Happy Mother's Day!

My old Beggarsall blogging buddy "Tim" sent me this article this morning: The Decline of Motherhood.

The author begins rightly decrying the pitiful rates of motherhood in the western world and the societal effects it is causing, but in answering her own question "How did it come to this?" she begins by emphasizing the least blameworthy factors: "In Canada, one answer is infertility. ...the two biggest factors are delayed childbearing and sexually transmitted diseases(STDs). ...Industrialized food production and environmental degradation are taking their tolls. ...hormone-treated beef. ...obesity and ovulatory cysts."

The author doesn't seem to want to identify contraception as the number-one cause of our pitiful fertility rates. However, she finally gets around to mentioning Mark Steyn's take on the problem, "...abortion, gay marriage, endlessly deferred adulthood," and then sums up:

So we pump our young with pills, wrap them in condoms and, coming soon, jab them with vaccines hoping to prevent unwanted pregnancies, STDs and, now, cervical cancer. This in the name of denying their capacity for personal responsibility by advocates who wouldn't shake hands with each other if they had a cold.

...Oh, and have an especially happy Mother's Day. Soon, there may be few mothers left to celebrate.

Motherhood is a blessed estate that blesses the world. Here is a final quote from Martin Luther commenting on 1 Timothy 2:15:

15. 'SHE WILL BE SAVED.' That subjection of women and domination of men have not been taken away, have they? No. The penalty remains. The blame passed over. The pain and tribulation of childbearing continue. Those penalties will continue until judgment. So also the dominion of men and the subjection of women continue. You must endure them. You will also be saved if you have also subjected yourselves and bear your children with pain. 'THROUGH BEARING CHILDREN.' It is a very great comfort that a woman can be saved by bearing children, etc. That is, she has an honorable and salutary status in life if she keeps busy having children. We ought to recommend this passage to them, etc. She is described as 'saved' not for freedom, for license, but for bearing and rearing children. Is she not saved by faith? He goes on and explains himself: bearing children is a wholesome responsibility, but for believers. To bear children is acceptable to God. He does not merely say that bearing children saves: he adds: if the bearing takes place in faith and love, it is a Christian work, for to the pure all things are pure (Titus 1 :15).' Also: 'All things work together,' Rom. 8:28. This is the comfort for married people in trouble: hardship and all things are salutory, for through them they are moved forward toward salvation and against adultery.... 'IN FAITH.' Paul had to add this, lest women think that they are good in the fact that they bear children. Simple childbearing does nothing, since the heathen also do this. But for Christian women their whole responsibility is salutary. So much the more salutary, then is bearing children. I add this, therefore, that they may not feel secure when they have no faith." [Luther's Works, Vol. 28, p. 279]

So, to all you Christian mothers who are submitting yourselves to God's command to be fruitful and multiply, Happy Mother's Day! May God bless you richly as he continues to bless us and the world through you!