Intentionally having a child at a young age is sort of a cultural no-no. Kids of young parents are, quite often, seen more as mistakes than lovingly accepted gifts from God.
So when my wife, Kathleen, and I decided to try and conceive after only a few months of marriage, we weren’t surprised by the reactions.
“I’m very happy for you,” a Catholic coworker told me when she heard about the pregnancy. “God provides – even if sometimes we’re a bit surprised!”
It’s pretty safe to say that – even for Catholics – the default response to a young couple’s fertility is a sense of shock. “God provides, even if we’re surprised” is a nice way of saying, “Wow, certainly you didn’t mean to conceive a baby so soon, did you?”
For young parents trying to feel out God’s will, the culture doesn’t do much to make authentic discernment any easier.
Read more here: http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/column.php?n=1486
