Contraception is clearly a pernicious evil as has been made clear on this blog during July. The 42nd anniversary of Pope Paul VI’s encyclical: Humanae Vitae is on Sunday July 25th. Looking out at your congregation on that Sunday can leave a priest with no doubt as to what his sermon needs to be about.
Yes fertility rates have dropped.
Yes on average couple marry later in life and thus there will be less children in the congregation than there would have been say 50 years ago.
But the fundamental reason for the shift in the number of children in front of you is contraception, contraception and contraception.
Preaching on contraception is probably not one of the easier subjects but is one of the more important, Dr Janet Smith’s talk: ‘Contraception, Why Not’ is full of useful information and is available from http://www.omsoul.com/ .
She gives a short and humourous example of a priests annual anti-contraception homily. “If you don’t want to go to Cincinnati what are doing on the train”.
Stuart McCullough
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