A Basic Theology of Marriage

Table of Content

CHAPTER ONE3

INTRODUCTION3

AIM AND PURPOSE OF THE ESSAY3

The Centrality of Marriage in God's Plan7

Male & Female: Image of the Trinity8

Marriage: Sacrament of Christ & the Church9

The Marital Embrace10

CHAPTER TWO13

CONCLUSION13

END NOTES22

Chapter One

Introduction

Aim and Purpose of the Essay

This report is a support which is providing resources for those striving to evangelize the world by means of Pope John Paul II's understanding of the human person, explained in his works Love and Responsibility and Theology of the Body. Our aim is to lead every person to an encounter with Jesus Christ.

In this Report we will discuss that the twentieth century witnessed significant developments in the Church's theology of marriage, beginning with Pope Pius XI's 1930 encyclical Casti Connubii, passing through the Second Vatican Council and Pope Paul VI's encyclical Humanae Vitae, and culminating in the manifold writings and original insights of Pope John Paul II. The report discusses the fact, that over two thirds of what the Catholic Church has ever said about marriage in her two thousand year history has come from John Paul II's pontificate.

The Pope's thesis, if we let it sink in, is sure to revolutionize our understanding of the human body, sexuality and, in turn, marriage and family life. "The body, and it alone," John Paul says, "is capable of making visible what is invisible, the spiritual and divine. It was created to transfer into the visible reality of the world, the invisible mystery hidden in God from time immemorial, and thus to be a sign of it" (February 20, 1980).

A mouthful of scholarly verbiage, I know. What does it mean? As physical, bodily creatures we cannot see God. He's pure Spirit. But God wanted to make His mystery visible to us, so He stamped it into our bodies by creating us as male and female in His own image (cf. Gen. 1:27).

The function of this image is to reflect the Trinity, "an inscrutable divine communion of [three] Persons" (November 14, 1979). John Paul thus concludes that "man became the 'image and likeness' of God not only through his own humanity, but also through the communion of persons which man and woman form right from the beginning." And, the Pope adds, "on all of this, right from 'the beginning,' there descended the blessing of fertility linked with human procreation" (ibid.).

The body has a "nuptial meaning" because it reveals man and woman's call to become a gift for one another, a gift fully realized in their "one flesh" union. The body also has a "generative meaning," which (God willing) brings a "third" into the world through the couple's communion. In this way, marriage constitutes a "primordial sacrament" understood as a sign that truly communicates the mystery of God's Trinitarian life and love to husband and wife, and through them to their children, and through the family to the whole world.

This is what marital spirituality is all about: participating in God's life and love and sharing it with the world. While this is certainly a sublime calling, ...