Pope advocating either the welfare state or laissez-faire materialism.

To the extent that you can call the Catholic Church's social teaching "anti-capitalist," it's a "private property anti-capitalism" that hearkens back to the older idealof a "moral society," without cutthroat capitalists or class struggle. In this view, a moral society is one in which the rich shun greed and recognize their obligations to the poor and workers, and workers and the poor, in return, refrain from envy, theft or violence.

At worst this is a pre-modern or paternalistic view of society.

But it's hardly a "Marxist" view. While it may recognize the existence of social classes, the Catholic orthodoxy doesn't champion class struggle as the motor force for change in the world. Nor does it argue for a society in which the State decides what to produce and how to allocate society's resources.

In fact, Pope Francis' "The Joy of the Gospel" advocates for:

"Ethics--a non-ideological ethics--[that] would make it possible to bring about balance and a more humane social order...Money must serve, not rule! The Pope loves everyone, rich and poor alike, but he is obliged in the name of Christ to remind all that the rich must help, respect and promote the poor. I exhort you to generous solidarity and a return of economics and finance to an ethical approach which favors human beings."

In in a December 14 interview with the Italian newspaper La Stampa, he flatly stated, "The ideology of Marxism is wrong."

Francis went on to defend his criticism of "trickle-down economics," but added, "I repeat: I did not talk as a specialist, but according to the social doctrine of the church. And this does not mean being a Marxist."

[Mrs. Don-o]

Please go back and read with an emphasis on comprehension.

First, I did not say consecrated celibacy was all about "vestal virgins" --- you did.

Second, celibacy is praised by Our Lord and recommended by St. Paul. Therefore celibacy is not only found in pagan religions.

[Mrs. Don-o]

That's fine. I thought we'd been talking about deacons and priests in the Western Church?

I'm here to learn, Tell me about your bishops.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Amen.

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

It would be nice if we saw mixed into all of that some of the wisdom of our Founding Fathers, including:

1) The virtue of limited government.
2) The virtue of private property rights.
3) The virtue of limited taxation.
4) The virtue of individual liberty.
5) The virtue of private ownership of firearms.

Perhaps its PR problem, but the Vatican these days seems hostile to all of these American virtues.

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

With the quote from Timothy I showed you in the Bible that a married clergy is permissible.

[Trapped Behind Enemy Lines]

I left one out and it’s one of the most important:

6) The virtue of free market capitalism.

[Romulus]

Let me know if you need a translation.

[Uri’el-2012]

You seem too oblique.

[Uri’el-2012]

I will ignore your personal supercilious remarks.

Please cite where celibacy is commanded by YHvH.

shalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach

[Mrs. Don-o]

The Catholic Church in every century has always had married clergy (though not always in the West). It has never taught that it was theologically or dogmatically impossible to have married clergy --- otherwise the 20+ Churches of the East (Melkite, Maronite, Coptic, Chaldean, Ruthenian, Ukrainian, etc.) would not be Catholic.

So, I'm still interested. Tell me about your bishops.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I never said the Catholic Church believed in vestal virgins. You said that.

I never said celibacy was commanded by God.

Is it supercilious -- really? --- for me to point out that you're asking me to support positions I did not express and do not hold?

[Uri’el-2012]

I never said celibacy was commanded by God.

Good; because celibacy is commanded
by man from the Evil One.

YHvH commanded marriage for all including His High Priests.

shalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach

[Tax-chick]

My parents were so eager to avoid living with the Family Circus that they saved large amounts of money, purchased long-term care insurance, and established themselves in an inconvenient part of the country.

I’m expecting Frank, my #8, to take care of me when I have Alzheimers. He’s “insecurely attached,” according to his brother who got an A in Intro to Psychology.

[Mrs. Don-o]

"YHvH commanded marriage for all including His High Priests."

God did not command "marriage for all." Given that there was a general commandment for our species, like all the other species, to "be fruitful and multiply," it still does not imply that every individual without exception is in sin unless he reproduces. Some people never find a suitable marriage partner. Others have a calling to celibacy.

Both Jesus (Matthew 19:9) and Paul (1 Cor 7:8, 32-35) recommended celibacy for people who had that calling. Should we ignore these verses?

[Uri’el-2012]

What does this verse have to do with celibacy ?

"And I say to you, whoever divorces his wife,
except for immorality, and marries another
woman commits adultery."

Also See Genesis 2:22-24 for a purpose of marriage.

Thoughout the WORD of YHvH marriage is shown
as a metaphor of our relationship with YHvH.

So anyone who refuses to marry can never understand
their relationship with YHvH. It appears to be a rejection of YHvH.

shalom b'SHEM Yah'shua HaMashiach

[Mrs. Don-o]

I apologize. I meant Matthew 19:12 and the verses cited in 1 Cor. 7.

Do you disregard these instances where the calling to celibacy is endorsed by Our Lord and by St. Paul?