Go forth and multiply

 Go forth and multiply The Bible has several exhortations to increase humans and to subdue the earth and everything in it.

Genesis 1:28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it; rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and every creature that crawls upon the earth.”

Genesis 9:1 And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

Genesis 35:11 And God told him, "I am God Almighty. Be fruitful and multiply.

In the past, when disease took such a toll of infants the death rate balanced the birth rate. Consider the case of Edward 1, King of England, whose children would be considered to have the best chance of surviving; out of his 19 total children 8 lived to grow up. However, only two lived what we would consider longish lives.

Today the infant mortality rate has decreased dramatically. Globally, the infant mortality rate has decreased from an estimated rate of 65 deaths per 1000 live births in 1990 to 29 deaths per 1000 live births in 2017. WHO. 

Lowering infant mortality is a big positive but it brings with it a negative; the world’s population is growing and destroying the environment on which it depends. The present population of 7.7 billion [2022 - 7,953,952,577] is forecast to grow to 9.77 billion by 2050. Already we are looking at deforestation, climate change, species extinction, the ravaging of our oceans and much more. Can this planet sustain all these people?

It must stop but there is a religiously inspired barrier against the use of contraception and abortion. The USA will not fund any institution which even mentions abortion. The Roman Catholic church and some other denominations are fundamentally opposed to contraception, even where this has been shown to lower the spread of STDs and the abortion rate. Go figure, one thing that reduces unwanted pregnancies is forbidden.

So, we come back to those verses quoted above and the deleterious effect that they have had on our planet.

How can we stop or slow the growth of the world population?

How can the RCC and other religious sects be persuaded to drop their ban on artificial contraception?

Should women be forced to give birth to an unwanted child?

[I posted this on another forum three years ago, but it becomes more relevant as the years roll on, and we continue to over populate our only home. This style 10/6]












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