How Many Children Should Mormons Have?
by Jan
February 16, 2011
Q. Do Mormons believe in the use of birth control or only mass producing children?
A. Only mass producing children. That’s why so many Mormons are going into engineering. . . there has got to be a more efficient way.
Ha. There are a LOT of shades of grey between those two options. This post by Megan addresses some of those issues. For the record though, there are Mormons with no children and Mormons with 15+ children. For everyone, it is a personal decision between the husband, wife and the Lord; not a mandate from the Church.
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The church teaches that happiness can be found in families so Mormons are counceled to not inhibit having kids for selfish reasons. There are however many reasons to curtail having children and the church is not against birth control. All things must be done in wisdom and order.
Having said that, I am one with a large Mormon family of 11 children. This is very unusual, even in the church. I still have 4 children living at home and life has become very robust for me and my family. People are coming and going all the time and they love to be with each other. We have our own community. So far I only have 7 grandchildren and one on the way but I expect that I will probably have around 40 in the end. The older I get, the more I appreciate it.
Isn’t THAT the truth! But I wouldn’t trade them for the world! (literally!) I have 9 children ranging from 3-18. 7 girls and 2 boys. People think we are a little nuts in this day and age but as long as we are able to support our family (and we do, though it is tough at times financially!) when your destination is the Celestial Kingdom you want your family with you as we know we will in the LDS Church. People are amazing to me though with the comments they say like “Are all these children yours?” (no, we just bring strange children with us whereever we go?) or “Don’t you people know about birth control?” (no, this is the 21st century and we have never heard about it! Can you enlighten us?) Or, “don’t you know you are contributing to over population?” (last I saw there is still plenty of land in Montana!). It never ceases to amaze me that people are so “comfortable” asking such rude questions! I would NEVER say to someone “why don’t you have any children? Don’t you know about infertility clinics?” or “You need to have more children–3 just isn’t enough!” But for some reason people take it upon themselves to try to “educate” us on a regular basis!
I understand the blessings of having children & that many mormons are “encouraged” to have as many children as they can handle to give bodies to spirits needing bodies. But what about the fact that the world is or will shortly face a over population problem that not only limits resources, but has a negative impact on the environment to such a extend that having a lot of children these days also cause an enevitable increase in unnatural death rates? Does the church leaders have a view on or at least teach of the consequences of over population?
See video 1-8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY
I have been off the board for a long time and have been catching up the last few weeks on some posts I missed. It has been a real blessing to me! Thank you for this board! I was never told when I was married 22 years ago in the temple that I should have as many children as possible in order to give more spirits bodies on earth. I have heard many non Mormons say this and I am wondering if there is anything in the scriptures that points to this? As those of you on the board may remember I have 9 children. My oldest son is 19 and just left on his mission to Argentina. My youngest daughter is 5 and starting kindergarten next week! A large family has been a great blessing to us. Our children make up our eternal family and the fact that we know we will be together forever in eternity keeps us in a frame of mind to work out as many problems on earth that we face! And we face many as we all know! We had a large family because we wanted one. We wanted to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ with the world not just as a married couple but by bringing up children in the love of the Lord and each and everyone is a blessing. We lost one child who would have been 12 now when he was only 2 from a bizarre viral infection. It has grieved us all of our life and we miss him terribly. But knowing we are a ‘forever family” and that we will see Matthew again in heaven cushioned the blow then and continues to cushion it every day when we pray for him. I know Matthew is doing great things for his Heavenly Father right now! Thanks for listening! Kassie