By John M. Grondelski .

The New York Times recently published an op-ed by Jessica Grose entitled "Motherhood Should Come with a Warning Label." A conservative poster on X tweeted about it as yet one more example of the Left's anti-motherhood bias.

Now I would not be surprised if Ms. Grose took that view, but in this case, it's not completely true. Yes, she feints left. But our politics are so polarized that people don't read very carefully (or maybe hope that you don't).

Catholic social thought (CST) is controversial because it does not fit comfortably in the political categories of "right" and "left." Ideological Catholicism from either side cherry-picks CST to further a political agenda. Real Catholicism lets faith shape one's politics.

Although it may gore the sacred oxen of those who worship at the altar of Adam Smith, the Grose essay has important things to say in support of CST. As one woman summed up Grose's thesis: "[O]ur society and economic systems are built off taking my labor as a mother for granted." That's the "motherhood penalty."

Money, of course, isn't everything - especially when it comes to having and raising children - but it's not nothing, either.

In his most famous encyclical, which inaugurated modern Catholic social doctrine, Pope Leo XIII spoke in 1891 of a living and just wage as one "sufficient to enable [a man] comfortably to support himself, his wife, and his children. . .[and] by cutting down expenses, to put by some little savings [for old age]." (Rerum novarum, 46)

He spoke of one person as the wage earner (per the custom of his time, the father) to support a family, i.e., feed and clothe them, put a roof over their heads, and squirrel something away for old age. These are not radical wants.

Any observer of modern America must admit that the Leonine vision is almost totally absent from our social policies and even our default assumptions about family life. To achieve the things Leo XIII deemed to be part of what a living wage should afford requires, in reality in today's America, two wage-earners.

The consequences for women are not insignificant. In practice, it means that dedication to raising one's children is out of reach for most mothers, except for a privileged few or those unusually committed to the task, despite the costs. And the consequences for stay-at-home moms are long-term: as Grose notes, they stretch "all the way to retirement."

Some conservatives will say that these consequences are a function of how women choose to work. They generally drop in and out of the job market and often prefer part-time work so that they may also spend time with their children. Their financial profile, therefore, differs from the classical model for men.

That much is true. But the catch in viewing things this way is that "work" by definition means paid economic activity outside the home. And economic activity inside the home in childrearing is regarded as not valuable. It's treated as not valuable because it carries no price tag. And, in a world where the mortgage does, like it or not, parenthood often becomes expendable.

A woman devoting a substantial part of her life to her children is not just not making money. She is actually paying for that devotion. She is financially penalized for being a mother.

She gets no wages in a society whose price structure presupposes two-wage earners. Without wages, she loses contributions in both time and money into Social Security, meaning her eventual old-age benefits will be smaller and she will likely take much longer to be fully vested in terms of qualifying quarters.

If a mother caring for her children could rely on children caring for their mother in her old age (as was once the norm), there might be some balance here. But neither socio-cultural expectations nor the job market for young people support that today.

If she eventually gets into the paid-job market, it is likely to be later and, because of her years outside it, likely result in relegation to lower...