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Answers for couples

Marriage and family

Here you will find the Church’s teaching on marriage, love, fidelity, and family.

Topics

Topic I · What is marriage?

What is marriage?

For the Catholic Church, marriage is a lifelong union between a man and a woman in which they freely give themselves to one another, accept one another, and are open to the birth and upbringing of children. It is not merely a private matter or a feeling, but a vocation to love, fidelity, and the formation of a family written into human nature. Between the baptized, this union is also a sacrament, because Christ raises the spouses’ love to a sign of his grace (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church 1601; Pius XI, Casti Connubii; John Paul II, Letter to Families 7).
In cohabitation there may be sincere affection and mutual care, but in the Church’s understanding it lacks the public and permanent bond proper to marriage, in which a man and a woman promise fidelity to one another for life and together accept responsibility for children and society. Marriage is not simply another name for the same relationship, but a binding self-gift that creates a family and protects love even when feelings become more difficult. This difference is emphasized by the Catechism of the Catholic Church 1601 and the teaching of John Paul II on marital consent.
The family is the foundation of society because it is there that a person is first received as a gift, learns to love, forgive, believe, take responsibility, and live with others. The family cannot be replaced by merely a legal arrangement, because it forms the person from within: as a child, spouse, parent, and grandparent. John Paul II calls the family the way of the Church and the sanctuary of life and emphasizes that the common good of society grows out of the good of the family (cf. Letter to Families 2, 11, 17).

Topic II · Sacrament and promise

Sacrament and promise

When two baptized people enter into a true marriage, their promise does not remain merely a human agreement. Christ makes it a sacrament—a visible sign through which God gives grace to love, to be faithful, to bear hardships, and to grow in holiness. The spouses themselves administer this sacrament to each other when they give their free and lasting consent. Casti Connubii teaches that Christ strengthens the natural love of the spouses and sanctifies their indissoluble union (see also Catechism of the Catholic Church 1601).
The indissolubility of marriage is not simply a strict rule, but arises from the very nature of love: true marital self-giving seeks to be complete, faithful, and definitive. Jesus links this to the beginning of creation: “What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate” (Mt 19:6). The Church teaches that a valid and consummated sacramental marriage lasts until death, because it represents Christ’s faithful union with the Church (see Casti Connubii 31-38; Letter to Families 11; Cardinal Ennio Antonelli’s text on the indissolubility of marriage).
The Bible sees marriage as a union created by God: a man leaves his father and mother, clings to his wife, and they become one flesh (Gen 2:24). Jesus confirms this original plan and restores the indissolubility of marriage, saying that man must not separate what God has joined (Mt 19:3-9; Mk 10:2-12). Paul sees in Christian marriage a great mystery that refers to the love of Christ and the Church (Eph 5:21-33).

Topic III · Love and everyday life

Love and everyday life

Marital love grows through daily choices: in patience, forgiveness, seeking the good of the other, and the readiness to reaffirm one’s original promise. Love is not only a feeling, but the whole person’s journey in self-giving. Deus Caritas Est teaches that eros needs purification and maturation in order to become true care for the other. Amoris Laetitia adds that marriage is a dynamic path of growth, within which there is joy, tension, struggle, peace, and the constant decision to remain together in love (see AL 122-126, 163).
Responsible married life means that spouses take seriously both the unitive meaning of their love and openness to new life. They are not masters of life, but co-workers with God, who consider their situation in conscience and in the light of the moral law. Humanae Vitae teaches that marital love is human, total, faithful, and fruitful, and that responsible parenthood may mean both generous openness to children and, for serious reasons, spacing births in morally acceptable ways (see HV 8-12, 16).
A Christian family not only prays together at times, but learns to see the whole of home life as a vocation lived before God. The Our Father together, grace at meals, Sunday Mass, blessing the children, and praying for one another make the home a small domestic Church. John Paul II writes that prayer strengthens the spiritual unity of the family and helps the family share in God’s power (Letter to Families 4). Pope Francis asks that families be places of communion and prayer, true schools of the Gospel.

Theme IV · Christian Home

Christian Home

The vocation of the Christian family is to make room for Christ at home and to let His love become visible in everyday life. The family is called to be a domestic Church: a place where one learns to pray, forgive, serve, respect life, and see in each family member a gift from God. Pope Francis says, speaking about the family of Nazareth, that every family can transform the ordinary into love and mutual help. Amoris Laetitia describes family spirituality as thousands of small but real acts of love (cf. AL 315-323).
Raising children begins with parents seeing the child as a gift, not a burden. They are their children’s first and most important educators and pass on the faith above all by their lives: through prayer, Sunday observance, honesty, forgiveness, and love of neighbor. The Letter to Families emphasizes that education is a communion of persons carried out in love and that religious education makes the family a domestic Church (cf. 16). Amoris Laetitia adds that children should be helped to grow into freedom, maturity, and responsibility, not simply be controlled in everything (cf. AL 260, 271, 280).
The Church does not speak of the family as a perfect picture, but as a real vocation, where there is joy, fatigue, crises, wounds, and healing. Amoris Laetitia emphasizes that no family falls from heaven ready-made; families must constantly grow in the ability to love (AL 325). At the same time, the Church does not leave families in difficulty alone. It calls pastors to listen to people, guide them, and help them find their place in the Church, without losing sight of the full ideal of marriage (cf. AL 291-312).

Topic V · More difficult questions

More difficult questions

The Church wishes that every person be treated with dignity and justice, but it does not consider it right to create legal forms that blur the meaning of marriage or place marriage essentially on the same level as other forms of cohabitation. Marriage is a permanent union of a man and a woman, with a special role in the well-being of children, generations, and society. The positions of the Catholic Church in Estonia regarding the Cohabitation Act and amendments to the Family Law emphasize that the state should protect the essence of marriage, not just the word, and engage in a broad discussion about its consequences.
If a person has been married before, it must be clarified before a new church marriage whether the previous marriage was valid in the eyes of the Church. The Catholic Church does not treat divorce simply as the end of a relationship, because a true matrimonial bond is by its nature indissoluble. However, sometimes a church tribunal may conclude that the marriage was not valid from the beginning, for example due to a lack of free consent or some essential condition of marriage. In such a situation, a valid marriage is not dissolved, but it is declared that a sacramental bond did not arise (see Mt 19:6; Casti Connubii 31-38; Amoris Laetitia 246, 298-300).
The Church’s teaching distinguishes between human dignity, inclinations, and actions. Every person is a child of God and must be treated with respect, compassion, and without unjust discrimination. At the same time, the Church teaches that marital sexuality belongs to the union of a man and a woman that is open to life. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that people with homosexual tendencies must be treated with respect and sensitivity and that unjust discrimination must be avoided, while at the same time calling all Christians to live in chastity and to follow Christ (see CCC 2333, 2357-2358; Amoris Laetitia 250).
The Church protects children first of all by seeing in every child a gift from God and a person who must not be used as a means for adults’ desires, convenience, or conflicts. A child has the right to life, to a mother and a father, to upbringing, to security, to faith, and to a loving home environment. Pope Francis emphasizes that the suffering of children is a cry for help to God and a responsibility of adults before society. The Letter to Families teaches that the child is the common good of the family and the central gift of the sanctuary of life (see Letter to Families 11, 16; Amoris Laetitia 245-246, 259-290).