Child-free by choice misses the mark

A particular online subculture of “child-free by choice” women and DINKS (double-income, no-children) couples enjoys boasting about their seemingly carefree, kid-free lives of luxury. They spend hours in bed on Saturdays, grab interruption-free cappuccinos with friends whenever they want, and spend disposable income on rare artwork, tropical vacations, and designer clothing. 

Their steady stream of content invites spicy feedback, and they appear to delight in needling the internet with their controversial lifestyle, baiting strangers into tirades about how misguided they are about the realities of parenthood. Yes, parents can be defensive, but it’s not because our particular kids are so great, or that parenting is without trials. 

We’re defensive because we’ve experienced the abundant purpose that comes with raising children—one of God’s primary callings for most people. It’s a vocation woven into the fabric of creation, tied to the mandate to “be fruitful and multiply,” and grounded in God’s own identity as Father. This doesn’t diminish the beauty of vocational singleness or the grief of infertility, but it does acknowledge that for the majority, parenthood is a central path to meaning.

Parenthood unveils a life dimension unreachable by other means—where your own pursuits yield to the sacred task of making a child feel safe, loved, and secure. Children undo us in the best ways—a shout of “Daddy!” at the door, or the weight of them asleep on your chest, a cheek warm and red, pinning you to the couch as if the world can wait. The child-free-by-choice crowd may cringe at these scenes, but many of today’s parents once did too. We really don’t want anyone to miss this. 

We’re defensive because we know what it’s like to rearrange our lives for someone else and find that the sacrifice is worth it. That small, daily reorienting—making breakfast, calming fears, bandaging boo-boos—elevates a God-given purpose that’s unknowable in advance. 

Like those who once feared they couldn’t love a second child as much as their first, the purposefully childless often miss that human experience isn’t finite. Parenthood doesn’t diminish who we are; it enlarges our capacity for love, purpose, possibility, and adventure.

We also bristle because many child-free influencers speak with confidence about an experience they’ve never had. The vast majority fixate on the exhausting years of early childhood, assuming a perpetual state of toddlerhood. Yes, littles are hard—but the clichés culture repeats (“babies never sleep,” “two-year-olds are terrible”) flatten an entire human lifespan into a handful of difficult stages. The modern child-free movement misunderstands what parenthood is, but the Christian understanding has something better to offer.

Most comments on these videos say they’d rather invest time and energy in themselves than raise children. It reflects a cultural drift stemming from the sexual revolution and continuing on today. Childlessness among women 25–29 has risen from 50 percent to 63 percent in recent years, and from 29 percent to 40 percent among women 30–34. 

As marriage and parenting are delayed, people become accustomed to child-free adulthood; it becomes difficult to imagine life any other way. The God-given energy meant to be poured into generational life often redirects toward smaller pursuits, like career advancement, political causes, or online crusades that feel meaningful only for a moment. 

Most of the “child-free by choice” influencer videos are Gen Z and Millennial women. It’s like a warped form of feminism, shaped by a “my body, my choice” mentality still trapped in second-wave feminism’s attempt to push back on a system that left women optionless. But it’s 2025. Most of these influencers enjoy more freedom, education, and opportunity than any generation of women before them.

Most child-free by choice advocates are also religiously unaffiliated, carving an even more profound longing for purpose into their psyche. The meaning of life, for most people, comes first from religious devotion and secondly from depth, commitment, and connection with other people—most profoundly through the formation of the next generation. 

When young women intentionally reject this God-given design—and lack a larger spiritual anchor—they often turn toward pursuits that cannot satisfy the hunger for purpose. The Christian vision offers something far richer: a calling that begins with God, overflows into sacrificial love, and gives us a share in shaping the next generation. 

Parenthood is not the only path to meaning, but for most, it remains one of God’s most profound gifts, one that draws us into a purpose we could never create on our own.