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The church's provident living website providentliving.org states the following: "There are those married couples that are faced with the challenge of not being able bear their own children. This results in great disappointment, frustration, anger, guilt, and loss. Infertility can be the result of many different situations. Infertility may result from a health condition of both or either spouse. Regardless of the situation, all deserve understanding, compassion, and support. Judging childless couples unfairly can result in stereotypes, isolation, and greater feelings of guilt." Pages 262-263 of the institute of religion's eternal marriage manual it says that "Singleness, childlessness, death, and divorce frustrate ideals and postpone the fulfillment of promised blessings.... But these frustrations are only temporary. The Lord has promised that in the eternities no blessing will be denied his sons and daughters who keep the commandments, are true to their covenants, and desire what is right." This, along with the reading of several articles found at the same site, suggests to me that infertility has nothing to do with worthiness, and everything to do with accepting the will of the Lord in all things. Many members without children have been called to important positions within the church, and if infertility was a sign of unworthiness, then they would not have been called to those positions.

Christ was asked a similar question in the New Testament. Some of his disciples pointed out a blind man and asked the Savior who had sinned, this man or his parents that he should be born blind? The Savior said that neither had sinned but that he was born blind that the works of God might be shown, he then healed the man. (John 9: 1-7)

We don't always understand God's purposes for why certain people are given certain trials or sicknesses in this life, but we know that it is part of God's plan for us to pass through some trials of mortality here on earth. It is true that families are central to God's plan for us, but it also true that not all are given the opportunity to marry or to bear children in mortality. This should never be seen as a reflection on one's personal worthiness or standing before God, however. Even faithful Abraham's wife Sarah was unable to bear children for a long time, which was a test for their faith, not a punishment for sin.

Some members of the church may misunderstand and wrongfully judge others just as in any religion, but it should never be believed that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints teaches or supports such doctrine that infertility is a sign of unworthiness.

Hope that helps, and hope you feel comfortable asking any further questions about the church.

God knows us all better then we know ourselves as we have been with Him for a lot longer then we have been in mortality. When you have kids, or even nieces and nephews, you get to know who they are and how they will react to certian situations. Why wouldn't God, in his supreme knowledge of his children, know what they can handle for their own learning and benifit, toward their eternal progress?

When we reach a point in this life where it gets "hard" we don't need to start complaining and questioning "why me?" We should look at it in terms of, ok this is a new test for me, how am I going to handle this one? (FYI- the correct answer is always with help from Christ (see Ether 12:27))

If you are the one dealing with the infertility I would suggest watching an LDS video on infertility:



Webmaster: Great video, Richard!

Excellent answer, Pamela. Infertility is a biological problem, not a moral problem. It is entirely unrelated to worthiness.