New England states have among the lowest
Dead End of Secularism
by Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse
Secularism was to be the wave of the future.
Leading secular theorists such as Peter
Berger taught that secularism would be the
inevitable result of the inexorable march of
progress and that its many advantages would
simply drive out religion in all of its forms.
No serious discussion was possible or
necessary. Religion would be deposited
unceremoniously on the dustbin of history.
But a funny thing happened on the way to
the dustbin: secularism has not only failed to
triumph over religion, it can’t even
reproduce itself. In spite of enormous
institutional advantages conferred on it by
the state, the media and academia,
secularism has created a society that cannot
achieve replacement fertility. The most
secular places tend to have the lowest
fertility rates, and within countries, the most
modern parts of modern societies tend to
have the lowest fertility rates.
This is highlighted in the soon to be released
second part of Demographic Winter, an
independent film project which features
interviews with me, among other experts.
For instance, the US is alone among the
modern western democracies in having
fertility rates at or above replacement, and
the US is widely regarded as the last
remaining religious country in the
industrialized world. Within the US, the
Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse • 663 S. Rancho Santa Fe Road Suite 222 San Marcos CA 92078
www.jennifer-roback-morse.com • email: drj@jennifer-roback-morse.com • 760/295-9278
©2007 No part of this document may be reproduced or disseminated in any way without the expressed written consent of the
Ruth Institute.
fertility rates in the US. Vermont has the
lowest total fertility rate of any state in the
union: 1.66 babies per woman. (Note: you
have to click on the link for the excel file to
see the birth rates.) While you’re looking at
the table, please notice that the six New
England states, Vermont, New Hampshire,
Maine, Connecticut, Massachusetts and
Rhode Island, are in the “top ten” of the
lowest total fertility rate states in the
country. Not surprisingly, Vermont has a
low population growth rate compared with
the rest of the country: Vermont’s
population grew 2 per cent between 2000
and 2007, while the entire country grew by
7.2 per cent over the same period.
Citizens of Vermont also have the lowest
rates of regular religious practice. In
Vermont, for instance, 26% of the
population considers themselves
“unaffiliated” with any religious tradition,
compared with 16 per cent of the US
population. Even in Massachusetts, with a
large percentage of nominal Catholics, a full
third of the population never attends church
services, while nationwide only about a
quarter of the population nationwide never
attends church. Only 30% of Massachusetts
residents attends church services at least
once a week, compared with 39 per cent of
the general US population. The other New
England states have even lower rates of
church attendance.
Secularism contains many disincentives for
child-rearing. The most obvious is that
secularism considers sex a recreational
activity, with no social or moral
significance, and with no necessary
connection with child-rearing. People,
including school children, are encouraged to
act as if they have perfectly functioning
contraception, with abortion available any
time during pregnancy. Of course, no
contraception functions perfectly. So women
get themselves involved in relationships and
situations that cannot possibly support a
pregnancy. They naturally view these
pregnancies as “unintended” and believe
abortion is the only “choice.” Under that
world view, having children becomes an
inconvenient “choice.”
Operating within their world view,
secularists have created a society in which
sex is sterile for most people, for most of
their lives, with children thrown in as an
afterthought for those peculiar souls who
happen to like that sort of thing. Marriage is
organized around the desires of adults, not
around the needs of children. The state does
not recognize that children have an interest
in the stability of their parents’ union.
Mothers can count on the government for a
minimal level of support, but they cannot
count on substantial material or emotional
support from their child’s father. Poor
people can obtain low quality housing
subsidized by the state. But nice homes in
good neighborhoods, with good schools,
require two incomes. Women with high
aspirations for their children do want to raise is deeply religious people.”
their children within a stable marriage. But
the government undermines their efforts to
do so, by permitting divorce for any reason
Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse • 663 S. Rancho Santa Fe Road Suite 222 San Marcos CA 92078
www.jennifer-roback-morse.com • email: drj@jennifer-roback-morse.com • 760/295-9278
©2007 No part of this document may be reproduced or disseminated in any way without the expressed written consent of the
Ruth Institute.
or no reason. Women are expected to work
throughout their lives.
By contrast, most religious traditions
consider sex sacred and children a blessing.
Christianity, for instance, holds that God
created marriage in the Garden of Eden.
Man and woman are meant for love, for
union and communion with one another.
According to the Catechism of the Catholic
Church (2360), “Sexuality is ordered to the
conjugal love of man and woman. In
marriage, the physical intimacy of the
spouses becomes a sign and a pledge of
spiritual communion.” Marriage is the
lifelong union of one man and one woman
of exclusive fidelity for the purpose of
procreation and education of offspring and
the mutual good of the spouses. People who
participate in the Christian tradition believe
that the connection between sex, marriage
and children is ordained by God, for their
good, and for the common good of society.
This gives people a motivation to bear with
the inconveniences associated with child-
rearing.
Demographer Phillip Longman, author of
The Empty Cradle, puts it well: “who are
the people who are still having large
families today? The stereotypical answer is
poor people, or dumb people, or members of
minority groups. But birth rates among
American racial and ethnic minority groups
are plummeting. The more accurate answer
The claim that secularism would inevitably
drive out religion always had an element of
wishful thinking to it. The lofty semi-
science of the “inexorable laws of history,”
hid the fact that specific people embraced
secularism and enacted specific policies to
implement it. There was never anything
particularly inevitable about it. But now it is
clear that in the absence of massive
institutional support of the state, secularism
does not stand a chance of competing
against religion in a fair demographic fight
of having and raising the next generation.
Jennifer Roback Morse, Ph.D. is an
economist and the Founder and President of
the Ruth Institute, a nonprofit educational
organization devoted to bringing hope and
encouragement for lifelong married love.
She is also the author of Love and
Economics: It Takes a Family to Raise a
Village and Smart Sex: Finding Life-Long
Love in a Hook-Up World.

Dr. Jennifer Roback Morse • 663 S. Rancho Santa Fe Road Suite 222 San Marcos CA 92078
www.jennifer-roback-morse.com • email: drj@jennifer-roback-morse.com • 760/295-9278
©2007 No part of this document may be reproduced or disseminated in any way without the expressed written consent of the
Ruth Institute.