California is currently in the process of passing a bill that redefines what it means to be fertile.

SB 729, approved by the California Senate late last month and now on its way to the Assembly, expands insurance coverage for in vitro fertilization to cover those who fall under their new definition of infertility.

And who, you might ask, falls under this definition? Literally everyone.

“For purposes of this section, ‘infertility’ means a disease, condition, or status characterized by any of the following: . . . A person’s inability to reproduce either as an individual or with their partner without medical intervention.” [Sec. 2(b) & Sec. 2(b)(2) of the bill, italics added]

To be fair, the traditional definition of fertility (“The failure to establish a pregnancy or to carry a pregnancy to live birth after regular, unprotected sexual intercourse”) is technically still in the bill, in the subsection following. But to be blunt, it doesn’t matter anymore; this new definition encompasses both the “old” understanding—a man and a woman who are trying to have a baby but can’t—and a myriad of new “understandings.”

In doing so, it renders the word “infertility” meaningless.

The correct use of the word “infertile” itself implies a defect corrupting a system that normally should produce a given outcome for us. Watered and seeded land should normally produce crops, but if it’s infertile, there is some kind of defect preventing it from producing them.

On the other hand, we wouldn’t say that a highway is “infertile” (even after we’ve sprinkled it with water and dumped seeds onto it and nothing seems to be happening); it simply isn’t the kind of system that produces what we want. We’d be better off moving our seeds to the field across the way.

So here’s the problem. California is taking a word that refers to a defect corrupting a system that should normally work properly and applying it to a context where “functioning properly” was never even possible!

The bill basically asks grown adults to scratch their heads and wonder why two individuals ignoring the definitional principles of sexual reproduction—“the production of new organisms by the combination of genetic information of two individuals of different sexes” (Brittanica)—somehow just can’t manage to achieve the results of sexual reproduction!

Excuse my sarcasm for a second, but this is basically what we are asked to ponder:

“A man and a man trying to have a baby together, but can’t? That’s odd… Everyone knows they should normally be able to, but for some reason it isn’t working… Well, we’ll call them ‘infertile!’”

“A woman and a woman trying to have a baby together, but can’t? That’s strange. They really ought to be able to; something must have gone wrong… Call them ‘infertile’ as well!”

“A man trying to have a baby by himself? Well now, that’s really weird it’s not working out for him—usually it should! He’s ‘infertile’ as well.”

Does that last one seem a little over the top? Check out the organization Men Having Babies. I’m not kidding.

The fact that only a heterosexual couple can conceive is one of the most powerful biological indicators that the family ought to be structured that way. Adults who want to be parents can best pursue that goal by marrying someone of the opposite sex, and adults who refuse to submit to God’s created order in this regard simply have to accept that they won’t be able to have children in the natural way.

Their ‘infertility’—to use California’s words—is, in a sense, a natural curse on their decision to pervert the natural order.

But the re-inventors of the family are trying to work around this natural curse. They are now co-opting the sympathy prompted by the concept of infertility (entirely appropriate when a heterosexual couple cannot conceive) and subtly applying that sympathy to artificial perversions of God’s created order. And they are conjuring up a ridiculously unscientific—yet sparklingly politically correct—term to describe the condition: “fertility inequality.”

And, because even science must now bow at the throne of equality, they are providing insurance benefits to ensure that these artificial couples can work around the natural order and artificially obtain children. We might as well criticize I-90 for its “fertility inequality” because it doesn’t grow crops as well as a plowed field.

The problem isn’t God’s world, it’s our refusal to acknowledge God’s order for the world and humbly live within it.

California is destroying the idea of fertility by applying a term that refers to an abnormality and now applying it to literally everyone! Thus, infertility becomes void of its real meaning.

Saying something is true doesn’t make it so, though. Truth comes from God, as does the natural world order. Ever since the Garden of Eden and the Fall, Satan keeps tempting human beings to “be like God” and make up their own rules.

That’s never worked out well for us.