CHRIST IN THE HOME
http://www.ewtn.com/library/FAMILY/CHRISTH1.TXT
BY RAOUL PLUS, S.J.
a Translation from the French
FREDERICK PUSTET CO., INC. Publishers NEW YORK AND
CINCINNATI
Nihil Obstat:
JOHN M. A. FEARNS, S.T.D., Censor Librorum
Imprimatur:
+FRANCIS CARDINAL SPELLMAN,
Archbishop of New York
New York, June 19, 1951
MARRIAGE
MARRIAGE AND THE BIBLE (2)
II. The Law of Procreation.
God did not create love and marriage only for the mutual pleasure of
husband and wife. The purpose of their union goes beyond union. From
the married couple's intimate union a third person will issue, and if
the marriage is fruitful a series of thirds, a progeny which will be
the glory of the parents.
Increase and Multiply. God could have multiplied the living without
using his creatures as instruments. Adam and Eve were directly
created. God needed no one. So true is this, that in the creation of
the soul the Most High uses no intermediary. He reserves to Himself
the power to infuse the soul into the child whose body the parents
cooperate in producing.
As far as the body is concerned God permits and even desires that
there should be an intermediary cause, and that constitutes a great
marvel. God imparts to His creatures a share in His creative power.
The parents are united in the physical expression of their conjugal
love and from this bodily union, provided nothing bars the way, life
will be born. For the soul there is to be no human agent. For the
body a human agent shall exist. It is through the instrumentality of
the parents that the body of the child will be born. But God reserves
to Himself the power to put the soul into that body by a direct act
of creation.
That is the basis for the sovereign beauty of fatherhood and
motherhood . . . At the birth of her first born son, Eve, transported
with joy, exclaimed, "I have gotten a man through God."
There is a double law in marriage--the law of chastity and the law of
fecundity. The law of chastity permits the husband and wife to
regulate according to their desire the frequency of intercourse.
Should they by mutual consent decide to live for a time as brother
and sister, say during Lent or Advent, or at some other times in
their life together, for any just and noble reasons, they may do so
provided they run no risk of sin.
The principal application of the law of chastity for the married is
this: If they decide either by explicit or implicit agreement to
perform the marriage act, they may do nothing to prevent conception.
Let them petition God for the desired grace to practice the
restraints and continence they recognize as helpful or if it is not
advisable for them to abstain from physical union, the grace to do
nothing counter to duty.
CONJUGAL DUTY
THE demands of married life emanate above all from the Natural Law;
in other words, right reason left to itself would reveal them to
conscience. Even if Christ had never come, if Revelation had never
been given, these requirements would be what they are. The Church,
keeping to the doctrine of Christ merely upholds them with her
supreme authority; she does not institute them. She reaffirms the
law, explains its application, clarifies the ideal every time someone
attempts to obscure it.
To that end we have various encyclicals of the popes as Maximum illud
by Leo XIII and Casti Connubii by Pius XI and also pastoral letters
issued periodically by bishops as the need arises.
One of the most complete of such letters on conjugal duty is the one
written by Cardinal Mercier. Reminding the people of his diocese of
the true doctrine on marriage, he explains the Christian concept of
the conjugal life:
"The original and primary reason for the union of man and woman is
the foundation of a family, the beginning of children whom they will
have the honor and the obligation to rear in the Faith and in
Christian principles.
"It appears, therefore, that the first effect of marriage is a duty
which the married may not avoid . . .
"How far from truth are those who present marriage as a union whose
sole purpose is physical love.
"The attraction to conjugal intercourse is legitimate, beyond a
doubt. But such satisfaction of the sexual appetite is justifiable
only in the function for which it was destined and which it was meant
to ensure.
"How grave then is the sin of those who circumvent the divine law in
this matter. A mortal sin is committed every time that the conception
of a child is prevented by a deliberate positive act."
Deliberately, before, during or after intercourse to take precautions
destined to prevent conception constitutes a formal and seriously unlawful act.
The insidious propaganda on birth control that is being spread about
through pamphlets, lectures, and advertisements is nothing but an
effort to make an attack on life a lawful act. Cardinal Mercier
condemns doctors, pharmacists, or mid-wives who betray their social mission.
It is forbidden to attack life, even in the generative act itself,
that is to say, at the very point of origin. And those who dare to
kill the living one being formed in the womb of its mother, are
punished by the Church with censure reserved to the bishop. That
means that the priest who absolves them must obtain from the bishop
special authorization to do so, although he need not mention their names.
How the thought of all the souls sacrificed through marriage frauds
ought to incite me to pray for holiness of family life and general
observance of conjugal duty. War is not the scourge which kills the
most people. It is lust.
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<*}}}>< <*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/by-the-by/>Half the
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Lord, may everything we do begin with Your inspiration and continue
with Your help,
so that all our prayers and works may begin in You and by You be happily ended.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
<*}}}>< <http://halfthekingdom.mofuse.mobi/>Half the Kingdom!
on your Mobile <*}}}><
<*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/wordpress/>Half the Kingdom!
Blog <*}}}><
<*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/>Half the Kingdom! Main Site
<*}}}>< <*}}}>< <http://www.halfthekingdom.org/by-the-by/>Half the
Kingdom! By the by <*}}}><
Lord, may everything we do begin with Your inspiration and continue
with Your help,
so that all our prayers and works may begin in You and by You be happily ended.
We ask this through Christ our Lord.
Amen.
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