Solving the alleged Population crisis...while solving the Vocation Crisis

[Lucretius]

Married couples should have lots of children, but promote clerical and religious vocations more, so that, even if they have lots of children, not all of them are marry and themselves have lots of children, while giving us an excess of vocations.

In this way, population is controlled, and we solve the shortage of priest, monks, and nuns. Two birds with one stone

Now, how we can cultivate a societal and cultural environment to promote this mindset is the question…

Christi pax.

 

[Sarcelle]

Married couples should have lots of children, but promote clerical and religious vocations more, so that, even if they have lots of children, not all of them are marry and themselves have lots of children, while giving us an excess of vocations.

In this way, population is controlled, and we solve the shortage of priest, monks, and nuns. Two birds with one stone

Now, how we can cultivate a societal and cultural environment to promote this mindset is the question…

Christi pax.

The Catholic Church, never mandated that married couples have lots of children.

Married couples are supposed to be open to life, but even being open to life does not guarantee parenthood.

Couples who are open to life but are childless or only have a few children are not sinning.

 

[SuperLuigi]

The Catholic Church, never mandated that married couples have lots of children.

Married couples are supposed to be open to life, but even being open to life does not guarantee parenthood.

Couples who are open to life but are childless or only have a few children are not sinning.

It’s not a matter of sin or not sinning but about building a stable society.

Actually, as we get closer to the next century, population decline may be a problem.

 

[Lucretius]

The Catholic Church, never mandated that married couples have lots of children.

And I didn’t say otherwise.

But I do think that a loving marriage inherently tends towards children, and that, when a truly loving and holy couple cannot have children because of infertility or prudential reasons, they have a sense of sadness and lose at what could have been. I mean, how could anyone say that they aren’t sad in some way at meeting and raising another person?

The idea is not to have as many children as you can physically have, but to have as many children you can have while living within your means, in relative comfort, within your ability to raise them, while maintaining your sanity, etc.

After all, the family is about creating mature, virtuous, happy, and holy persons, which is just as much about raising children as it is about making them

We don’t have to have this many or that many children, surely, as Christ gives couples freedom here, but I do think the Gospel teaches that married people should want to have many children, if it is prudent and possibly, and that a desire to avoid children is often the sign of an underlying vice or disordered selfishness. The issue isn’t in the actions and the behavior, but in the intention, motivation, mindset, or mentality. Having lots of children or little children can be either good or bad, depending on the motivations and practical judgment behind the choices

Christi pax.

 

[StudentMI]

But I do think that a loving marriage inherently tends towards children, and that, when a truly loving and holy couple cannot have children because of infertility or prudential reasons, they have a sense of sadness and lose at what could have been. I mean, how could anyone say that they aren’t sad in some way at meeting and raising another person?

Was that a dig at adoption?

 

[TheAmazingGrace]

Married couples should have lots of children, but promote clerical and religious vocations more, so that, even if they have lots of children, not all of them are marry and themselves have lots of children, while giving us an excess of vocations.

In this way, population is controlled, and we solve the shortage of priest, monks, and nuns. Two birds with one stone

Now, how we can cultivate a societal and cultural environment to promote this mindset is the question…

Christi pax.

To quote Jimmy Buffett, “God’s honest truth is it ain’t that simple.”

Overpopulation isn’t just a result of people breeding like rabbits. Most first-world countries are below replacement levels, while the high birthrates of developing countries are largely balanced by high mortality and low life expectancy.

Overpopulation is largely a result of modern medicine, which has enabled people to live decades longer, saved the lives of people who might have died before they were able to reproduce, and greatly reduced maternal mortality. Even if society did reform itself like you suggested, we would still have a lot of elderly people who would require a significant share of our resources.

Also, I find it highly unlikely that society is going to experience a mass conversion to orthodox Catholicism anytime soon. Let’s be real.

 

[TheAmazingGrace]

The Catholic Church, never mandated that married couples have lots of children.

Married couples are supposed to be open to life, but even being open to life does not guarantee parenthood.

Couples who are open to life but are childless or only have a few children are not sinning.

Right. Children are a gift from God - not collectibles that you have to acquire a certain number of before you can be considered a good Catholic.

 

[angell1]

To quote Jimmy Buffett, “God’s honest truth is it ain’t that simple.”

Overpopulation isn’t just a result of people breeding like rabbits. Most first-world countries are below replacement levels, while the high birthrates of developing countries are largely balanced by high mortality and low life expectancy.

Overpopulation is largely a result of modern medicine, which has enabled people to live decades longer, saved the lives of people who might have died before they were able to reproduce, and greatly reduced maternal mortality. Even if society did reform itself like you suggested, we would still have a lot of elderly people who would require a significant share of our resources.

Also, I find it highly unlikely that society is going to experience a mass conversion to orthodox Catholicism anytime soon. Let’s be real.

also, overpopulation is a myth that certain individuals use to try and control others.

unequal sharing of resources is mainly the problem. just look athe countries who practice “popopulation control”, they can hardly even sustain themselves anymore. I’m including china in that as well, there is a very unbalanced culture over there now.

 

[StudentMI]

also, overpopulation is a myth that certain individuals use to try and control others.

unequal sharing of resources is mainly the problem. just look athe countries who practice “popopulation control”, they can hardly even sustain themselves anymore. I’m including china in that as well, there is a very unbalanced culture over there now.

Overpopulation is a remnant of Malthusian economics, a completely ridiculous system which looked at English counties after the enclosures which artificially forced people into cities, and then extrapolated that overcrowding to biology and claimed that overpopulation was a problem. It’s like forcing people into a small room and then claiming too many people exist because there’s no stretching room. You forced them there to begin with. The problem isn’t the number of people, or even the room. The problem is you forced them into it to begin with.

 

[Kielbasi]

Married couples should have lots of children, but promote clerical and religious vocations more, so that, even if they have lots of children, not all of them are marry and themselves have lots of children, while giving us an excess of vocations.
.

At the peak of religious vocations here in America in 1965, there were 180.000 nuns and 60,000 priests, in a population of 48 million.

That’s one out of every 200 Catholics, I can’t see the number really expanding much past that, and 1 out of 200 isn’t going to make that much of a difference as far as population control- which I don’t see as a problem anyhow.

I guess the number of priests and nuns could rise even more, but what kind of work should they be doing? That is just a lot of manpower, new tasks would have to be appropriated.

 

[PseuTonym]

Overpopulation is a remnant of Malthusian economics, a completely ridiculous system which looked at English counties after the enclosures which artificially forced people into cities, and then extrapolated that overcrowding to biology and claimed that overpopulation was a problem. It’s like forcing people into a small room and then claiming too many people exist because there’s no stretching room. You forced them there to begin with. The problem isn’t the number of people, or even the room. The problem is you forced them into it to begin with.

I presume that we cannot learn anything from economic statistics of the period immediately after World War II, because military conscription artificially forced millions of men to fight. However, you could also say that the war changed the United States, giving it a military-industrial complex, and artificially forcing citizens of the USA to pay much higher taxes to support the military. So, should we wait until governments around the world beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks before we pay any attention to economic statistics?

Should economic theories attempt to explain reality as it is now, or should economists focus on an imaginary world in which there is no “artificial forcing”?

Also, where did European-looking people in North America come from if there wasn’t an overpopulation problem in Europe? The journey across the Atlantic used to be very dangerous, unpleasant, and expensive.

 

[Rosebud77]

At the peak of religious vocations here in America in 1965, there were 180.000 nuns and 60,000 priests, in a population of 48 million.

That’s one out of every 200 Catholics, I can’t see the number really expanding much past that, and 1 out of 200 isn’t going to make that much of a difference as far as population control- which I don’t see as a problem anyhow.
**
I guess the number of priests and nuns could rise even more, but what kind of work should they be doing? That is just a lot of manpower, new tasks would have to be appropriated.**

It was a lot higher here in Ireland post-famine, and deliberately so. I knew one family where all seven kids became nuns or priests. And it was normal for 2 or 3 in a big family to enter religious life or the priesthood.

And yes it DID control the population. When I came here nearly 17 years ago, a newspaper headline pointed out that the population here had JUST grown above immediate post-famine levels.

The Orders creamed off thousands of marriageable age women, leaving us with a population heavy with crusty old bachelors with no one to marry.

Whether a country wants to pay the price or not is another matter entirely.
It has been a bitter harvest here and we are still reaping that.
As for work?You have a huge homelessness problem over there and a First Nation siutation.

 

[Kielbasi]

Also, where did European-looking people in North America come from if there wasn’t an overpopulation problem in Europe? The journey across the Atlantic used to be very dangerous, unpleasant, and expensive.

It was unpleasant, I don’t think it was particularly dangerous. People made the trip for economic opportunity, America was teeming with new opportunities at the time. My grandfather was interested in getting in the ground floor of the then burgeoning coal industry.

 

[animalis]

With current economic conditions, particularly the context pertaining to the unjust wage - the potential burden of humble family life is heroic to many people. Pride is a fundamental issue. “Take up my yoke upon you, and learn of me, because I am meek, and humble of heart: and you shall find rest to your souls.” (Mt 11:29) Belial, according to Saint Thomas Aqunias, means without a yoke. This is also a term used in the OT for a devil.

If we are learning for humility, we are willing to grow and give life to others by giving ourselves.

 

[Rosebud77]

It was unpleasant, I don’t think it was particularly dangerous. People made the trip for economic opportunity, America was teeming with new opportunities at the time. My grandfather was interested in getting in the ground floor of the then burgeoning coal industry.

It was dangerous.

They used to call the ships “coffin ships” with good reason. ’ Long, often in bad weather, diseases.