Hot on the heels of that news item about the Muslim man aspiring to father 100 children is this story in Salon about the Quiverfull movement: "All God's Children," by Kathryn Joyce. This is a fundamentalist Christian movement that encourages women to have as many children as they can, with little regard to the effects such prolific child-bearing might have on the women. Joyce also refers to a leader of the Southern Baptist Convention who claims that married couples who choose not to have children are going against God's will:
the Rev. Albert Mohler, Theological Seminary president of the 16-million-member Southern Baptist Convention, argued, for example, that deliberate childlessness was "moral rebellion" against God.
Rev. Mohler has two children, so I guess he doesn't think doing God's will means having a quiverfull of kids; perhaps just one kid meets the reverend's religious standards for married life.
I continue to encounter reminders that support the reasons I left the Southern Baptist church, the Christian denomination in which I was reared. And examples of how wacky religion can be.
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