Egypt Pursues Family Planning Attitudes within Roman Catholicism and Islam Play a Significant Role When Nations Try to Lower Birthrates

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MUHAMMAD SAYEED TANTAWI'S office overlooks one of the infamous landmarks of this overcrowded city: a cemetery, the "city of the dead," home to hundreds of thousands of living people who have no other home. A mufti, or religious scholar, he speaks with authority as an interpreter of doctrine for most of the world's 1 billion Muslims.

"Islam provides no opposition to controlling birth. There is no Koranic verse which forbids family planning," says the robed cleric. "This is a decision between husband and wife."

Throughout the 1,400-year history of Islam, the world's second-largest faith, children have been considered one of the greatest blessings of Allah. The …