What the Church says about the demographic question is found above all in her social doctrine, which is particularly illuminated on this point by conjugal morality.¹ For the rest, this conjugal morality is oriented toward responsible parenthood.

Nevertheless, many do not realize that Christian social morality is as demanding as the conjugal morality of the Church.² Now, what the Church says in her social doctrine, first of all, is that it is not man who is made for the market, but that the market is made for man. Man's life cannot be organized principally or even exclusively in view of the demands of the market as it is understood in liberal ideology.

The Church adds that the problems of development and population result from the general egoism of those who refuse to put their life-style on trial, refuse to convert, and thence are led to call into question the right of the most destitute to live.

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¹ John Paul II's teaching on life given during the first ten years of his pontificate is the object of a collection of over 800 pages! See Giovanni Paolo II, Dieci anni per la vita, Giovanni Caprile ed. (Rome: Centro Documentazione e Solidarietà, 1988). See also Le droit à la vie (Solesmes 1981) and in the collection "Ce que dit le pape" in Editions du Sarment-Fayard: De la sexualité à l'amour (n. 15); Se préparer au mariage (n. 7), L'euthanasie (n. 11).

² This is what John Paul II emphasizes in his encyclical Veritatis Splendor 95-101.

  BACK TO "THE CHURCH & DEMOGRAPHY"   |   TABLE OF CONTENTS   |   NEXT QUESTION  
PERSISTENT MALTHUSIAN PARADIGM: http://www.brown.edu/Courses/Bio_Community_Health168C/malthus.htm
COUNCIL FOR SECULAR HUMANISM: http://www.freespeech.org/freethought/declaration.htm
SOCIAL DARWINISM AND ELITISM: http://tqd.advanced.org/3376/Genktk7.htm
THEORIES OF POPULATION: http://www.knight.org/advent/cathen/12276a.htm
THE OVERPOPULATION MYTH: http://www.ohiolife.org/overpop/overpop.htm
WESTERN CIVILIZATION IS DYING: http://www.ohiolife.org/qa/qa20.htm
IMPOSED MORALITY?: http://www.ohiolife.org/qa/qa22.htm
POPULATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE: http://www.pop.org

POPULORUM PROGRESSIO (ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF PEOPLES)
http://www.sni.net/advent/docs/pa06pp.htm
SOLLICITUDO REI SOCIALIS (ON SOCIAL CONCERNS)
http://listserv.american.edu/catholic/church/papal/jp.ii/jp2solli.txt
CENTESIMUS ANNUS (CENTENARY OF RERUM NOVARUM)
http://www.sni.net/advent/docs/jp02ca.htm
ETHICAL & PASTORAL DIMENSIONS OF POPULATION TRENDS
http://www.hli.org/issues/population/church/pop1.html
COMBATTING ABORTION & EUTHANASIA
http://www.sni.net/advent/docs/jp02ab.htm

CBCP GUIDELINES ON PHILIPPINE POPULATION CONTROL
http://www.cbcp.net/documents/population_90.html
THE TAIPEI DECLARATION OF 1996
http://www.simbahayan.org/taipeideclaration.html