Beginning "Death of the West"
I am currently reading Pat Buchanan’s The Death of the West, a Christmas gift from my wife. I have always enjoyed Pat’s written work, and in 1996, I supported him for the Presidency. I would have done so again in 2000 were it not for the fact that Pat decided to bolt the GOP and run as the Reform Party nominee. I believed then, as I do now, that we can’t win the culture war by being divided, and conservatives can’t afford to split their votes, that sort of behavior leads to people like Bill Clinton or Al Gore being elected. Buchanan understood this after the fact, I believe.In Death of the West, Pat Buchanan deals with the present reality facing the Western world. The book is not, as Buchanan puts it, a prediction of the future, but is rather a statement of fact about what is happening to Western civilization as we live in the present. Its projections seem to be based on what will happen to the West if the present trends continue.
The most alarming reality dealt with in this book is the fact that none of the Western nations are reproducing themselves. By 2100, Germany, France, Italy, and Britain will be a third of their regular population. In the U.S., European peoples will no longer be in the majority. The European race is dying, largely because it is failing to reproduce itself. Women in these countries are aborting their children, it is true. Beyond that, however, many are contracepting in the name of “family planning.” Others are not having children because they would sooner obtain success in a career or have greater material wealth than have many children. Many put off marriage until they are too old to have many children. Many others co-habitate (in a state of sin) and contracept so that they have no children. Somehow, we have managed to get away from the notion that having children and raising a family (thereby propagating the human race) is the highest glory of womanhood.
Catholics have been laughed at and sneered at because our Church teaches that contraception is a grave sin. Most of our Protestant counterparts now tolerate artificial contraception. I have even heard of cases where pastors have encouraged men to get vasectomies and women to take the pill. Shame!
The problem lies in the fact that in practicing a contraceptive lifestyle, we as a society get within our minds a contraceptive mentality. This mentality is hedonistic and says “my personal betterment or financial health is more important than raising a family.” It is a selfish, crude, and sad way to think and to live. This mentality is finally coming home to roost, as our Western Christian nations are not reproducing enough to sustain themselves.
And we have the audacity to complain about Third World immigrants who come to this country and produce as many children as they do…Perhaps the problem lies as much (or more) in the fact that we are not having enough children of our own.
posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 3:56 PM
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