Europe is infected with a strange lack of desire for the future. Children, our future, are perceived as a threat to the present, as if they were taking something away from our lives. Children are seen as a liability rather than a source of hope. There is a clear comparison between today’s situation and the decline of the Roman Empire. In its final days, Rome still functioned as a great historical framework, but in practice it was already subsisting on models that were destined to fail. Its vital energy had been depleted.
--Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, (Pope Benedict XVI),
Without Roots: The West, Relativism, Chistianity, Islam, 2004
