Posted on 02/22/2020 5:20:41 PM PST by marshmallow
The shrinking population affects the 'very existence of our country,' President Sergio Mattarella warns.
ROME, Italy, February 20, 2020 (LifeSiteNews) ― Italy welcomed its smallest number of newborns in 2019, leading its president to foretell the country’s doom.
“This is a problem that concerns the very existence of our country,” said Sergio Mattarella, 78.
“The fabric of our country is weakening, and everything must be done to counter this phenomenon.”
According to Italy’s national statistics agency, ISTAT, there were only 435,000 births in Italy last year, the lowest number ever recorded in the country, compared with 647,000 deaths.
The number of births was down 5,000 from 2018, and the number of deaths increased by 14,000.
Reuters reported that Italy’s overall population fell by 116,000 to 60.3 million despite the growing number of births to migrants to the country. The news agency also noted that “Italy’s population had risen virtually every year since World War I, hitting a peak in 2015 at 60.8 million, but has since started to decline.”
Life expectancy has increased to 85.3 years for Italian women and 81 years for Italian men. The decrease in births and increase in life expectancy has resulted in an average age of 45.7.
When the low number of Italian births for 2018 was reported, then-interior minister Matteo Salvini said, “We are in a terrible state.”
“This is the real crisis (in Italy), not the bond yield spreads or the economic crisis.”
Italian-American Beverly Stevens, editor of Regina magazine, told LifeSiteNews that the sexual revolution is to blame for the low Italian birth rate.
(Excerpt) Read more at lifesitenews.com ...
Officially sanctioned and approved birth control by Roman Catholicism.
The Pope did “Humanae vitae (Latin : Of Human Life) is an encyclical written by Pope Paul VI and dated 25 July 1968.” The text was issued at a Vatican press conference on 29 July.
Humanae vitae - Wikipedia”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humanae_vitae
Which was eventually ignored by the vast majority of the world’s Catholics.
The Vatican will make a nice mosque
“Oh, but you do have a Roman Catholic pope.”
Bleep off, snake handler. Francis is an imposter.
Then show me it's wrong.
The Catholic Church's position on birth control hasn't changed in over 2,000 years; the Protestant position changed after 400.
By migrating to a Protestant country, Catholics exposed themselves to the dominant culture, which was, of course, Protestant. And when the Protestants practiced birth control en masse, the pressure (financial and societal) on the Catholics was simply overwhelming.
Does it excuse Catholics for giving up the Faith? Absolutely not. Is it the fault of the Protestants that the Catholics joined them? Certainly not. But if anything I've said here is incorrect, then correct it.
Bleep off, snake handler. Francis is an imposter.
Snake handler....now that's a new one. You get credit for creativity.
But once again, you prove that it is usually, though not always, the Roman Catholic who first resorts to profanity and/or the personal attack when the argument goes against them...which is often.
Natural. Family. Planning.
The difference? It's the difference between respectful cooperation with the inbuilt design of sex and fertility, vs. overriding and disrespecting that design.
To use an analogy: temporary abstinence (NFP) is like a respectful silence. Contraception is like talking and lying.
NFP requires acceptance of and acting harmoniously with the God-given design which links intercourse and fertility. "A time to embrace,and a time to refrain from embracing."
But contraception, by contrast, is actually an act of perversion, like Onan's sin. It's going through the motions, while altering it, impairing it in some way so that its natural fruitfulness, what would be the natural outcome, is sabotaged. The Bible says what Onan did was evil, and God slew him.
NFP could be used with a selfish attitude. But that's a separate issue: the sin would be the selfishness, not the abstinence in itself. I've actually never known couples who NFP it for trivial reasons. It's typically used for health considerations, giving an exhausted or fragile mom a break from too-frequent pregnancies, or using NFP for baby-spacing, not baby-refusal.
I would wager that a lot of couples, without consciously choosing this as a "method," do find themselves temporarily abstaining when a pregnancy would be a seriously bad idea, e.g. the family loses its income and its health insurance because of job loss. They're hoping and praying this does noit last long!
People laugh and mock when they hear about NFP couples having seven kids, but that's not "method failure." It's usually method-success: they spaced their generous number of kids in way that shows wise sexual stewardship. Extended breastfeeding often achieves the same thing.
*****
It's not of a sort.
Natural Family Planning (NFP) is the general title for the scientific, natural and moral methods of family planning that can help married couples either achieve or postpone pregnancies.http://www.usccb.org/issues-and-action/marriage-and-family/natural-family-planning/what-is-nfp/index.cfm
“Oh, but you do have a Roman Catholic pope.”
Everything you “know” about Catholicism is wrong.
And not just wrong. Maliciously, obstreperously, blasphemously, obnoxiously, contemptibly, despicably, unjustifiably, irredeemably, nauseatingly wrong.
Fortunately, God’s mercy is infinite, so you are not unforgivably wrong.
Still, you really should shut up regarding a subject on which you are so blissfully free of the tiniest scintilla of knowledge or understanding.
It’s the right thing to do.
Everything you “know” about Catholicism is wrong.
LOL....you have no idea what I do or do not know about Roman Catholicism.
However, I have learned a great deal about Roman Catholicism.....from Roman Catholics on these forums.
And in many of those discussions I find the Roman Catholic knowledge of their own denomination is lacking.
“LOL....you have no idea what I do or do not know about Roman Catholicism.”
Nonsense. You have thoroughly exposed what you do or do not know about Catholicism. A Catholic can see through you like a parent sees through a fibbing child.
Our first four kids were born in fairly quick succession. I was in a conversation after church and someone mentioned an upcoming baby shower. One of them jokingly said, “Can you believe it? Someone’s having a baby and it’s not you!”
Her comment saddened me tremendously because I realized how few babies there were in our good sized church. Most families had the standard two kids. For what other blessings do we tell God “Thanks, but no thanks.”? It seems like it’s only the most precious blessing of all that we refuse to accept.
Nonsense. You have thoroughly exposed what you do or do not know about Catholicism. A Catholic can see through you like a parent sees through a fibbing child.
Comical and yet inaccurate at the same time.
A question for you.
Are the rulings of the prior councils of Rome still in effect today?
Teams of robots will raise large families from infants to legal adults and then push them out the front door.
“A question for you.”
Don’t assume I ever intended to waste my time arguing with you. I just felt a duty to tell you.
Done.
Up to date figures on TFR (total fertility rate, = number of children per woman, completed family size) Source, CIA World Factbook 2018
Average replacement rate= 2.1--- or higher where there is a higher infant/early childhood mortality rate.
Selected countries, slightly over replacement, but dropping:
| Algeria | 2.34 |
| Morocco | 2.33 |
| Mexico | 2.24 |
Selected countries, all under replacement:
| Saudi Arabia | 2.09 |
| Turkmenistan | 2.07 |
| Sri Lanka | 2.07 |
| Libya | 2.04 |
| Dominican Republic | 2.03 |
| Turkey | 2.01 |
| Colombia | 2.00 |
| Iran | 1.97 |
| Paraguay | 1.9 |
| Costa Rica | 1.89 |
| Nicaragua | 1.89 |
| United States | 1.87 |
| El Salvador | 1.87 |
| Uruguay | 1.8 |
| Chile | 1.8 |
| Puerto Rico | 1.22 |
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