I got a beautiful e-mail from Erin who very eloquently put into words what it means to live a Catholic lifestyle of being open to new life. With her permission I would like to share it here:
I was out for a walk the other day with my two younger children in the jogging stroller, and I was meditating on my children, and how many I “wanted,” or if we should start using some kind of birth control, when out of no where I thought to myself, “I want ALL of my children!” how obvious that should have been. I want all of my children, those that are here, and those that might not yet be with me.
When I hear someone say, “I don’t want any more children,” I can’t help but feel a little sad for them. How can you not want your children?
I can’t find an ob/gyn who doesn’t want to force birth control on me and I never bothered to go back for my six week follow-up.
Everywhere I go people want to know if I’m done having children, my own family wants to put us on birth control.
What does this say about how we think about our children? Nothing is left as sacred, everything is whittled down to a choice. We must be making all of our choices! There must always be a choice!
Did you ever see the movie, Polish Wedding? There is a scene where the mother says, “Why would you have only two children? That’s like baking only two cookies.”
I understand her frustration with pressure from the secular culture and even in our Catholic culture to “choose” and to be “responsible” when it comes to having more children. There is a loss of the sacred and it all seems to all be so clinical now, even inadvertantly at times with natural family planning.
I once heard a priest say that the best approach is to simply enjoy your marriage and any fruits that came from that enjoyment. In otherwords, to choose not to choose but to just take life as it comes.
This weekend I got to enjoy the different flavors of my own half-dozen “cookies!” My two older children were at the Youth Conference at Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio. Mr. Pete went with them. He told me that the first night there, after mass and adoration, Calvin felt moved to go to confession. Sam went the second night. Pete said that he just sat in wonder and awe as he watched our strapping teenage sons participate fully in the mass and in adoration, with song, and even dancing during the Praise concert afterwards. There was reverence and there were tears. They were moved. This is certainly what I hoped for them, that they would experience the richness of their faith under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Today they are still walking around in a different state. It’s hard to explain how profound the experience was for them. The experience has deeply affected them.
While on the home front I held tender baby Rosie until she slept one night. I also chased her down the street to get her clothes on, wrestled with her at mass to sit still, and kept her from pulling over a display at the grocery store. In between I went yard saling with my daughter (boy is she getting good at bargain hunting!) explained a few of the facts of life to Noah, and comforted Gabe who feels that he is friendless in the neighborhood. It was the full ride up and down and I feel so privileged to be able to experience it all.
Before I had children I was so afraid of them and how it would change my life and my body. Now I am so grateful for each one of them. If I had stopped with my two sons, I would be missing out on all of the toddler and elementary school things I am seeing right now. If I had stopped after the boys, I never would have had my lovely daughters. My only regret is that I didn’t understand how fulfilling the vocation of motherhood is earlier in my life, because I was too afraid to choose it.
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