CNN recently reported that like several other countries, the US fertility rate is below the level needed to replace its population. If this trend continues, the population of the US will decrease. China faces an “unstoppable” population decline and Japan is close behind.
What are the theological implication of these trends? Does LDS theology require a belief that there is a fixed number of spirits children created by God and his wife (wives), and the end of the world will not come until all have been given a chance to be born? If so, does the slowing of the birth rate prolong the life of the earth, or did an all knowing God foresee this trend, and the end of the earth is exactly when it is suppose to be per God’s plan?
For those as old as dirt (like me), you’ll remember the Saturdays Warrior play that made the rounds of Mormondom in the mid 1970’s. The 70’s was the height of the “population control” movement, perpetuated in no small part by a book called the The Population Bomb. Saturday’s Warrior showed people waiting in the pre-earth life (1) to be born into a specific family, and the family that these kids were assigned to on earth debating if they should have more kids. The implication was that these kids needed to be born into a given family, that they were together before this life, and that promises where made to be together on earth. The church has repudiated most of the “Saturday’s Warrior Theology” in the years since, but did not answer the underlying theme of pre-earth bodies waiting for an earthly body, and we on earth should not interfere with this plan.
What are your thoughts? Is there any way our theology can support an idea that does not include a fixed number of spirits waiting for bodies? Did God foresee the current fertility decline, and has already factored that into his timeline?
(1) I don’t use the word “pre-existence” as something cannot exist before it exists.
Wheat & Tares 
Is the population in decline only in the US and China? Is it not still booming in India and in Muslim countries? Is the not still booming everywhere that the patriarchy manages to suppress women’s education? I don’t know. I assumed it was. If so, isn’t the Mormon theology of lots of spirits needing bodies still intact? But, I suppose if they’re not born here, we need to somehow do better about getting the gospel message to them.
Actually a number of Muslim countries are below replacement.
In the 70s the infant mortality issue started to be fixed resulting in the Arab Spring. But fertility has been dropping and adjusting since.
Iran is now at 1.7. Turkey is at 2. Those are below replacement.
https://www.google.com/search?q=birth+rate+in+iran&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari
Russia
1.75 births per woman (2016)
Turkey
2.05 births per woman (2016)
Mexico is 2.1 (a huge drop from ten years ago).
https://www.downtoearth.org.in/news/health/fertility-in-india-is-declining-rapidly-says-national-health-profile-2018-60921
Ok. How did my name get changed?
Ehlich has been proven as a fraud.
He literally used half a mathematical model, that of a sigmoid curve, and cut the s off and left the exponential arm.
Anyone who mentions him without mention of his sincere lying is complicit.
Kjugccc, I said Ehlich’s book was part of the reason for the population discussion . It does not matter for this conversation if the book was factual or not (it was NOT), only that it was that book that drove the culture that produced Saturday’s Warrior.
Bill, I know my parents take the limited spirits model as gospel truth. I recall as a teenager mentioning that when I grow up I didn’t expect to have more than a couple kids. My mom kindly but emphatically tried to call me to repentance with a lecture about all the spirits who needed bodies and should have the blessing of being born in an LDS family.
I don’t have strong feelings about this issue but I recognize that if you don’t have a limited spirits model the concept of premortal spirits as currently taught by the Church would need significant revision.
I’m not aware of any official repudiation of the Saturday’s Warrior model/doctrine, although I have heard individuals argue against it. The only thing I can remember leaders disputing (half heartedly, I would say) is the idea that there is one ideal partner/spouse for a person. That was replaced with an even worse idea that any Christlike man and woman should be compatible. I guess leaders have loosened up on the idea of birth control and encouraging large families, but I wouldn’t call it a repudiation.
IF this was about fewer spirit children waiting to be born wouldn’t the birth rate of Mormons decrease while birth rates among non-Mormons remain constant? Why would spirit children be waiting to be born into Gentile families and countries?
Never mind. I didn’t think the through very well
But that does bring up the question why Heavenly Parents would be giving birth to so very many unworthy spirit children…
Our theology definitely includes a millennial era of peace and prosperity where Christ will reign on earth as he does in heaven. If there is a fixed number of spirit children of Heavenly Father, then any adjustments could be made by lengthening/shortening the millennial era or increasing/decreasing the family size (intentionally) during that time.
The main message of Saturday’s Warrior seemed to be aimed at the reduction in numbers of children for parental convenience & extravagance, and the combating of newly legalized abortion. The creators of the play attached themselves to the most starkly contrasting theology available. Some of the interpolations on that theology (one ideal spouse, one destined family for a spirit) seem just as funny as the missionary’s comedy routines.
On a related note: I have seen an increase in warrior doctrine being preached. The message is clearly set for the youth that it is spiritual warfare against the devil and his minions, but this message is definitely settling in among many saints. The gospel warrior theme does resonate with many people and certainly has done good when interpreted correctly. Paul uses the outfitting of an idol worshiping Roman soldier as a metaphor, so using a Christian US soldier as a model is no problem at all.
I’ve said before that it makes no sense to me that just because there may be so many waiting it should follow that they need to get here as fast as possible. What’s the hurry? Thinking about sustainability both for the family as well as the earths resources, wouldn’t it make more sense to have just as many children as you are able to manage physically, both from a health perspective and family resource perspective, to give them the best start possible, in terms of education and opportunity. Children are not fodder, and I don’t understand the view that more must be better regardless of circumstance. Having fewer children might mean it takes longer, but would stress the environment less, would seem to me to point to better stewardship of resources. Why the hurry?
Ugh, Saturday’s Warrior, I can’t believe Mormon culture used to be that way.
If you fear overpopulation, you are right. If you fear a declining population, you are right as well. Egypt, Niger, and Yemen are severely overpopulated and while growth is slowing they simply cannot keep up in terms of reeources. People in Yemen are already facing sever water shortages.
Aging populations from not enough children per female are a problem too. Japan and Korea will face severe productivity shortages and people will either have to work longer or just die younger I guess. The US is OK because we attract and accept lots and lots if outside migrants. Immigration will compensate for our lack of reproduction.
I am pessimistic about the future of the world. I foresee massive environmental crises and resource shortages. Ideally we could relocate people from where they are repopulating the most, such as Nigeria, to places where population growth is needed such as Russia, but cultural differences, xenophobia, and nationalistic pride get in the way. And that is what I fear most about humanity.
(John W drops the mic.)
The Saturday’s Warrior theology ran rampant among me and my peers at that time. Many people applied Moroni’s promise to mate selection and experienced revelations as certain as any testimony of Joseph Smith or the Book of Mormon, early in the dating process. My cousin went on a date with this dude who told her he had prayed fervently and received a revelation that they had promised each other in the pre-existence to get married. She famously told him if she had been that stupid in the pre-existence, she was sure as hell not going to make the same mistake again in this life.
I thought I was above this nonsense. One Friday night while in college I went to the mountains to pray about finding a wife- after discovering my most recent crush was using cocaine and doing “housework” for wealthy foreign students (in their bedrooms). After several hours I felt a warm powerful glow that the Lord loves me and I would meet my future wife very soon. The next day at a church activity I got into a friend’s car and sat by a girl I had never met because she had graduated from high school that week. I asked her name and upon hearing her say it, I instantly felt the return of the Spirit and knew she was the one promised me.
She also felt strongly attracted to me and we couldn’t pull ourselves away from each other for about 36 hours. This required some elaborate sneakiness since she still lived with her parents and had a curfew. We saw each other every day after that and 6 days later I asked her to marry me. She said yes. We experienced together probably the strongest spiritual experiences of my life. We tasted the glories of the celestial kingdom and the next 80 years of our life seemed like a small thing in comparison.
The trouble was she was not ready for marriage yet so we dated for over a year . Eventually she decided to break up with me. She found another guy and married him 3 months later in the temple, presumably after another revelation. They made a honeymoon baby. About 5 months after the wedding she called me on the phone and asked me if I would take her back. Her husband was drinking beer and looking at nasty magazines and being rude to her parents and not going to church. I declined and told her to figure out how to make her marriage work for the sake of her unborn child.(Yeh, any two decent Mormons of opposite gender could make a marriage work). I found out they divorced several years later.
That was a major faith crisis. I could see and hear and touch her every day and yet my revelation about her was totally wrong. If I could be fooled by something as tangible and important as marriage to her, then I could be wrong about anything; Joseph Smith, the Book of Mormon and the church. I could not distinguish young love from the Spirit. I came to see the relationship as one ginned up by the other.
I got off lucky- with little lasting damage and a lesson learned. But this false doctrine made the next several years of that ex-girlfriend’s life miserable. She was not alone. This short-cut sappy approach to the difficult decision of selecting a marriage partner wrecked havoc in the lives of so many people. Further damage in a parallel way was done by bringing children into the world before the parents were prepared to raise them and by having too many children to properly raise.
Saturday’s Warrior theology was hatched in hell and gave the devil much cause to laugh.
PS. I agree with Bishop Bill’s logical meaninglessness of the word pre-existence. But the word is so engraved into my lexicon that I can’t think of a better and concise one.
Attitudes about population and fertility in the Church have definitely shifted over the years, though quietly. Speculative folk doctrine about finite spirits and family size have largely fallen by the wayside. But some people haven’t really gotten the memo yet. I’ve lived in about 5 different wards in the last decade, and each ward seems to have at least one unusually large family, wherein the couple has far more kids than they have reasonable means (financial, physical, emotional) to take care of. Their kids are out of control and account for a majority of the behavior problems. They are a burden on the ward, and in some cases, the state. Usually, the mother doesn’t work outside the home, and takes every opportunity to trumpet the superiority of stay-at-home motherhood. My current ward has two such families, and we consistently pay out way more in fast offering funds than we take in.
This is not a sustainable way to live. There is nothing virtuous about reproducing one’s self into poverty, or raising children in a life of benevolent neglect. Sometimes I wish Church welfare assistance would come with contraceptives.