Children Matter

As the numbers of people living on the earth rise, resources will fall, and life as we know it will cease.  

At least, that’s what we’ve been told to believe, but is that actually true? No (https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GZmVLpfunzE). In fact, right now the opposite is true. Globally, population has been decreasing, causing a rise in school closures, a lack of hands for the workforce, an increase in the older generation to younger generation ratio, and many other things that are having an effect on economies and populations all over the world. 

 

Something that is said often by members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is that the Adversary (a very real being who is doing everything he can to oppose God and godly things to bring people down to the level of misery he is experiencing) is making a concentrated effort on opposing the family. The family is one of the most important things of this life. I wouldn’t be here without my mom and dad, and none of you would be here without your mother and father either. Family is important to our Heavenly Father. Dieter F. Uchtdorf, a living apostle of Jesus Christ, recently said “there’s something… sacred—something irreplaceable—about a parent nurturing a child. It reflects the pattern of heaven. Our Father in Heaven, our Divine Parent, surely rejoices when His children are taught and nurtured by their parents on earth.” Unfortunately, it’s not that parents aren’t nurturing their children so much as it is that children are not really being born. 

 

That’s not to say that there are no children born, but that is to say that in 1960, the fertility rate worldwide was about 4.7 children born per woman, but in 2020 that rate was down to 2.3 children born per woman. That means that in the span of 80 years we have cut the amount of children we are having in half. Each country varies in the specifics of this information, but a similar trend is being seen everywhere. Apparently Thanos didn’t even need to snap his fingers for his goal to be achieved. 

 

Personally, my thoughts for why this trend is being seen is because we are so caught up in ourselves. Some might tell themselves they’re just trying to get through school before they get married so they can bring more to the relationship, or even just because they want to expand they’re knowledge and be more personally responsible. But no one wants to be lonely, so people can move in with each other to solve that. Typically, people want a more stable home to bring children to, so pregnancy is to be avoided until they move forward with the ceremony of matrimony. Then they need time to be married, of course, so they can get used to each other and find a more stable spot before children are introduced to the picture. But wait! There’s also traveling, and bringing children along on those trips is quite the hassle, so they gotta get some sightseeing in first. Do you see where I’m going with this? The longer we try to make life “stable” the more you should invest in horses instead of children to fill that “stable home” with because the older a woman gets, the less likely it is she will be able to have children. I believe in miracles, and have witnessed some in my own family as far as childbirth goes, but they’re considered miracles for a reason. This whole scenario started with good intentions, but you know what they say about those (if you don’t, they say “the road to hell is paved with good intentions”). 

 

I don’t think you’ll go to hell for gaining an education or traveling or not having children, but I do think the longer one puts off having children, the less fulfilled they will feel. It is in our divine nature as spirit children of a Heavenly Father to rear children. I went to a seminar with the artist Jason Lanegan this week, and he talked about how it didn’t make sense for things to work out with his family, but it did. He and his wife were both in school, but they never had to hire a nanny to stay with their children. They had a home. They were able to pay for everything they needed to. He says the only way that happened though is because they put family first and everything else found a way to “work itself” out. They worked hard, and they made it possible. 

 

I tend to be a master procrastinator, but usually that is because I don’t see the worth of doing the task I am avoiding. There are other things I would much rather be doing. Spending time with family is not one of the things to procrastinate or put aside entirely. Having a family of your own is the most important thing you can do, especially as you strive to raise them well. Don’t put it off for things that really won’t make much of a difference in the grand scheme of things.  

Works Cited:

Averett, Sarah. “BYU Marriage Statistics Reflect US Trends, Attitudes.” The Daily Universe, 29 Aug. 2016, https://universe.byu.edu/2016/09/01/byu-marriage-statistics-reflect-us-trends-attitudes/. 

“The Baby Boom (Article).” Khan Academy, Khan Academy, https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-history/postwarera/postwar-era/a/the-baby-boom.

“Fertility Rate, Total (Births per Woman).” World Bank Open Data, https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SP.DYN.TFRT.IN?end=2020&start=1960&view=chart. 

Lauer, Robert, and Jeanette Lauer . Marriage and Family the Quest for Intimacy. 8th ed., McGraw-Hill , 2011.

Uchtdorf, Dieter F. “Jesus Christ Is the Strength of Parents.” The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, 1 Apr. 2023, https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/general-conference/2023/04/29uchtdorf?lang=eng.