The 1,471 Children of Area Seventies Considered Collectively and Not Individually

Considered individually, special going-against-the-grain mention of Kyung Yeol Park, his wife Myeongsuk, and their seven children. Elder Park was 48 when called to the 4th Quorum in April. At that time he was a counselor in the presidency of the Seoul Korea South Stake.

The title of your post has a Dr Seuss feel to it

Contrary to stereotype its the North American authorities who have the most children on average

Birthrate numbers for the church come from a body that is the composite of many diverse members. Americans, Mexicans, Polynesians, Filipinos, and more nationalities. Large, functional families and lone, struggling people are both found in the net that gathers all kinds. When I noticed the data on all the area seventies’ fertility, it seemed like a large enough sample to get a useful view of the more capable and actively religious segment of the latter-day saints.

Only one area seventy was no children. I was surprised by this since infertility is more common than 1 in 360. The resolution of that may be that some adopted children when infertility interfered with natural increase.

Infertility is more than a yes/no matter. Many couples were able to have one or three, followed by miscarriages. Some women are blessed with healthy childbearing into their 40s, but not all. Elder Holland has remarked on his and his wife’s experience with that. In the March 1987 Ensign, Flora Amussen Benson (wife of Ezra) was quoted, “I wanted twelve children, but had to settle for a choice half dozen. If we just would have had twins every time, we would have made it.”

In that light, it is remarkable that so few North American area seventies have only three children or two, 12 and 4 out of 122. Those who emphasis biology over all will go on and on about every form of attractiveness being a signal of reproductive fitness. Nice hair shows good nutrition which helps fertility. A good job allows a man to support a large family. The area seventies are capable men, and apparently part of that is they were capable of attracting an attractive wife and rearing four, five, or more children. And as disciples who received good teaching, those couples went ahead and did what they were capable of.

As a little more on my last comment, half of the current Quorum of the Twelve are fathers of three or fewer children. (Holland, Bednar, Cook, and Soares have three; Uchtdorf have two; Renlund has one.) Three previous presidents of the church had three children (Monson, Hunter, and George Albert Smith), and Harold B. Lee had two. The relative absence of small families among North America’s area seventies is unusual.

Also of note is that no area seventies have more than nine children. My mother was one of her parents’ fourteen children, the fifth of ten sisters. I formed from that an exaggerated sense that any couple that was willing could have a dozen children, but it is not really so. To be physically capable of that, even if willing, is very exceptional. For example, of apostles ordained in the 20th Century, Packer and Nelson each had ten children, and to find another with at least that many we have to reach back to Joseph Fielding Smith, who had two children with his first wife and nine with the second following the death of the first. Numerous 20th Century apostles had seven or eight children, though.

I know personally several current and recently released Area 70s near me. With lots of kids and in some cases grandchildren they are very acquainted with many of the young church members. These guys are in contact with the GAs and probably the first ones contacted about regional or local issues in the church and general society.

It’s true that somehow we have perpetuated the idea (at least this was my feeling when I was younger) that if you just “let the children come” you will be overwhelmed with a ridiculously big family. In reality, many women find themselves with the opposite problem, and wish they could have more, not fewer. Postponing childbearing (even by a couple years while you finish school, “get more settled” etc), exacerbates this problem. I have told my children this, but how can you control what messages they absorb without knowing it from the world? And what their spouses will choose?

My husband and I were far more worried about “too many children” early on than we became later. Now he says, as I do, “if only we could have ten more.” Knowing what we know now, we would gladly take that many again. Children are everything—the definition of a fulness. Sorrow and the best kind of joy. Our last three have been taken home before we got to meet them. How I long for the day when I will at last hold them in my arms.