Faithful Catholics Returning to Humane Vitae?

The Annual Catholic Directory Years 1944-2003 | 7/10/03 | Me

[Hermann the Cherusker]

Year	Infant Baptisms	Marriages	Cuumlative Baptisms	Cummulative Baptism	Cummulative Baptisms/Marriage	Annual Baptism/Marriage	Ratio of Catholics Married In Church
1943	722434	289548		4699880	3.14	2.45	1.12
1944	710648	249140	14770410	4725321	3.26	2.83	1.17
1945	705557	245261	15404338	4796173	3.34	2.88	1.21
1946	705557	245261	16012434	4870393	3.42	3.01	1.18
1947	738314	345772	16659248	4937943	3.49	2.62	1.13
1948	907294	394593	17243217	4903826	3.60	2.38	0.90
1949	937208	373191	17658238	4838683	3.73	2.53	0.82
1950	943443	338512	18031443	4817950	3.81	2.88	0.78
1951	973544	328317	18362938	4836438	3.84	3.10	0.72
1952	1018303	319846	18580236	4869050	3.84	3.37	0.67
1953	1077184	303444	18701181	4920359	3.80	3.61	0.63
1954	1094872	303187	18719169	5022707	3.73	3.83	0.63
1955	1161304	313652	18711155	5136791	3.63	3.84	0.60
1956	1204982	324907	18638314	5249448	3.52	3.95	0.59
1957	1284534	325249	18488265	5341465	3.40	4.02	0.54
1958	1307666	314989	18178802	5431703	3.27	4.27	0.53
1959	1344576	319992	17787700	5523622	3.14	4.11	0.51
1960	1313653	319481	17319430	5588659	3.02	4.23	0.53
1961	1352371	312811	16900769	5638311	2.91	4.23	0.51
1962	1322283	311655	16433323	5677977	2.82	4.24	0.52
1963	1322315	329450	16001717	5707651	2.73	3.98	0.51
1964	1310413	352458	15575553	5718690	2.65	3.62	0.52
1965	1274938	357000	15175646	5711753	2.60	3.34	0.53
1966	1190842	360929	14844340	5705498	2.57	3.16	0.56
1967	1139248	371155	14636084	5697944	2.54	2.95	0.57
1968	1095172	405792	14461885	5674234	2.53	2.68	0.58
1969	1086858	417271	14341730	5616415	2.53	2.61	0.56
1970	1088463	426309	14202540	5545117	2.54	2.47	0.56
1971	1054933	416924	14067400	5467108	2.55	2.34	0.57
1972	975071	415487	13954365	5392624	2.58	2.21	0.59
1973	916564	406908	13917241	5318759	2.62	2.15	0.60
1974	876306	385029	13946980	5248766	2.69	2.32	0.61
1975	894992	369133	14115008	5205093	2.76	2.40	0.60
1976	884925	352477	14367992	5172605	2.83	2.53	0.58
1977	890677	341329	14663774	5152596	2.90	2.63	0.54
1978	896151	340489	14966219	5137056	2.94	2.67
1979	910506	345521	15106117	5111954	2.98	2.73
1980	943632	350745	15225305	5071818	3.02	2.80
1981	982586	353375	15310954	5023992	3.06	2.73
1982	965049	347445	15372672	4971199	3.11	2.81
1983	975017	347973	15448460	4912347	3.15	2.72
1984	947668	345973	15486880	4838074	3.22	2.76
1985	953323	348300	15561226	4759618	3.29	2.70
1986	941898	342440	15639146	4680352	3.36	2.74
1987	937947	341622	15704964	4594475	3.43	2.77
1988	946303	336915	15772507			3.10
1989	1044334	341356				3.36
1990	1147976	336645				3.51
1991	1180707	332468				3.59
1992	1193122	325789				3.18
1993	1036049	315387				3.26
1994	1029694	305385				3.37
1995	1029281	302919				3.45
1996	1044304	300582				3.46
1997	1040837	288593				3.51
1998	1013437	273700				3.73
1999	1022014	267517				3.85
2000	1031243	269034				3.75
2001	1007716	256563				3.92
2002	1005490	241727

The data above are from the Annual Catholic Directory of the United States and Canada. The data is for all American Catholic dioceses, including the eastern rite jurisdictions.

Column 1 is the year of the data (the data for the previous year appears in the Catholic Directory of any given year).
Column 2 is the number of Baptisms for that year.
Column 3 is the number of Marriages for that year.
Column 4 is a 15 year moving total of Baptisms.
Column 5 is a 15 year moving total of Marriages.
Column 6 is the ratio of Column 4 to the previous years Column 5.
Column 7 is the ratio of Column 2 to the previous years Column 3.
Column 8 is the ratio of twice Column 2 25 years later to Column 1 of that year.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

I answered all those arguments you mentioned. They are not persuasive to me at all and have no backing in the data. None of them explain the sudden change in 1989.

[Onelifetogive]

I answered all those arguments you mentioned. They are not persuasive to me at all and have no backing in the data. None of them explain the sudden change in 1989.

Your statement was that there were "no other possible conclusions." Whether you find those conclusions persuasive or not does not refure the fact that there are other possible explanations!

[Onelifetogive]

None of them explain the sudden change in 1989.

To characterize a return to Humane Vitae as a "sudden change" also seems like quite a stretch.

[Possenti]

Converts often have the most enthusiasm. But they don't have the deep-down intuition about the real meaning of the faith which is not intellectual and often not even spoken. Enthusiasm unbridled by humility can be destructive.

Good advice. Although I try to earnestly contend for the Faith, I strive to remain humble while doing so. At the beginning of my catechism studies, I told my Godfather(-to-be) that since I was not a cradle Catholic, I felt unworthy to become one. I'm always reminding the young adults in my Church how blessed they are to have been born into a Traditional Catholic family. Everything they have had ingrained into them since birth, I have to - or am learning at 33.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

That somewhat depends on the genes. One of my great-grandmothers had six after 35, in six years, and the great-great grandmothers on the other side had four and five after 35. It's never a guarantee, but when one is dealing with God, anything is possible.

You bet. My Nonna had her last baby at 45. Not ideal, but she didn't marry until age 33. She had seven pregnancies.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

I'm thinking that there are other factors in the infertility we don't know about

Yes, there are. STDs, abortion, etc all decrease fertility. I've seen women in their 20s have difficulty getting pregnant. Age does matter but not as much as some think.

[Desdemona]

Nutrition is also fairly important - and has been somewhat ignored.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

I have read a theory (and I emphasize it's just a theory) in a medical research study IIRC which hypothesized that women who use birth control for a long period of time somehow condition their bodies against pregnancy. The idea was that the excessive birth control created some kind of immunity or immune response against pregnancy. I wish I could recall where I read it but it was very interesting.

[Desdemona]

Moral of the story - stick with God's plan.

[american colleen]

Everything they have had ingrained into them since birth, I have to - or am learning at 33.

My money is on the fact that as a convert you know more about your faith than most cradle Catholics know or knew at aged 33. I'm trying hard (at age 44) to think of anyone my age who had faith ingrained into them at all.

[american colleen]

And I never heard of anyone on their deathbed lamenting the fact that they had too many children.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

A possible explanation must be plausible, else it is not truly an explanation. Given that immigration has been steady throughout and illegitmacy has held steady or gone down, these cannot be seen as reasonable explanations for a sudden 25% rise in baptisms per marriage in a two year period.

To characterize a return to Humane Vitae as a "sudden change" also seems like quite a stretch.

To me, the most satisfactory answer is that younger married couples today are more likely to follow the teaching of the Church. This agrees with empirical and anecdotal evidence concerning Gen-X vs. the Baby-Boomers.

Honestly, I was quite startled to find the trend I did when I analyzed the data. I had expected it would confirm a collapse in the Catholic birth-rate.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

But as far as your statement goes, I hear this a lot, but I disagree. Converts often have the most enthusiasm. But they don't have the deep-down intuition about the real meaning of the faith which is not intellectual and often not even spoken. Enthusiasm unbridled by humility can be destructive.

I agree with your castigation of enthusiasm (have your read Msgr. Knox's book?). However, I have to wonder at what you think the real meaning of the faith is?

I've always understood faith to be the path to love of the triune God, and love the path to holiness and divinization - the partaking in the divine nature by the Holy Trinity coming to dwell within our soul and the radiation of this grace into a sanctification of our surroundings and neighbors in the world - the reconsecration and purification of "vineyard of the Lord" from the destruction wrought by the sin of Adam - so that we may shine as a light from the mountaintop, so that our days are ordered in peace, so that we can spend the remainder of our lives in true penance, so that in departing this life, perpetual light might shine upon us in the next, and our heart being pure, we might come to see God.

[Maximilian]

However, I have to wonder at what you think the real meaning of the faith is?

Your description is pretty good. However, I think it misses the substance of faith when you use words like "path" and "partaking." Faith is something solid, something that really exists, something that we are trying to grasp the reality of, but it's much bigger than we are. It's like the blind men and the elephant, and the faith has the same solid reality as the elephant. It's only our understanding of the faith that is not complete and tangible.

To extend the metaphor, if faith is like an elephant, then someone who has spent their entire life around the elephant will have a better feel for the reality of it, the size of it, the substance of it, the implications of it. Someone who reads a book about elephants is not going to have the same experiential knowledge, although they may believe that they have learned everything there is to know about elephants from the book.

[Hermann the Cherusker]

However, I think it misses the substance of faith when you use words like "path" and "partaking."

"For indeed His divine power has granted us all things pertaining to life and piety through the knowledge of Him who has called us by His own glory and power - through which he has granted us the very great and precious promises, so that you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption of that lust which is in the world." (2 Peter 1.3-4)

Or more simply, "God became man, so that man might become god." (St. Athanasius)

[Possenti]

My money is on the fact that as a convert you know more about your faith than most cradle Catholics know or knew at aged 33. I'm trying hard (at age 44) to think of anyone my age who had faith ingrained into them at all.

I'm trying - but have a lot of catching up to do :) The "ingrained" cradle Catholics I'm surrounded by are all traditional. Even the teenagers are well-versed in the Faith. Best group of young people I've ever met.

BTW - the smallest Catholic family I'm aquainted with has 6 kids - the parents are in their late 20's. The largest is 15 kids. My wife is unable to have any more, but we have a 10 year-old daughter. I'm looking forward to many grandchildren in my later years...

[narses]

"How totally free from sin does the couple have to be?"

Free of Mortal Sin, at least. Why would a Deacon ask such a question?

[narses]

That's the point. The ultimate law -- the salvation of souls. I fear the good Deacon is more concerned about the "happiness" of the young couple. The reality is that children are a predictable result of a decision to marry, that a freedom from Mortal Sin and a pledge to raise those children as Members of the Mystical Body of Christ are the bare minimum that the Church ought to require, seems clear to me. And who am I? Nobody. A neuter, a man with no say in the running of the Church. The Good Deacon, he is in the Apostolic Succession. He advocates lust, mixed marriages and the like. I sink sadly into despair.