Thought of the Week –

MARRIAGE UNDER SEIGE

Most of us over forty were brought up to accept that sex is for marriage, and marriage is for life. Today, this understanding of sex and marriage, and family life as well, is definitely under siege.

The notion that the only moral way to fully express sexual love is within a life-long marriage, is being challenged.

First, it is being challenged in practice. It is an undisputed fact that most young people today, including Catholics, regard sex before marriage, co-habitation, contraception, and the possibility of divorce, as normal.

Second, it is being challenged in theory. Many people quite sincerely believe that the old ideas of sex only within marriage, and marriage for life, are socially conditioned.

This was fine in the past, they say, when we lived in close-knit communities, and people rarely moved far from their family or place of birth. But there has been an evolution in the way we live, and it makes our former understanding of sexual relations, marriage and family life, obsolete.

Many people are convinced that “man” does not have a fixed nature with definable, permanent truths; but that “man” is basically a social construct whose way of life and moral values can change, and should change.

In front of this reality the Church is not silent. The Church has something to say. But who really listens to the Church? Very few. Most people only “hear” what the Church is against. NO sex before marriage; NO condoms or contraception; NO divorce or second marriage …

They think this is the truth, as the Church understands it. But what many people fail to grasp is that this is not the whole truth, as the Church understands it. Because the WHOLE truth includes the reasons why the Church teaches these things, and the pastoral care and concern it can offer to those people who feel they are living outside the Church’s teaching.

Is sex before marriage always wrong? Is contraception always wrong? Is divorce always wrong? The Church can answer these questions, but not with sound-bite, or strong words of condemnation. But in a measured, comprehensive and loving way, a way that does not sacrifice compassion and concern.

GOD LOVES YOU AS YOU ARE!