VATICAN CITY (RNS) Less than a month after saying Catholics don’t have to multiply “like rabbits,” Pope Francis on Wednesday (Feb. 11) once again praised big families, telling a gathering in St. Peter’s Square that having more children is not “an irresponsible choice.”
He also said that opting not to have children at all is “a selfish choice.”
A society that “views children above all as a worry, a burden, a risk, is a depressed society,” Francis said.
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The pope’s comments on childbearing and selfishness might spark some commentary, but they are not likely to produce as many headlines as his improvised comments the previous week when he seemed to signal that it was OK for parents to spank their children.
“One time, I heard a father say, ‘At times I have to hit my children a bit, but never in the face so as not to humiliate them,’” the pope said. “That’s great,” Francis continued. “He had a sense of dignity. He should punish, do the right thing, and then move on.”
