A conversation about marriage. Join in!

Last updated on: May 18, 2015 at 12:47 am by Mark Shea

A conversation about marriage. Join in! 2015-05-01T18:24:22-07:00 Mark Shea

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A reader writes from Canada:

I have an idea, and I am half-tempted to send it to our conference of Bishops in the light of the coming Synod on the family. But I don’t know if it makes any sense, so I thought I would “clear” it with you first (and if you decide so, with your readers).

Okay.

It is my impression that marriage has been losing its meaning long before the gay lobby began challenging it. When I was a little girl, I was given fairy tales to read, where, once the fair maiden and the Prince Charming had found each other, the story very often ended with “and they were married, were happy and had several children.” However, since at least half a century or more, most “love stories” in books, films and TV now seem to end when the lovers have found each other (over and over again). Their wedding is just like icing on the cake, a public celebration of their love. Nowadays, the stories rarely seem to even suggest children and families.

I think you are on to something here: namely that the definition of marriage, under the influence of sentimentality and narcissism, has drifted from that of the union of man and women ordered toward the union, healing, and (in Christian marriage, sanctification) of the spouses and fruitfulness in children, ad has become, first, simply about the feeling of the couple and now about forcing those around the couple (or throuple or quartet or animal fetishist or building fetishist, or roller coaster fetishest) to pretend that whatever that particular person or collection of persons says is a marriage *is* a marriage. What used to be ordered to mutual self-donation is now ordered toward massive narcissism and use of the state to punish those who will not play along with the fantasy. Children are, in this reckoning, seen as obstacles or accessories and, in gay marriages, are frequently products of manufacturing.

For that reason, it seems to me that one thing the Church could do is start re-emphasising the sacramental aspect of marriage. Actually, why not simply drop the words “marriage” and “wedding”, with their compromised meanings, and bring instead some wording like “the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony”?

I s’pose. But language change doesn’t really work like that. People will go on saying “marriage” anyway.

When it comes to the sacraments of the Catholic Church, it seems to me that a child who has not been baptized and/or has not received – or bothered to attend – the proper sacramental preparation, would not be allowed to receive First Communion and Confirmation. And a man who has not followed the required course of studies and graduated would not be eligible for ordination (although, if my memory is correct, an exception has been made once for Saint Jean-Marie Vianney, and maybe there has been a few more).

Therefore, why should it be any different for people desiring to receive the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony”?

This is beyond my competence to speak to. The Church already does marriage prep, but I don’t know how much prep, if any, the Church requires if people are adamant about getting married. I’d discuss this with a priest or sacramental theologian. I don’t even play those on the Internet.

Of course, it could be a lot of work to design and implement proper sacramental preparation in that case, but it could be a very useful thing to do, considering the weakness of Catholic education I keep hearing about. But on the other hand it could also be useful to eliminate, before any official ceremony, candidates who are facing major impediments that could eventually lead to a long and costly annulment process (including, but not limited to, partners of the same gender…), thus reducing the work load in that area.

Again, I think that’s part of what marriage prep is already ordered toward doing. Things may end up differently in your country since you have no Bill of Rights. So I can see some zealot bringing suit in Canada and trying to full nelson the Canadian Church into doing gay “marriages”. The thing has always been self-evidently about the narcissistic need to either force everybody to pretend that gay “marriage” is real or punish them for ungoodthink if they don’t. So I have never believed this is going to stop till an attempt is made to bend churches to offer the pinch of incense or crucify them if they will not.

It might also be a good way to avoid, or at least reduce, the risk of legal actions taken against churches that will refuse to marry gay couples. The Catholic Church will simply no longer be in the “business” of marriage or weddings… If, in some areas, it is considered useful to let those churches still do whatever paperwork is needed for a couple to be legally married, there could probably be a way to make it clear that it would only be a service offered to those people having actually received the sacrament in those churches, and not available to the general public.

I don’t see how this will take Churches out of the “business” (awful word) of marriage. Nor how anything can. It’s one of the sacraments. Nor am I clear how we can decouple it from *some* kind of involvement with the state. Marriage, after all, exists in order to assist, privilege and protect the family in ways that other human associations are not.

Another point could be made about the cost of fancy wedding ceremonies. I remember that several years ago – it might have been at the time of Vatican II – efforts were made in my part of the continent to simplify First Communions and get rid of those fancy ceremonies where an entire class of 1st graders, with the girls decked out in expensive long white dresses as if they were little brides, walked in a procession down the aisle to go and receive the Eucharist for the first time. More simplicity became the rule of the day, and now, for example in the parish I attend, children receive their first Communion during Sunday mass, with their families, and not all on the same Sunday.

I’m all for simplicity and not bankrupting families as they start out. But this doesn’t seem especially germane to the question.

Maybe it would be a good thing to introduce the same kind of simplicity for the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony? I have read somewhere that some couples don’t get married simply because they find it too expensive to do so. That would not exclude the possibility, for people who wish to do so, to have a big party afterwards, but in my opinion it should no longer be seen as a necessary part of celebrating the sacrament itself. Maybe some church halls would lose a source of revenue, but I am sure it would be less costly than the legal troubles coming from refusals to rent the halls for same-sex celebrations. And I assume it would be possible to make it clear that that service is still available, but only for people whose ceremonies took place in that particular church.

What do you think?

I completely agree that the real and ancient enemies of marriage are typically poverty and war, but especially poverty. And I certainly want people to see marriage in light of the meaning of the sacrament. Beyond that, I don’t have much of a brilliant plan. Perhaps some readers can pitch in.

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