Each year in mid-February the Catholic Church celebrates World Marriage Day. The casual observer might think this is just a passing nod to Valentine’s Day or perhaps a promo for Worldwide Marriage Encounter. In fact the Church is one of the few organizations that still recognizes the extreme importance of marriage, and has taken a strong position in defense of marriage, while most of the rest of the world fails to recognize the global efforts to undermine and ultimately destroy this most sacred institution.
This is no exaggeration, and although it may sound a bit like paranoia, the truth is that decades of subtle attacks on marriage have recently escalated to the level of outright assault. Consider the fact that the Obama administration has announced its intent to revoke the Defense of Marriage Act while numerous state governments and courts have attempted to redefine marriage to include homosexual relationships. Liberal judges and courts are even preventing implementation of referendums passed by a majority of voters which defines marriage as between one man and one woman. Apparently they only believe in democracy when it suits them.
These assaults on the institution of marriage are being disguised as “civil rights” issues, claiming that gay couples are entitled to the same rights as heterosexuals. These same proponents of gay marriage see no civil rights problem with the intentional and violent murder of millions of unborn children. Gay couples already have legal rights similar to married couples, in that they can own property in common, assign one another as beneficiaries of their insurance policies, grant legal authority to manage health care decisions, obtain health insurance for partners, and even adopt children. These are all rights that can be and have been granted by government, but homosexual relationships are not and never will be a sacred institution for the purpose of conceiving children for the continuation of humanity.
When God created us in His great wisdom and love, He made us men and women. Our two sexes are complementary in every way, designed in accord with nature for the purpose of conceiving children and raising them in a family characterized by fidelity and lifelong commitment. God created man and women in His image, so that in our physical, emotional and spiritual unity we would share in the inner life of God’s love as creator and as Love itself. Our love as man and women is a reflection of the love and unity of God in the Holy Trinity. This love is characterized by a unity of purpose and commitment that is eternal in nature and infinite in its scope, even to the point of self-sacrifice for the beloved. This is the love of God as demonstrated by Jesus who described Himself as a bridegroom (humanity being His bride) and referred to heaven as a wedding feast. His very first public miracle occurred at a wedding feast and His final human act was to sacrifice Himself for the love of all humanity. This mature and perfect love is the ideal that we aspire to in marriage, and which makes it possible for us to live out our commitments to spouse and children.
Long before becoming Pope, Father Karl Wyjtola wrote a wonderful book entitled, Love and Responsibility in which he described the difference between mature and immature relationships. Here’s what he wrote, as cited recently in the National Catholic Register:
In relationships marked by immaturity, “the person is constantly looking inward absorbed in his own feelings.” These relationships demonstrate the typical vagaries observed when individuals allow “sensual and emotional reactions” to control the relationship. In essence, a “subjective aspect of love reigns supreme” and the relationship suffers “unstable and constantly changing” emotions.
Contrary to the inwardness of immature relationships, there is a “mature love” and “is one that looks outward.” As expected, this love is “based not on [the individual’s] feelings, but on the honest truth of the other person” and the “commitment to the other person in self-giving love.” This of course is not a cold rational approach to relationships, but rather the lover can look upon the beloved without any “idealization of that person,” and offer them an authentic love formed by the true identity of the beloved. A mature outward-looking relation has a developed “serene and confident” character that ceases to look at the beloved as an object and sees them as a person, a person that the lover “actively seeks what is best for the beloved.” (National Catholic Register on-line edition, 2/6/2012)
This is the kind of love that is meant to characterize marriage and parenthood. Unfortunately it is lacking in too many marriages, as evidenced by the high rate of divorce and historic low percentage of married couples (now only 52% of all adults). How and why has marriage devolved to the point that so many people fear the lifetime commitment of marriage, and seek relationships in which their own desires are more important than the good of their spouse and family? The answer lies in the fact that our culture has changed and continues to change in ways that distort the notion of freedom, holding up personal and individual freedom as the most important value, to the detriment of marriage and families. In other words, too many of us are willing to settle for immature love which tends to be self-centered. This culture change began decades ago when contraception became accepted as the norm and as an entitlement. Even Sigmund Freud warned that separating sex from the responsibility for children would have disastrous effects on society. When Pope Paul VI wrote his prophetic encyclical, Human Vitae, he was widely denounced as being out of touch with modern reality for predicting the demise of marriage, the increase in divorces and abortions. He even predicted the economic crisis that ensues when birthrates fall below replacement level as they are now in Europe. However, every one of his predictions has come true, and now the world suffers the effects of millions of broken families, tens of millions of abortions and birth rates so low that we are no longer having enough babies to replace ourselves. This contraceptive mentality led to what Pope John Paul II described as the “culture of death.” Although the popes have been described as befuddled old men who are anti-feminists, they have been right about the consequences of putting personal freedom ahead to mature love and commitment, and society is now paying the price for gradually changing our culture to one in which individual rights and freedom are more important than mature love and commitment.
Homosexual relationships tend to be based on the notion of personal freedom in which each person is entitled to obtain whatever pleasures or impulses they believe will make them happy, even to the point of using another person, despite the many risks and consequences it entails. Many gay marriage advocates endorse “open” relationships and some even want to legalize “man-boy” sexual relations. As bad as the heterosexual divorce rate is, homosexual relationships tend to be even more temporary in nature, making it a tenuous environment for raising children. Moreover, it is a well-documented fact that children need both father and mother to learn what life and love are really all about.
The family is the basic unit of society, not the individual, as so many people mistakenly believe. Families do best when they have a father and mother who love each other, the way God loves us: maturely, completely, unconditionally, and infinitely. Marriage is not merely a legal contract as so many have come to believe, it is a sacred institution intended by God for the procreation of humanity and for each of us to grow in love and maturity to the point that we learn to act more like God by making sacrifices for those we love and for whom we are responsible. Within the bonds of a monogamous, permanent union, there are many benefits that far surpass the momentary pleasures of relationships based on lust or convenience. Married monogamous couples suffer no STDs, are more likely to be happy, financially independent, and emotionally healthy than couples who live together, using their partners to fulfill their desires, only as long as it is convenient to do so. The consequences of uncommitted sexual partners are almost too numerous to list, but at a minimum include many forms of STDs, unwanted pregnancy, and emotional stress which often leads to depression and its many consequences.
Married love, when it is mature, brings fulfillment, gives meaning to life, and brings with it the many rewards of family life, and most importantly, children who are a blessing beyond compare. In contrast, relationships characterized by immature love, view children as a burden to be avoided, and when that fails, destroyed. Marriage is at the very heart of what it means to be fully human, fully alive, and capable of life-giving love. Our sexuality and fertility is a wonderful gift that not only defines us, but completes us in the holy union of marriage, preparing us for the incomparable joy of parenthood.
Like so many good things created by God, our sexuality can be perverted and abused out of selfish interests. Left to their own urges, men can become sexual predators who view women not as beautiful children of God, to be respected for their inherent dignity, but as objects for their own selfish desires. True manhood is achieved only through the disciplines of mature love and self-sacrifice. True womanhood celebrates fertility and the awesome privilege of bearing children; it does not suppress the most feminine aspect of womanhood, the ability to bear children. Contraception robs women of their fertility, debases their sexuality and makes them vulnerable to all the negative consequences of immature love.
Marriage has been severely damaged by the contraceptive mentality our culture has adopted, and billions of women have been victimized by the culture of death which robs them of their sexuality and their unborn children. This is NOT what God intended for men and women. The God who is love means for us to participate in His love and the love of one another in a culture of life, in which the inherent dignity of every person is honored and respected; in which we make a gift of ourselves to those we love as God loves us. This is what marriage is all about. This is the teaching of the Catholic Church. This is what God wants for us: to love one another as He loves us. Don’t settle for anything less. Don’t fall victim to the liberal and progressive idea that marriage is an archaic vestige of our ill-informed past, or that marriage is merely a civil agreement. Marriage is a Sacrament because it is a visible sign of the invisible reality of God’s love. Marriage is our opportunity to perfect ourselves in our efforts to love our spouse and our children as God loves us: unconditionally, sacrificially, infinitely, and for all eternity. Don’t settle for anything less. Stand up for marriage and for the culture of life. Nothing less than the future of humanity depends on it.
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