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Priests, married couples and catechists often
are at a loss for adequate words to describe the faith of the Christian
community with the human experience of marriage which is, by Catholic
belief, raised to the dignity of Sacrament by Jesus Christ. Catholic faith
holds up the values of faith, fidelity, and sacrificial love as superior
virtues responding to a sacred reality that is defined by God and explained
further by his Son, Jesus Christ to would-be disciples.
Sacramental marriage reaches to heaven for the
benefit of the couple while communicating saving graces with the presence of
Jesus Christ in that marriage. From the Latin term, sacra, sacramental
marriage is a sacred thing that belongs to God where Christian couples are
Called to participate in the mystery of who God is to us.
An increasingly secular society such as ours may
find such traditional reflection arising largely from the rubrics of an
ancient culture and its patriarchal images hardly relevant to the popular
ways relationships come together in the modern day. But we cannot afford to
dismiss so easily the foundational teaching with marriage that is
substantive to our Judeo-Christian heritage.
Some couples may be anxious about the
increasingly counter-cultural stance of the church in face of a number of
issues popularly debated that carry ramifications for church life and
practice, most of them moral issues with sexual content and life issues
bearing upon the privilege of individual choice. In this area, church
teaching about human sexuality, childbearing, family size regulation are not
always clearly understood or, in instances, outrightly rejected as
old-fashioned and irrelevant to the times.
Mere cohabitation without marriage, seemingly
stemming from a popular hesitancy with life-long commitment, financial and
other personal considerations, is another idea that makes the Church's
message fall on deaf ears. Divorce is rampant in American society and
provokes certain emotional reactions in the young who may not have seen many
marriages work, including that of their own parents.
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