Sister Julie’s question this week is:
Should people heed the call of the Catholic Church to not use artificial means of contraception/reproductive health products and services OR should they go ahead, talk to their doctors and plan for how they want to practice family planning?
My Answer:
Since the most populated religion in this country is Roman Catholic, i think think that is one of the reasons why the population booms because they were so true in heeding the counsel of the church on not to use any artificial birth control. But at least, if aritificial is not encouraged, the church should have have encouraged the natural family birth control.
Actually, even if birth controls abound or even given for free – i just feel that many of these people who gave birth to uncontrolled number are not disciplined. With due respect to the Catholic church, i think that population control is government sanctioned not by the church. How i wish that the church and the state are two separate entities on this matter. The government should work hard heaven and earth to be real serious on stopping the population boom.
Being in china for 3 years – a country where for more than 2 decades the “one child policy” has been strictly implemented in urban areas— i had been wishing deep in me that somehow the Philippine government could have done the same. I knew long time ago chinese people may have felt that they were too oppressed because of the rule, but years later, when they saw the good result of having only one child — good work, own home, comfortable life, good education for the kid —with all the goodlife, they now worshipped the wiseness of Mao Tse Dong. Some even felt that having a child at an early age is a hindrance to real success in life materially and financially. So most men and women marry at almost 30 but gave birth later beyond 30 or almost 40 years old – a time when the couple feel that they can now responsibly raise a child.
I know too there is a bad side on the one-child policy but i just knew that it did work well in China. Just try to imagine if the one-child policy has not been implemented? Do you think that China would be at its best as now?
Hi Arlene, thanks for taking time to answer this question.
Discipline, this is what really seemed lacking to a lot of Filipinos. I have read somewhere about the two-child policy to be implemented here but I just can’t find the link anymore. But I doubt if that will work. There are so many families out there trying out for a boy or a girl until they have had so many children already. But the thing is, having children is not just about being able to feed them and give them what they need, having children means being able to mold them as responsible citizens, which is hard.
The one-child policy in China, according to what I have read made naman the only child “spoiled” because they were treated like kings and queens in their household. Yes, they are successful right now but there are so many changes there that sort of “erased” their wonderful history, just to be able to build gigantic structures.
Hay,so many options but still it is up to the parents to decide but yet, a lot are still ignorant of the results of this population explosion.
Thanks, Arlene, and have a great week
hmm the one child policy is one way to curb the population explosion but it does have negative effects but we will not go into that as of the moment…
The bottom line is that Filipinos are not educated when it comes to birth control, either artificial or natural. It is sad, unfortunately, that those belonging to the lower income bracket are those who are mass producing kids and those who can afford to have more kids are the ones who are diligent users of contraceptive methods.
The Church’s problem is that they keep on objecting to the artificial form of family planning BUT they do not do anything to actively promote the natural method of family planning.
Read my entry here