THE CHURCH HAS LOST THE BIRTH CONTROL BATTLE – SUFFERING GREAT LOSSES

NOTE: This an expanded version of a paper published in Crisis Magazine on August 16, 2019, entitled “Artificial Birth Control, A Battle Lost”. https://www.crisismagazine.com/2019/artificial-birth-control-a-battle-lost

The Dimensions of the Battle

A battle is a confrontation between an enemy, invading to dominate and a friend defending to protect. In the Church, a most crucial battle has been fought for many decades, between a culture that offers artificial birth control  as the clear means for protecting one’s freedom and the Church’s defense of the fundamental truth that sexual intercourse is between a married man and woman and is to be open to life and not artificially blocked. It is essential that this battle be recognized and its loss be reported with sincerity and fearlessness

The Church has lost this battle.

On what basis can this loss be quantified? How is the loss of this battle with artificial birth control to be reported? The simplest and most straightforward measure is the infant baptismal rate, the Church’s “fertility rate”, i.e., the rate of new “births’ into the Church The battle losses are immense as shown by the precipitous decline of baptismal rates in the US Church to historically low levels: about a 75% plunge from 1950 – 2018.

Therefore, it is essential to recognize that since  the battle lines were first drawn in the 1960s with VC II and Humane Vitae as the modern clarion call against artificial birth control, the Church’s battle with the “enemy” culture, largely pagan,  has gone so very poorly as to necessitate an announcement of a loss of a battle that  seriously jeopardizes the very heart of the Church.

It is interesting that this pagan culture is itself losing its own battle against declining birth rates for the US population as a whole.  The decline in US fertility rates has been widely reported as sinking to levels well below population replacement rates and thereby having severe economic consequences. Of course, not all in the culture believe this to be a loss but in fact, a kind of gain for an over-population ideology. But a question naturally arises as to how the Church’s fertility rate has done relative to the low fertility rates of the US population as a whole. Let us see. Recall that it is the baptismal fertility rate which is the measure of casualties in this battle.

Some Significant Statistics

 If we compare US “crude” fertility rates (i.e., births/1000 population) with the US Church “crude” birth rates (i.e., infant baptisms/1000 Catholic population), a number of revealing facts emerge. We can see this in the Figures below. In 1950, the US birth rate was about 24 births per 1000 people while the US Church birth rate was 34 infant Baptisms per 1000 Catholics, 40% higher than the US population at large. We can easily interpret this as indicating that in 1950, the birth rate of babies from Catholic couples was higher than the non-Catholic population. The larger number of baptisms then reflects the larger number of children born to the Catholic couple. We had the upper hand in the battle.

But the shift in the battle begins with a decline in the 1960s. By 1970, baptismal fertility dropped from 34 to 23 Baptisms/1000 Catholics, which was still 25% higher than the declining US fertility rate (18 births/1000 people). Both rates then continue to decline together so that, given some measure of uncertainty, one can say that for the decades from 1990 – 2010, the Church suffered extensive combat setbacks with the baptismal fertility rate at essentially the same level as the US fertility rate of about 13/1000 population. This means that there has been a massive defection from the Church and a joining the “enemy” culture.  And yet the situation is increasing in severity.

A further major redirection in this battle with artificial birth control begins to emerge in our current decade. The US Church baptismal fertility drops below the US fertility rate and significantly so. For 2018, the US rate is about 12 births/1000 pop while the US Church baptismal fertility is about 9 baptisms/1000 Catholic pop (recall that the 1950 Church rate was 34 baptisms/1000 Catholic pop). This 2018 baptismal fertility rate is about 25 % less than the US fertility. A baptismal fertility below the US fertility has not occurred in the last 70 years of record.

Consequences of Declining Baptisms

So what? What is the magnitude of the “casualties” on the side of the Church? Has this battle, that is, the clear dominance of the culture in convincing modern couples to “desert” to the advantages of artificial birth control, had any significant effect on the Church? I have previously estimated the impact of the declining baptismal fertility rate on the US Catholic population (A Hemorrhaging Church, Amazon). If the baptismal rate had remained at 1950 levels, and using an ecclesial model which includes, births, deaths, net immigration and defections, I calculated a total loss of 26 million due to the declining baptismal rate! This magnitude of casualties represents an enormous loss of souls, either never born or never brought to the font. The consequences of this overall battle loss is hardly news as the sacraments, especially marriages have seriously declined, presbyteral vocations have plunged, and parishes have had to close, or merge or be regionalized. The real news is that the magnitude of the decline, its cause,  interpretation and moral meaning seems to be hidden behind a kind of veil of non-recognition.

What are we to make of all this? Two major morality features emerge. First, for approximately the last 50 years, there has been a wholesale assimilation by the general Catholic population of a secular, largely pagan mentality regarding the regulating of births. What is this mentality? It is essentially a moral decision made by the individual or individual couple independently of any Church teaching of moral dogma. It is a choice that centers around one’s own comfort, projection of the future and economic considerations. In other words, the decision to enter into a contraceptive mentality is governed by a determination on the part of the individual as to the consequences of having a child or not. Any reference to the moral teaching of the Church is generally absent. Here we are of course speaking of the Catholic population as a whole. Exceptions are increasing with more couples desiring a faithful Christian marriage. But it is clear that the secular rationale for having or not having children has been widely embraced by the US Catholic population.  This secular rationale is a contraceptive mentality which beginning in the 1960s is so easily and readily implemented through a pill, intrauterine devices or surgical procedures that the Catholic couple becomes effectively isolated from any moral teaching to the contrary. All of this is now of record and reveals the total failure of Church moral teaching for the last half century on the sinfulness of contraception.

Yet as noted above, the situation is deteriorating even further with baptismal rates below secular birth rates during at least this past decade. What does this mean? To interpret this result, one assumption is necessary and entirely reasonable. If one assumes that the birth rate of Catholics is essentially the same as the non-Catholics, then the baptismal rate below the US birth rate indicates that there are an increasingly number of babies being born to “Catholic” couples that are not being baptized. This is a fundamental rejection of the Sacrament of Baptism, to wit: “Why should I have this infant baptized? Let us wait until he is old enough to make his own decision.”

This two-fold rejection of the teaching of the Church, i.e., assimilation of a contraceptive mentality and a deep-seated questioning of the meaning of Baptism, is even more than a numerical tragedy, it is a great moral tragedy and crisis which we can expect to not only continue but to increase in its magnitude. The tragedy is most significant because it simply is not recognized. If the previous analysis is of any meaning and accepted as an entirely reasonable interpretation of the reality of the past decades, then the question must be addressed: What is (are) the cause(s) of this wide-spread rejection of Church moral teaching regarding an openness to life and the essential nature of the Sacrament of Baptism? This is a most difficult question and I simply offer it here for open discussion. But one might conclude that the Catholic moral teaching from the 1960s to date has been ambiguous, unclear and subject to easy manipulation by the prevailing culture. This is in front of the clear, unambiguous teaching of Humane Vitae (1968). Further, one may conclude that the secular culture is so convincing to the individual and the couple with its message of self-fulfillment, of the need for each person to make their own decisions independent of external moral mandates that a reference to Church teaching has little relevance.

Alice von Hildebrand, the wife of Dietrich von Hildebrand, the noted Catholic philosopher and teacher told a most interesting story about her husband at a Conference in 2010 (“The Christian Personalism of Dietrich von Hildebrand: Exploring his Philosophy of Love” Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, Rome, Italy.) She told how Dietrich, who was not a Catholic was enlightened to “the” truth of the Catholic church and began to take instruction on entering the Church. When told of the unambiguous teaching of the Church regarding artificial birth control, Dietrich remarked how he thought that birth control had much to recommend it. he was then told very simply “If you do not believe in what the Church teaches regarding artificial birth control, you cannot enter.” No rationalisms, no apologies, no intellectual explanations. Hildebrand accepted it, entirely in the spirit of Augustine and Anselm ” Believe first and then you will understand.”

Let me offer a further personal digression. I can testify personally to this history with my wife Joan and I having lived as a young couple in the 1960’s. After the birth of our seventh child, I had a vasectomy. Since Joan had had eight pregnancies and seven births in our first 13 years of marriage, I was fully convinced of the uprightness of the decision. My sense of prideful nobility was even further increased by my taking on the manly deed for myself as husband to take the important step of sterilization rather than leaving that step to my wife.  Of course, all of this was but a cover for my underlying desire to lead a convenient and comfortable sex life subject to my desires and urgencies rather than attached to a fertility calendar. Yet the grace of God intervened into this hard heart. More than 20 years later, we decided to reverse the surgery and be once more open to life. A most strange, irrational decision this was since we were both well past child conceiving years. Yet it was a decision which returned us to a joyful bond with the Lord and now with Abraham and Sarah as our latter-day hero and heroine. 

To return to our reflection, we can affirm that the Church in the United States is in the midst of a major moral catastrophe that is so little spoken about or even recognized. This crisis  has had and will continue to have the most devastating consequences for the Church.  Also, in the recent Catholic media, a somewhat fierce frustration and impatience is expressed over the apparent decline in emphasis on moral dogma and teaching in Church institutional and academic circles. An example is the introduction of the new statutes for the John Paul II Institute on Marriage and Family which has produced an outcry of opposition centered on the apparent loss of moral focus. Here is where the veil of non-recognition is particularly dense and, in a way, quite strange, given the qualifications of those expressing their anger and irritation. The implication of this anger seems to be that all has been going so well in the Church and now, with these current changes in Vatican appointments and other redirections of Church effort, all will be lost.  This is not the place to comment on the validity of these theological and organizational objections. But the record of the battle with ABC over more than 50 years is abundantly clear and can no longer be hidden. Only a major recognition and announcement of where we are as a people of professed Christian faith will begin to provide a way for a movement towards a reestablishment of moral reality.  

The Great Reward of This Experience

Finally, one can ask what can be done to address this continuing trend towards rejection of an openness to life and infant Baptism? Where is the great reward from this history? Clearly, the moral teaching has been equivocal, the sinful mortal consequences of artificial birth control in individual decision making has not been sufficiently announced and here moral theologians bear a heavy burden. Strong Vatican and episcopal support is needed for those ecclesial realities that have been raised up by the Spirit concurrent with the decline in infant Baptism rates. Realities such as the Neocatechumenal Way which in 2018 celebrated 50 years of evangelization announces Church teaching clearly, without compromise and cultural nuances. Clear teaching is essential even with possible rejection. But clear Church teaching is first an announcement of the love of God; a love that embraces couples at every moment with joy at receiving an announcement to be open to life and then, with the clear grace of God, acting on that announcement with confidence in the truth of the teaching. This is the reality of our personal experience as recounted earlier. Here is the reward to be received from this historical tragedy of rejection. God continues to love and to see that experientially is a gift of truly transcendental origin. 

 The net result of all this will be a much smaller remnant Church but a more stable Church comprised of a faithful people who live with this rewarding experiential sense of being loved with a deep Christian calling and mission. In fact, clear unequivocal teaching has the effect of attraction more often than rejection. Loss of a battle does not mean loss of the war. The good news is that our Church will emerge from this battle stronger and much more conscious of the dimensions of the many battles in which we are engaged.  In any event, all of this is preceded by the need to recognize our past history as the people of God in the Church, our present situation and our hope for the future. Tragedies, both personal and ecclesial are meant to be first identified and not covered over and then faced with the courage that can only come from a most sincere clinging to the love of God. We have suffered great losses in this battle with ABC but have received even greater rewards through the love of God for His Church.