Technocratic pro-natalists often desire to create a certain kind of a child: a healthy child, a smart child, or a “wanted” child. Indeed, with the expansion of embryonic genetic selection technology and the potential of artificial wombs or in vitro gametogenesis—an experimental procedure that genetically modifies anyone’s DNA into viable gametes—parents may use technology to customize their future children. This “Silicon Valley” style of pro-natalism exploits a parent’s desire to raise healthy and happy children by offering them a false promise of control.

My husband and I have one little girl and we are expecting our second child at the end of this year, six weeks before our third wedding anniversary. We represent a growing minority among Generation Z. In 1965, five in six adults between the ages of eighteen and thirty-four were, or had been, married. Since 1970, however, the marriage rate has fallen by sixty percent. Today, approximately one-third of Gen Z is on track never to marry, with many preferring to remain in unstable cohabitating arrangements. 
What began as a marriage recession has turned into a full-blown birth dearth. In 2023, the birthrate fell to its lowest point of 1.62 births per woman, well below the replacement rate of 2.1. The future of the United States, along with that of every developed nation except Israel, is threatened by demographic decline. Our economy, Social Security, military readiness, eldercare, education, and more depend on new generations of children. On an individual level, this decline reflects a much darker reality. Happy, hopeful people have babies. If we are not having babies, what does that say about the health of our nation? 
The causes of this birth dearth are varied: rising infertility among men and women, the atomizing force of technology, the high cost of living and raising children, and the decline in marriage and church attendance. Abortions have increased since the Dobbs ruling—perhaps due to the increased availability of medical abortion—as have intentional sterilizations, especially among younger men and women. Each of these factors, individually and in concert, has resulted in what Tim Carney calls a “family unfriendly” culture where children are seen as impositions or, at best, luxury goods. 
Pro-natalism, a movement against the decline in births, is making headlines as it draws prominent champions like Elon Musk. While we should be pleased by this development, we should distinguish between “mere pro-natalists,” who simply want to see more babies born, and those who prioritize family formation as the basis for increasing birth rates. Mere pro-natalists can serve as excellent allies against our anti-child culture, but the lack of concern for family formation risks perpetuating the very social pathologies that gave rise to the birth dearth in the first place. 
By overlooking the prior decline in mother-father marriage rates, the fertility crisis is reduced to a national collective action problem for someone else to solve. Mere pro-natalism also tends to view children, and their mothers, as means to a greater end: saving the world, the nation, the economy, or finding meaning in one’s life. As the failure of China’s efforts to increase births shows, instrumentalizing motherhood in this way can actually discourage women from childbearing.
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In days to come, Southern Baptists will have a decision to make. Will Scripture be sufficient to determine how Christ’s church should function, or will feminists win the pulpit and destroy what’s left of their churches?

As culture wages war against God’s design of a man and woman (males and females), the casualties from this battle are piling up. Any observation of the latest headlines exposes the damage this confusion brings. New storylines appear every day, from transwomen (biological men) destroying women’s sports to a confirmed Supreme Court Justice pretending she could not define her gender, which was why she was nominated for the position.
Once again, with a brand new week, we witnessed the successful impact of feminism on full display in two of the most unlikely places. While both sources were seemingly unpredictable and unrelated, a closer look revealed the opposite was true.
What Is a Woman?
Recently, audiences experienced the DailyWire movie, “What is a Woman?” While critics ignored the film, it received high praise from the massive audience who watched the documentary. If you haven’t watched the movie, you should. The movie provides a unique glimpse into the world of gender theorists, transgender surgeons, and gender identity experts, as Matt Walsh (the documentary’s focus) asks the question, “What is a woman?”
With this one simple question, viewers witness the verbal gymnastics, obfuscations, and outright cosmic interruptions in the vortex of reality, which initially serves as the movie’s charm. However, the seriousness of this dangerous ideology is on display toward the movie’s end as viewers learn about the long-term impact of puberty blockers and double mastectomies on girls as young as 15.
For the feminist proponents of transgender identities, the tactics required to hold such views are simple:

First, they ignore the meaning of words. In this instance, this is accomplished by decoupling the word gender from sex. I will address this in greater length in an upcoming blog article.
Next, they redefine the meaning of the word(s) they ignored. For example, feminists will redefine gender as a social construct so that they can abandon all of the traditional feminine roles attached.
Then, they declare autonomy, apart from the God who created them. The declaration of autonomy allows them to determine what they will be.
Finally, they require the world to accept their position as truth. Any opposition to their view will be shamed through name-calling (bigot, sexist, transphobe) or legal action.

What Is a Pastor?
In the next unlikely place, the Southern Baptist Convention demonstrated feminism’s slow creep through the church doors and into the pulpits of the largest evangelical convention in the world.
In May 2021, after ordaining three women as pastors, Rick Warren of Saddleback Church in Lake Forest, California, came under fire as images from the ordination service appeared on social media. By June 2021, during the annual Southern Baptist Convention, calls to disfellowship Saddleback Church had reached the convention floor. The Credentials Committee, which reviews such requests, was set to respond during the 2022 convention in June.
In addition to three women pastors, Rick Warren has selected a husband and wife pastoral team as his successor at Saddleback Church. The growing concern is that Saddleback is not the only Southern Baptist Church engaged in this practice. Internal reports suggest that a number of churches have women with the title of pastor or co-pastor alongside their husbands in leadership. Furthermore, studies suggest that many Southern Baptists would welcome a woman pastor.
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Schaeffer says our love must be observable, something others can see. Observable love often requires saying sorry and asking for forgiveness—with a spouse, a friend, a child, a parent, or another person or group we’ve wronged. This is simple, but it won’t be easy. In my experience, it takes great strength of character to say, “I’m sorry. I was wrong. Will you forgive me?”

Editors’ note: Taking the advice of C. S. Lewis, we want to help our readers “keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds,” which, as he argued, “can be done only by reading old books.” To that end, our Rediscovering Forgotten Classics series surveys some forgotten Christian classics that remain relevant and serve the church today.
I tend to tune out social media controversies and negative online comments. It’s generally a good course of action given the storms of shock and outrage about nearly everything on any given day. Even attempts at good-faith responses sometimes fan the flames.
Avoiding such storms works well because of the distance the internet provides. But when Henry, a real-life friend of mine, objected on social media to something I was personally involved with, it raised a different set of questions. Since the critique was on social media, should I respond there? Should I give a long, nuanced reply, sure to be read by few? Should I say something punchy, sure to get everyone’s attention? Should I ignore it? As Christians, how can we learn to disagree well, especially with other Christians?
In 1970, Francis Schaeffer, one of the most astute apologists of the 20th century, published The Mark of the Christian. I first read the book about 50 years ago, and it continues to shape how I think about encounters like the one with my friend. It’s a brief book; you can read it in about an hour. Yet it may carry more weight today than at any time in the last half-century because it reminds us of the importance of loving our neighbor and being able to disagree well—vital skills in an increasingly polarized age.
Two Passages in John
The Mark of the Christian is Schaeffer’s meditation on two passages in John’s Gospel. He begins with John 13:34–35: “A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Schaeffer marvels at Jesus’s words:
In the midst of the world, in the midst of our present dying culture, Jesus is giving a right to the world. Upon his authority he gives the world the right to judge whether you and I are born-again Christians on the basis of our observable love toward all Christians. . . .
In other words, if people come up to us and cast in our teeth the judgment that we are not Christians because we have not shown love toward other Christians, we must understand that they are only exercising a prerogative which Jesus gave them. And we must not get angry. . . . We must go home, get on our knees and ask God whether or not they are right. (22–23)
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