One very common problem noticed among the ministers and christian workers is treatable inability to bear kids. Studies have shown that 10 to 20 in 100 of ministers and christian workers suffer infertility.  Medically, infertility means not being able to achieve pregnancy after one year of trying (or six months if a woman is 35 or older). Women who can get pregnant but are unable to sustain their pregnancy to delivery may also be considered infertile.

Reports have shown that about 50 per cent of persons who seek medical intervention for infertility problem usually achieve conception and delivery. Fifty percent of infertile couples conceive within two years of starting treatment. Of couples that seek medical treatment for infertility, studies show that 20 percent conceive before the treatment actually begins. One reason may be that anxiety about infertility may have contributed to the fertility problem, and just contacting a doctor provided the needed emotional relief.

However, most ministers and their followers usually consider infertility to be spiritual attack and rarely seek medical attention. Rather, they often embark on fruitless deliverance processes, binding and casting out demons that may be non-existent!

 CAUSES OF INFERTTILITY AMONG RELIGIOUS PEOPLE

1. Antisocial lifestyle and lack of regular intercourse:

Infertility can be caused by poor sexual or lifestyle habits that are easily remedied. Some religious settings train their followers to regard and treat sexual activities among couples as sensual and carnal acts that should be highly curtailed by christian couples. Many christian couples are preparing for heaven, hence, they dare not “waste” their precious moments making love with their partners, since it will make them derive unnecessary pleasure. This definitely sounds spiritual, yet it is the reason why the couple cannot achieve child bearing! A newly married christian couple who do not give attention to love making will hardly achieve conception, especially those who were faithful to God and never indulged in premarital sexual activities. This is partly due to the fact that the reproductive process, which is hormonally controlled, was dormant and needs effective activation. This properly conditions the reproductive systems for reproduction

2. Physical and Emotional Stress

Physical and emotional stress suppress libido (desire for sex). Stress may cause women’s menstrual periods to be irregular, and may reduce sperm count in a man. Many ministers and christian workers observe routines that predispose them to physical and emotional stress. Protracted fasting and counseling sessions keeps the minister away from his wife and the process of conception. The pastor is always praying, weeping and bearing the burdens of the sick, widows, fatherless and unsaved. He is so unsatisfied with the situation of his assembly that desire to touch his wife is almost non-existent. This can precipitate a cascade of events that lead to childlessness

3. Spiritual Problem Syndrome

This refers to the situation where anatomical disorder such as tubal blockade and retroverted uterus (the womb shifts from its usual positioning), or biochemical disorder such as hormonal imbalances, are adjudged “spiritual problems” that require no medical intervention. To many ministers, nothing can just naturally happen, except caused by demon spirits and evil men. Hence, they would not bother seeking any medical intervention, even for conditions such as urinary tract infection, pelvic infection and discharge, sexually transmitted diseases, because to them they are spiritual problems.  In fact, their worry is that the only doctor they know is an unbeliever and lacks spiritual insight!

While there are no disputations that there exist cases of infertility due to attacks by demons and demonic agents, many cases of childlessness are due to ‘”body problems” that are medically addressable.  Most infertility results from physical problems in a man or woman's reproductive system.

4. Personal Problem and “Private Part” Syndrome

There is nothing truer than the adage that a problem shared is half-solved. Many christian workers consider consulting a doctor on their inability to achieve pregnancy as a mark of faithlessness and making their personal problem a public one. Many ministers do not share their life challenges with anybody because they are their personal problems. Yet, one dirty linen that anybody should not bother that it is washed in the public is childlessness. In fact, the public has already seen that the man of God has not nursed any kid since he got married to his wife. Hence, one important place that the minister and christian worker should take the challenge of childlessness for thorough discussion and assessment is the hospital.

Some ministers and christian workers hold the view that exposing their “private parts” for doctors and laboratory workers to see is being casual, carnal and an unrighteous act. Worse still, if the doctor is of the opposite sex! In an attempt to preserve the sanctity of their “private parts”, they avoid seeing a doctor on any issue that will involve getting them physically exposed.   Because their private parts must neither be seen nor touched by doctors, they conceal their fertility problems to themselves, while waiting for spiritual intervention.

5. Ignorance of the Menstrual Cycle

For everything there is time and a season for everything, including child bearing. The female reproductive life is divided into seasons and times, medically referred to as the menstrual cycle. Many christians do not know that their wives can only get pregnant within a particular two to four days in the whole month, and that they will be childless except they have meaningful sexual intercourse on the particular days. All sexual activity carried out outside these particular two to four days of the month are merely for pleasure!  

Interestingly, many ministers who complain of inability to achieve pregnancy have never had sex during their wives’ fertile period. It is either they do not have the urge during the particular days in every month, or they are deeply engaged in their routine church programmes and activities such as fasting and prayers, crusades, conferences and journeys. Some even schedule their monthly dry fasting period to coincide with their wives’ fertility period.

The woman’s fertile period called ovulation period occur once a month and last for only two to four days. During this period, the woman produces an egg (ovum) into her tube ready to be fertilized by the man’s egg (sperm) for a child to be formed. If the period is missed, the next chance is in a month time. Many have consecutively missed their fertility period for more than a year!

Some Important Facts about Infertility

• Infertility is not just the woman’s problem as widely believed
• About 35 percent of all cases of infertility are due to abnormalities in the male's system.
• About 35 percent of all cases are due to abnormalities in the female's system.
• In about 20 percent of the cases, the man and woman both have fertility problems.
• In 10 percent of cases, no cause can be found.
• Age often increases the risk of infertility.
• The female’s fertility ceases between the age of 45 and 50 years

MALE FERTILITY

Male infertility constitute 35 - 40 percent of all cases of infertility. The commonest cause of infertility in male is a problem associated with the sperm, which may be inadequate quantity, poor quality, or abnormally shaped sperms. Although only a single sperm is needed to fertilize the female egg for a child to form, not less than 20 million viable sperms must be present for the entire process to take place. The role of other millions of sperms in getting a single sperm to fertilize the ovum is still being investigated. Viable sperm count below this number is very unlikely to achieve fertilization.

Multiple, and sometimes inexplicable factors can cause low sperm count. There are generally no predictable symptoms or signs of low sperm count other than inability to get a female pregnant. Some causes of low sperm count include the following:

• Overheating of the testiclesusing excessive heat generating pants. Although wearing tight pants or briefs is no longer considered a viable cause of low sperm count, restrictive, tight clothing is not advisable for a man who is trying to achieve conception with his partner. Tight underwear or pants in the man raise the scrotal temperature, and has the potential to reduce sperm count.
• Emotional, psychological, and physical stress from any source
• The effects of certain drugs
• Smoking
• Nutritional deficiencies and abnormal  weight gain (obesity)
• Environmental poisons

Poor quality or unhealthy sperms cannot move rapidly enough, and cannot move in the right direction.

Note that most of the problems listed above are not spiritual and are resolvable with proper intervention, namely:

• Medical treatment
• Lifestyle modifications, such as wearing boxer shorts,
• Proper nutrition
• Stress reduction through physical exercise orgood relaxation techniques

Some other conditions that may contribute to sperm problems include:

• Under-developed testes: Thisusually results from infection like mump orchitis,   surgery for hernia, an injury during birth or birth defect.
• Swollen veins in the scrotumcalled varicocele, which is a condition whereby the veins of the spermatic cord are tortuous, enlarged and improperly dilated. Varicocele has been known to cause fertility problems such as a low sperm count, reduced sperm motility, and abnormally shaped sperm
• Undescended testes: A situation in which the testes remain in the body cavity. Normally they descend into the scrotum before birth. This problem usually presents at birth.
• Infections, such as gonorrhea, syphilis or tuberculosis, that block the ducts through which the sperm travel.
• Exposure to metalssuch as leads, or chemicals such as pesticides.
• Certain drugs, such as cimetidine, phenytoin, methotrexate, Axulfidine, corticosteroids and cyclophosphamide.
• Injury to the testicles
• Chronic infections of the prostate gland

FEMALE FERTILITY

For a woman to conceive a baby, intercourse must take place at the appropriate time; around the time when an egg is released from the egg sack called ovary. The system that produces and releases eggs has to be working optimally. The channel through which the eggs travel (fallopian tubes) must be clear and certain chemicals in her body called hormones must be balanced. Any distortion in any of these processes and mechanisms will result in infertility.

Cause of Infertility in females may be classified into

• Tubal
• Ovarian
• Uterine
• Hormonal

Tubal causes include blockage of the Fallopian tube due to

• Malformations during intrauterine development. Abnormal tubes that do not allow normal movement of the eggs and sperms.
• Infections such as chlamydia, an ascending pus forming infection from the uterus
• Scar tissue within the lumen of the tube

Ovarian causes may be malformation of the eggs, partially developed eggs within the ovary (polycystic ovary).  Some women are infertile because their ovaries do not mature and release eggs to be fertilized.

Uterine causes of infertility include closure of the uterine cavity, formation of adhesions and septum within the cavity, uterine tumours and pelvic infections. The fertilized egg has to travel back to the cavity of the uterus, get implanted and grow to full baby. Any disorder disturbing this process in the uterus results in miscarriages.

Hormonal

One very common cause of female infertility is imbalances in the female reproductive hormones. Hormones are chemical messengers that carry information, signaling the body on the need to perform a particular or cascade of activities.  The levels of these chemical messengers in the blood are highly regulated within limits for optimum function of the body processes. The maturation and release of the female eggs, the process of fertilization and implantation of the newly form child in the womb, the growth and development of the newly formed child in the womb, the sustenance of the entire process of pregnancy and delivery, are all hormonally controlled.  Any abnormality in the balances of the female reproductive hormones spells danger to the process of conception and childbearing.  

Hormonal imbalance is not a spiritual but physical cause of infertility. It can be medically corrected through proper assessment and replacement. Body solution should be given to body problem. This is why the ministers having the problem of childbearing should subject themselves for proper medical assessment, rather that embarking on protracted fruitless religious exercise and rituals.

Other factors that can affect a woman's ability to conceiving include being overweight or underweight. Moreover, studies show that female fertility declines after the age of 30 years.  Some young ministers overlook this age factor and get married to a sister quite advance in age. Sometimes the newly married sister is very close to the female’s menopause. As childlessness ensues, demons and evil spirits are seen as the cause.  

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