Marriage as an institution

Marriage as a vocation and mystery of salvation cannot be properly understood outside an institutional, cultural and historical context. The vision of Christian life requires great attention towards these various elements.

On an institutional level, marriage and family belong to each other. They are the oldest and most basic institutions that guarantee human culture and personal security. They are the living cell of human society and the church, where over the course of history, marriage existed, increased and suffered from interdependence within social, cultural, political and economical structures of all human life.

When we talk about marriage as an institution, our first thought as Christians is that it was established by God, and that He has his own plan, which humans must respect. God wants marriage to be a community of love. Scripture and church doctrine tell us about the beauty of marriage. Marriage and family expect society to grant them certain security, stability and the fulfillment of their functions which they are entitled to. Christian marriage requires the church to hold it in highest esteem, to help spouses and families better understand their vocation. The church that proclaims marriage as a mystery of salvation, cannot neglect how society relates to marriage, and must protect it from any hindrances. The state must also examine the activities and all its laws as well as the economic plan and cultural programs, to see how they affect marriage and families. That state or society which neglects the stability of marriage and the family as well as those who do not help parents educate their children properly are hindering their health and prosperity.

In the past the teaching of the church used to put special emphasis on the fact that marriage exists for procreation and as a remedy for lust.

So the idea of procreation was the scope of marriage, so much so that it used to agree with the belief that the world is just a temporary home for humans.

Saint Augustine himself said that the pleasure from the act of marriage could not be undertaken except for procreation. He also said that even when there is good intention, the sexual relationship alienated man from his purpose and could never be taken without any venial guilt.

This was the teaching of the church, and remained so until the sixteenth century, although the multitude of Christians did not take much notice of this, as evidenced in medieval literature.

Because of this, within the church, the spouses thought of themselves as second class citizens in Christ’s flock, and marriage was not considered a state that leads to holiness.

Sometimes they would think that they were not worthy of receiving Holy Communion, so much so that even in our country, in the time of our grandparents, some couples would not receive the Eucharist the the day after their wedding. This stemmed from the fact that there was a lot of emphasis on celibacy and virginity as an ideal state of Christian life.

Saint Thomas of Aquinas presented a more beautiful ideal of love, because for him love is when you wish something good for someone. It is a virtue whereby the husband and wife communicate with each other the entire goodness gained from their marriage.

They communicate the goodness of their soul, life and the act of marriage. During the sixteenth century Protestantism continued, raising many misunderstandings about marriage, and family became the subject of many heated debates. Kalvin wanted a puritan moral, Luther rejected the sacramental nature of marriage and said that marriage is a civil matter, Lay people separated marriage from religion and Marxism introduced free love and wanted to destroy the religious myths regarding the family.

The biggest change in the thinking of theologians took place within the last fifty years, where many began to write about the theology and morals of marriage. The theologians started asking a lot of questions and raised many issues regarding the traditional teaching of the church. The aim was not to take the church’s teaching but to find new facts and ideas to further enhance learning.

The Second Vatican Council felt that it had to do something about this as it was very conscious about the institutional dimension of marriage.

The Council understood that there should be no division between marriage as an institution and pact of love.

The Council and other writers such as Dionigi Tettemanzi hold these views about marriage:

By their very nature, the institution of matrimony itself and conjugal love are ordained for the procreation and education of children, and find in them their ultimate crown.

The council deplores the fact that the magnitude of this institution is not viewed the same everywhere. The church expects that the spouses contribute in the cultural, psychological and social renewal, necessary for the good of marriage and family.

However, the power and strength of the institution of marriage and family can also be seen in the fact that time and again, despite the difficulties produced, the profound changes in modern society reveal the true character of this institution in one way or another.