Michael Voris: How much damage do you think the acceptance of contraception inside the Church by many Catholics has caused to the faith?
Bishop Schneider: We can now see the effects in many areas of Church life, especially among lay people. In the Western world, the results are visible. Many Catholics have no children or very few. The great part of so-called practicing Catholics have small families, while those who do not practice contraception usually have large families. Thanks be to God, we still see such families in the United States, in France, and in other countries. This is a good sign, but I think they are not the majority.
We know the effects. The Catholic population is decreasing, and Catholics who practice contraception have given a bad example to non-Christians and to non-practicing Christians, who have adopted this lifestyle. They share part of the responsibility for the spread of the contraception culture and for the decline of the population in their countries.
A part of the responsibility also lies with the clergy, who did not teach clearly about the immorality of contraception. Thanks be to God, there were and still are good bishops, and Saint John Paul II was very clear in his teaching on this topic. However, I think his teaching was not sufficiently supported by the majority of the clergy.