The U.S. bishops are expected to give a thumbs-up to a new pastoral letter on marriage today during the USCCB’s Fall General Assembly in Baltimore. The letter is a high point of the National Pastoral Initiative on Marriage, instituted a few years ago to show the Church's care and concern for couples and families. One of the more popular programs of the Initiative is the “For Your Marriage” website, featuring a video that we have posted on the homepage of Fathers for Good.
The new pastoral letter is titled, “Marriage: Love and Life in the Divine Plan.” It is designed to both inspire and teach. As the bishops state in the introduction, “Our pastoral letter is an invitation to discover, or perhaps to rediscover, the blessing given when God first established marriage as a natural institution and when Christ restored and elevated it as a sacramental sign of salvation.”
One thing you should not expect from the pastoral is a sort of “I feel your pain” approach. While the bishops acknowledge the problems many couples experience today in living out a faithful marriage, and remaining true to the teachings of the Church regarding contraception and indissolubility, they have chosen to present the sacrament of marriage in all its splendor and beauty.
They do this, I think, because they rightly assume that so many married couples – as well as young people contemplating marriage – have never heard the truths about marriage stated plainly in a single document. The first sentence of Part One may be an eye opener for many, and a healthy reminder for everyone:
“Marriage is a lifelong partnership of the whole of life, of mutual and exclusive fidelity, established by mutual consent between a man and a woman, and ordered towards the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring.”
Although this is the longstanding teaching of the Church, based on Scripture and centuries of tradition, every clause of that definition is opposed by modern culture, and many Catholics have been influenced by that culture. So the bishops do well to start from the very beginning, and set the terms and definitions of the discussion.
Let’s compare what the Church says to what our culture tells us today:
“lifelong partnership” – as long as the soul mates find fulfillment with one another
“exclusive fidelity” – nice ideal, but everyone’s human so don’t be judgmental
“between a man and a woman” – love makes a marriage whether it’s two men or two women
“procreation and education of offspring” – marriage and sex have nothing to do with children unless the spouses choose to have them, and there are many ways to conceive.
Of course, the pastoral letter will make headlines with its clear defense of marriage as only between a man and woman, and the old diatribes will be heard from the elite media against the bishops who would deny gay marriage and influence the political process.
“Progressive” Catholics will cringe at the strong statements about the “two ends or purposes of marriage,” which is ordered toward the good and mutual support of the spouses and the generation of offspring. The bishops make it clear that any form of contraception is absolutely forbidden because it introduces a barrier to true love and denies a sharing in the divine self-giving love that is found in the Holy Trinity, of which marriage is a symbol.
At 50 or so pages, the pastoral is a bit long, and parts of it may be a bit too theological or elevated for the average reader. But the bishops have done couples, and all Catholics, a great service by their very simple act of restating the basic teachings on love, marriage and family. As a husband and father, I say hooray!
For those who have ears to hear, this is a document that lifts up everything that is good and beautiful in the human heart. Those who seek to live according to this pastoral letter will find rich blessings amid the many trials of marriage in the modern world.
I am glad to bishops are trying to do something for marriage, because it seems Catholics have no idea what this sacrament is all about. Get back to basics
Posted by: John R | November 17, 2009 at 11:47 AM