APOSTOLIC
EXHORTATION OF HIS HOLINESS POPE JOHN
PAUL II ON THE FAMILY
TO THE EPISCOPATE TO
THE CLERGY AND TO THE FAITHFUL OF THE
WHOLE CATHOLIC CHURCH
INTRODUCTION
1. The family in the modern
world, as much as and perhaps more than
any other institution, has been beset
by the many profound and rapid changes
that have affected society and culture.
Many families are living this situation
in fidelity to those values that constitute
the foundation of the institution of
the family. Others have become uncertain
and bewildered over their role or even
doubtful and almost unaware of the ultimate
meaning and truth of conjugal and family
life. Finally, there are others who
are hindered by various situations of
injustice in the realization of their
fundamental rights.
Knowing that marriage and the family
constitute one of the most precious
of human values, the church wishes to
speak and offer her help to those who
are already aware of the value of marriage
and the family and seek to live it faithfully,
to those who are uncertain and anxious
and searching for the truth, and to
those who are unjustly impeded from
living freely their family lives. Supporting
the first, illuminating the second and
assisting the others, the church offers
her services to every person who wonders
about the destiny of marriage and the
family.[1]
In a particular way the church addresses
the young, who are beginning their journey
toward marriage and family life, for
the purpose of presenting them with
new horizons, helping them to discover
the beauty and grandeur of the vocation
to love and the service of life.
2. A sign of this profound interest
of the church in the family was the
last Synod of Bishops, held in Rome
from Sept. 26 to Oct. 25, 1980. This
was a natural continuation of the two
preceding synods:[2] The Christian family,
in fact, is the first community called
to announce the Gospel to the human
person during growth and to bring him
or her, through a progressive education
and catechesis, to full human and Christian
maturity.
Furthermore, the recent synod is logically
connected in some way as well with that
on the ministerial priesthood and on
justice in the modern world. In fact,
as an educating community, the family
must help man to discern his own vocation
and to accept responsibility in the
search for greater justice, educating
him from the beginning in interpersonal
relationships, rich in justice and in
love.
At the close of their assembly, the
synod fathers presented me with a long
list of proposals in which they had
gathered the fruits of their reflections,
which had matured over intense days
of work, and they asked me unanimously
to be a spokesman before humanity of
the church's lively care for the family
and to give suitable indications for
renewed pastoral effort in this fundamental
sector of the life of man and of the
church.
As I fulfill that mission with this
exhortation, thus actuating in a particular
matter the apostolic ministry with which
I am entrusted, I wish to thank all
the members of the synod for the very
valuable contribution of teaching and
experience that they made, especially
through the propositiones, the text
of which I am entrusting to the Pontifical
Council for the Family with instructions
to study it so as to bring out every
aspect of its rich content.
3. Illuminated by the faith
that gives her an understanding of all
the truth concerning the great value
of marriage and the family and their
deepest meaning, the church once again
feels the pressing need to proclaim
the Gospel, that is the "good news,"
to all people without exception, in
particular to all those who are called
to marriage and are preparing for it,
to all married couples and parents in
the world.
The church is deeply convinced that
only by the acceptance of the Gospel
are the hopes that man legitimately
places in marriage and in the family
capable of being fulfilled.
Willed by God in the very act of creation,[3]
marriage and the family are interiorly
ordained to fulfillment in Christ[4]
and have need of his graces in order
to be healed from the wounds of sin[5]
and restored to their "beginning,"[6]
that is, to full understanding and the
full realization of God's plan.
At a moment of history in which the
family is the object of numerous forces
that seek to destroy it or in some way
to deform it, and aware that the well-being
of society and her own good are intimately
tied to the good of the family,[7] the
church perceives in a more urgent and
compelling way her mission of proclaiming
to all people the plan of God for marriage
and the family, ensuring their full
vitality and human and Christian development,
and thus contributing to the renewal
of society and of the people of God.
4. Since God's plan for marriage
and the family touches men and women
in the concreteness of their daily existence
in specific social and cultural situations,
the church ought to apply herself to
understanding the situations within
which marriage and the family are lived
today, in order to fulfill her task
of serving.[8]
This understanding is therefore an
inescapable requirement of the work
of evangelization. It is, in fact, to
the families of our times that the church
must bring the unchangeable and ever
new gospel of Jesus Christ, just as
it is the families involved in the present
conditions of the world that are called
to accept and to live the plan of God
that pertains to them. Moreover, the
call and demands of the spirit resound
in the very events of history, and so
the church can also be guided to a more
profound understanding of the inexhaustible
mystery of marriage and the family by
the circumstances, the questions and
the anxieties and hopes of the young
people, married couples and parents
of today.[9]
To this ought to be added a further
reflection of particular importance
at the present time. Not infrequently
ideas and solutions which are very appealing,
but which obscure in varying degrees
the truth and the dignity of the human
person, are offered to the men and women
of today in their sincere and deep search
for a response to the important daily
problems that affect their married and
family life. These views are often supported
by the powerful and pervasive organization
of the means of social communication,
which subtly endangers freedom and the
capacity for objective judgment.
Many are already aware of this danger
to the human person and are working
for the truth. The church, with her
evangelical discernment, joins with
them, offering her own service to the
truth, to freedom and to the dignity
of every man and every woman.
5. The discernment effected
by the church becomes the offering of
an orientation in order that the entire
truth and the full dignity of marriage
and the family may be preserved and
realized.
This discernment is accomplished through
the sense of faith,[10] which is a gift
that the Spirit gives to all the faithful,[11]
and is therefore the work of the whole
church according to the diversity of
the various gifts and charisms that,
together with and according to the responsibility
proper to each one, work together for
a more profound understanding and activation
of the word of God. The church, therefore,
does not accomplish this discernment
only through the pastors, who teach
in the name and with the power of Christ,
but also through the laity: Christ "made
them his witnesses and gave them understanding
of the faith and the grace of speech
(cf. Acts 2:17-18; Rv. 19:10), so that
the power of the Gospel might shine
forth in their daily social and family
life."[12] The laity, moreover,
by reason of their particular vocation
have the specific role of interpreting
the history of the world in the light
of Christ, inasmuch as they are called
to illuminate and organize temporal
realities according to the plan of God,
creator and redeemer.
The "supernatural sense of faith,"[13]
however, does not consist solely or
necessarily in the consensus of the
faithful. Following Christ, the church
seeks the truth, which is not always
the same as the majority opinion. She
listens to conscience and not to power,
and in this way she defends the poor
and the downtrodden. The church values
sociological and statistical research
when it proves helpful in understanding
the historical context in which pastoral
action has to be developed and when
it leads to a better understanding of
the truth. Such research alone, however,
is not to be considered in itself an
expression of the sense of faith.
Because it is the task of the apostolic
ministry to ensure that the church remains
in the truth of Christ and to lead her
ever more deeply into that truth, the
pastors must promote the sense of faith
in all the faithful, examine and authoritatively
judge the genuineness of its expressions
and educate the faithful in an ever
more mature evangelical discernment.[14]
Christian spouses and parents can and
should offer their unique and irreplaceable
contribution to the elaboration of an
authentic evangelical discernment in
the various situations and cultures
in which men and women live their marriage
and their family life. They are qualified
for this role by their charism or specific
gift, the gift of the sacrament of matrimony.[15]
6. The situation in which the
family finds itself presents positive
and negative aspects: The first is a
sign of the salvation of Christ operating
in the world; the second, a sign of
the refusal that man gives to the love
of God.
On the one hand, in fact, there is
a more lively awareness of personal
freedom and greater attention to the
quality of interpersonal relationships
in marriage, in promoting the dignity
of women, to responsible procreation,
to the education of children. There
is also an awareness of the need for
the development of interfamily relationships,
for reciprocal spiritual and material
assistance, the rediscovery of the ecclesial
mission proper to the family and its
responsibility for the building of a
more just society. On the other hand,
however, signs are not lacking of a
disturbing degradation of some fundamental
values: a mistaken theoretical and practical
concept of the independence of the spouses
in relation to each other; serious misconceptions
regarding the relationship of authority
between parents and children; the concrete
difficulties that the family itself
experiences in the transmission of values;
the growing number of divorces; the
scourge of abortion; the ever more frequent
recourse to sterilization; the appearance
of a truly contraceptive mentality.
At the root of these negative phenomena
there frequently lies a corruption of
the idea and the experience of freedom,
conceived not as a capacity for realizing
the truth of God's plan for marriage
and the family, but as an autonomous
power of self-affirmation, often against
others, for one's own selfish well-being.
Worthy of our attention also is the
fact that in the countries of the so-called
Third World, families often lack both
the means necessary for survival, such
as food, work, housing and medicine,
and the most elementary freedoms. In
the richer countries, on the contrary,
excessive prosperity and the consumer
mentality, paradoxically joined to a
certain anguish and uncertainty about
the future, deprive married couples
of the generosity and courage needed
for raising up new human life: Thus
life is often perceived not as a blessing,
but as a danger from which to defend
oneself.
The historical situation in which the
family lives therefore appears as an
interplay of light and darkness.
This shows that history is not simply
a fixed progression toward what is better,
but rather an event of freedom, and
even a struggle between freedoms that
are in mutual conflict, that is, according
to the wellknown expression of St. Augustine,
a conflict between two loves: the love
of God to the point of disregarding
self, and the love of self to the point
of disregarding God.[16]
It follows that only an education for
love rooted in faith can lead to the
capacity of interpreting "the signs
of the times," which are the historical
expression of this twofold love.
7. Living in such a world, under
the pressures coming above all from
the mass media, the faithful do not
always remain immune from the obscuring
of certain fundamental values, nor set
themselves up as the critical conscience
of family culture and as active agents
in the building of an authentic family
humanism.
Among the more troubling signs of this
phenomenon, the synod fathers stressed
the following, in particular: the spread
of divorce and of recourse to a new
union, even on the part of the faithful;
the acceptance of purely civil marriage
in contradiction to the vocation of
the baptized to "be married in
the Lord"; the celebration of the
marriage sacrament without living faith,
but for other motives; the rejection
of the moral norms that guide and promote
the human and Christian exercise of
sexuality in marriage.
8. The whole church is obliged
to a deep reflection and commitment,
so that the new culture now emerging
may be evangelized in depth, true values
acknowledged, the rights of men and
women defended and justice promoted
in the very structures of society. In
this way the "new humanism"
will not distract people from their
relationship with God, but will lead
them to it more fully.
Science and its technical applications
offer new and immense possibilities
in the construction of such a humanism.
Still, as a consequence of political
choices that decide the direction of
research and its applications, science
is often used against its original purpose,
which is the advancement of the human
person.
It becomes necessary, therefore, on
the part of all to recover an awareness
of the primacy of moral values, which
are the values of the human person as
such. The great task that has to be
faced today for the renewal of society
is that of recapturing the ultimate
meaning of life and its fundamental
values. Only an awareness of the primacy
of these values enables man to use the
immense possibilities given him by science.in
such a way as to bring about the true
advancement of the human person in his
or her whole truth, in his or her freedom
and dignity. Science is called to ally
itself with wisdom.
The following words of the Second Vatican
Council can therefore be applied to
the problems of the family: "Our
era needs such wisdom more than bygone
ages if the discoveries made by man
are to be further humanized. For the
future of the world stands in peril
unless wiser people are forthcoming."[17]
The education of the moral conscience,
which makes every human being capable
of judging and of discerning the proper
ways to achieve self-realization according
to his or her original truth, thus becomes
a pressing requirement that cannot be
renounced.
Modern culture must be led to a more
profoundly restored covenant with divine
wisdom. Every man is given a share of
such wisdom through the creating action
of God. And it is only in faithfulness
to this covenant that the families of
today will be in a position to influence
positively the building of a more just
and fraternal world.
9. To the injustice originating
from sin--which has profoundly penetrated
the structures of today's world--and
often hindering the family's full realization
of itself and of its fundamental rights,
we must all set ourselves in opposition
through a conversion of mind and heart,
following Christ crucified by denying
our own selfishness: Such a conversion
cannot fail to have a beneficial and
renewing influence even on the structures
of society.
What is needed is a continuous, permanent
conversion which, while requiring an
interior detachment from every evil
and an adherence to good in its fullness,
is brought about concretely in steps
which lead us ever forward. Thus a dynamic
process develops, one which advances
gradually with the progressive integration
of the gifts of God and the demands
of his definitive and absolute love
in the entire personal and social life
of man. Therefore an educational growth
process is necessary in order that individual
believers, families and peoples, even
civilization itself, by beginning from
what they have already received of the
mystery of Christ, may patiently be
led forward, arriving at a richer understanding
and a fuller integration of this mystery
in their lives.
10. In conformity with her constant
tradition, the church receives from
the various cultures everything that
is able to express better the unsearchable
riches of Christ.[18] Only with the
help of all the cultures will it be
possible for these riches to be manifested
ever more clearly and for the church
to progress toward a daily, more complete
and profound awareness of the truth,
which has already been given to her
in its entirety by the Lord.
Holding fast to the two principles
of the compatibility with the Gospel
of the various cultures to be taken
up and of communion with the universal
church, there must be further study,
particularly by the episcopal conferences
and the appropriate departments of the
Roman Curia, and greater pastoral diligence
so that this "inculturation"
of the Christian faith may come about
ever more extensively in the context
of marriage and the family as well as
in other fields.
It is by means of "inculturation"
that one proceeds toward the full restoration
of the covenant with the wisdom of God,
which is Christ himself. The whole church
will be enriched also by the cultures
which, though lacking technology, abound
in human wisdom and are enlivened by
profound moral values.
So that the goal of this journey might
be clear and consequently the way plainly
indicated, the synod was right to begin
by considering in depth the original
design of God for marriage and the family:
It "went back to the beginning,"
in deference to the teaching of Christ.[19]
11. God created man in his own
image and likeness:[20] calling him
to existence through love, he called
him at the same time for love.
God is love[21] and in himself he lives
a mystery of personal loving communion.
Creating the human race in his own image
and continually keeping it in being.
God inscribed in the humanity of man
and woman the vocation, and thus the
capacity and responsibility, of love
and communion[22]. Love is therefore
the fundamental and innate vocation
of every human being.
As an incarnate spirit, that is, a
soul which expresses itself in a body
and a body informed by an immortal spirit,
man is called to love in his unified
totality. Love includes the human body,
and the body is made a sharer in spiritual
love.
Christian revelation recognizes two
specific ways of realizing the vocation
of the human person, in its entirety,
to love: marriage and virginity or celibacy.
Either one is in its own proper form
an actuation of the most profound truth
of man, of his being "created in
the image of God."
Consequently sexuality, by means of
which man and woman give themselves
to one another through the acts which
are proper and exclusive to spouses,
is by no means something purely biological,
but concerns the innermost being of
the human person as such. It is realized
in a truly human way only if it is an
integral part of the love by which a
man and a woman commit themselves totally
to one another until death. The total
physical self-giving would be a lie
if it were not the sign and fruit of
a total personal self-giving, in which
the whole person, including the temporal
dimension, is present: If the person
were to withhold something or reserve
the possibility of deciding otherwise
in the future, by this very fact he
or she would not be giving totally.
This totality which is required by
conjugal love also corresponds to the
demands of responsible fertility. This
fertility is directed to the generation
of a human being, and so by its nature
it surpasses the purely biological order
and involves a whole series of personal
values. For the harmonious growth of
these values a persevering and unified
contribution by both parents is necessary.
The only "place" in which
this self-giving in its whole truth
is made possible is marriage, the covenant
of conjugal love freely and consciously
chosen, whereby man and woman accept
the intimate community of life and love
willed by God himself,[23] which only
in this light manifests its true meaning.
The institution of marriage is not an
undue interference by society or authority,
nor the extrinsic imposition of a form.
Rather, it is an interior requirement
of the covenant of conjugal love which
is publicly affirmed as unique and exclusive
in order to live in complete fidelity
to the plan of God, the creator. A person's
freedom, far from being restricted by
this fidelity, is secured against every
form of subjectivism or relativism and
is made a sharer in creative wisdom.
12. The communion of love between
God and people, a fundamental part of
the revelation and faith experience
of Israel, finds a meaningful expression
in the marriage covenant which is established
between a man and a woman.
For this reason the central word of
revelation, "God loves his people,"
is likewise proclaimed through the living
and concrete word whereby a man and
a woman express their conjugal love.
Their bond of love becomes the image
and the symbol of the covenant which
unites god and his people.[24] And the
same sin which can harm the conjugal
covenant becomes an image of the infidelity
of the people to their God: Idolatry
is prostitution,[25] infidelity is adultery,
disobedience to the law is abandonment
of the spousal love of the Lord. But
the infidelity of Israel does not destroy
the eternal fidelity of the Lord, and
therefore the ever faithful love of
God is put forward as the model of the
relations of faithful love which should
exist between spouses.[26]
13. The communion between God
and his people finds its definitive
fulfillment in Jesus Christ, the bridegroom
who loves and gives himself as the savior
of humanity, uniting it to himself as
his body.
He reveals the original truth of marriage,
the truth of the "beginning,"[27]
and, freeing man from his hardness of
heart, he makes man capable of realizing
this truth in its entirety.
This revelation reaches its definitive
fullness in the gift of love which the
word of God makes to humanity in assuming
a human nature, and in the sacrifice
which Jesus Christ makes of himself
on the cross for his bride, the church.
In this sacrifice there is entirely
revealed that plan which God has imprinted
on the humanity of man and woman since
their creation,[28] the marriage of
baptized persons thus becomes a real
symbol of that new and eternal covenant
sanctioned in the blood of Christ. The
Spirit which the Lord pours forth gives
a new heart, and renders man and woman
capable of loving one another as Christ
has loved us. Conjugal love reaches
that fullness to which it is interiorly
ordained, conjugal charity, which is
the proper and specific way in which
the spouses participate in and are called
to live the very charity of Christ,
who gave himself on the cross.
In a deservedly famous page, Tertullian
has well expressed the greatness of
this conjugal life in Christ and its
beauty: "How can I ever express
the happiness of the marriage that is
joined together by the church, strengthened
by an offering, sealed by a blessing,
announced by angels and ratified by
the Father?!!! How wonderful the bond
between two believers, with a single
hope, a single desire, a single observance,
a single service! They are both brethren
and both fellow servants; there is no
separation between them in spirit or
flesh. In fact they are truly two in
one flesh, and where the flesh is one,
one is the spirit."[29]
Receiving and meditating faithfully
on the word of God, the church has solemnly
taught and continued to teach that the
marriage of the baptized is one of the
seven sacraments of the new covenant.[30]
Indeed by means of baptism, man and
woman are definitively placed within
the new and eternal covenant, in the
spousal covenant of Christ with the
church. And it is because of this indestructible
insertion that the intimate community
of conjugal life and love, founded by
the creator,[31] is elevated and assumed
into the spousal charity of Christ,
sustained and enriched by his redeeming
power.
By virtue of the sacramentality of
their marriage, spouses are bound to
one another in the most profoundly indissoluble
manner. Their belonging to each other
is the real representation, by means
of the sacramental sign, of the very
relationship of Christ with the church.
Spouses are therefore the permanent
reminder to the church of what happened
on the cross; they are for one another
and for the children witnesses to the
salvation in which the sacrament makes
them sharers. Of this salvation event
marriage, like every sacrament, is a
memorial, actuation and prophecy: "As
a memorial, the sacrament gives them
the grace and duty of commemorating
the great works of God and of bearing
witness to them before their children.
As actuation, it gives them the grace
and duty of putting into practice in
the present, toward each other and their
children, the demands of a love which
forgives and redeems. As prophecy, it
gives them the grace and duty of living
and bearing witness to the hope of the
future encounter with Christ."[32]
Like each of the seven sacraments,
so also marriage is a real symbol of
the event of salvation, but in its own
way.
"The spouses participate in it
as spouses, together, as a couple, so
that the first and immediate effect
of marriage (res et sacramentum) is
not supernatural grace itself, but the
Christian conjugal bond, a typically
Christian communion of two persons because
it represents the mystery of Christ's
incarnation and the mystery of his covenant.
The content of participation in Christ's
life is also specific: Conjugal love
involves a totality, in which all the
elements of the person enter--appeal
of the body and instinct, power of feeling
and affectivity, aspiration of the spirit
and of will. It aims at a deeply personal
unity, the unity that, beyond union
in one flesh, leads to forming one heart
and soul; it demands indissolubility
and faithfulness in definitive mutual
giving; and it is open to fertility
(cf. Humanae Vitae, 9). In a word, it
is a question of the normal characteristics
of all natural conjugal love, but with
a new significance which not only purifies
and strengthens them, but raises them
to the extent of making them the expression
of specifically Christian values."[33]
14. According to the plan of
God, marriage is the foundation of the
wider community of the family, since
the very institution of marriage and
conjugal love is ordained to the procreation
and education of children, in whom it
finds its crowning.[34]
In its most profound reality, love
is essentially a gift; and conjugal
love, while leading the spouses to the
reciprocal "knowledge" which
makes them "one flesh,"[35]
does not end with the couple, because
it makes them capable of the greatest
possible gift, the gift by which they
become cooperators with God for giving
life to a new human person. Thus the
couple, while giving themselves to one
another, give not just themselves but
also the reality of children, who are
a living reflection of their love, a
permanent sign of conjugal unity and
a living and inseparable synthesis of
their being a father and a mother.
When they become parents, spouses receive
from God the gift of a new responsibility.
Their parental love is called to become
for the children the visible sign of
the very love of God, "from whom
every family in heaven and on earth
is named."[36]
It must not be forgotten however that,
even when procreation is not possible,
conjugal life does not for this reason
lose its value. Physical sterility in
fact, can be for spouses the occasion
for other important services to the
life of the human person, for example,
adoption, various forms of educational
work, and assistance to other families
and to poor or handicapped children.
15. In matrimony and in the
family a complex of interpersonal relationships
is set up--married life, fatherhood
and motherhood, filiation and fraternity--through
which each human person is introduced
into the "human family" and
into the "family of God,"
which is the church.
Christian marriage and the Christian
family build up the church: for in the
family the human person is not only
brought into being and progressively
introduced by means of education into
the human community, but by means of
the rebirth of baptism and education
in the faith the child is also introduced
into God's family, which is the church.
The human family, disunited by sin,
is reconstituted in its unity by the
redemptive power of the death and resurrection
of Christ.[37] Christian marriage, by
participating in the salvific efficacy
of this event, constitutes the natural
setting in which the human person is
introduced into the great family of
the church.
The commandment to grow and multiply,
given to man and woman in the beginning,
in this way reaches its whole truth
and full realization.
The church thus finds in the family,
born from the sacrament, the cradle
and the setting in which she can enter
the human generations and where these
in their turn can enter the church.
16. Virginity or celibacy for
the sake of the kingdom of God not only
does not contradict the dignity of marriage
but presupposes it and confirms it.
Marriage and virginity or celibacy are
two ways of expressing and living the
one mystery of the covenant of God with
his people.
When marriage is not esteemed, neither
can consecrated virginity or celibacy
exist; when human sexuality is not regarded
as a great value given by the creator,
the renunciation of it for the sake
of the kingdom of heaven loses its meaning.
Rightly indeed does St. John Chrysostom
say: "Whoever denigrates marriage
also diminishes the glory of virginity.
Whoever praises it makes virginity more
admirable and resplendent. What appears
good only in comparison with evil would
not be particularly good. It is something
better than what is admitted to be good
that is the most excellent good."[38]
In virginity or celibacy, the human
being is awaiting, also in a bodily
way, the eschatological marriage of
Christ with the church, giving himself
or herself completely to the church
in the hope that Christ may give himself
to the church in the full truth of eternal
life. The celibate person thus anticipates
in his or her flesh the new world of
the future resurrection.[39]
By virtue of this witness, virginity
or celibacy keeps alive in the church
a consciousness of the mystery of marriage
and defends it from any reduction and
impoverishment.
Virginity or celibacy, by liberating
the human heart in a unique way,[40]
"so as to make it burn with greater
love for God and all humanity,"[41]
bears witness that the kingdom of God
and his justice is that pearl of great
price which is preferred to every other
value no matter how great, and hence
must be sought as the only definitive
value. It is for this reason that the
church throughout her history has always
defended the superiority of this charism
to that of marriage, by reason of the
wholly singular link which it has with
the kingdom of God.[42]
In spite of having renounced physical
fecundity, the celibate person becomes
spiritually fruitful, the father and
mother of many, cooperating in the realization
of the family according to God's plan.
Christian couples therefore have the
right to expect from celibate persons
a good example and a witness of fidelity
to their vocation until death. Just
as fidelity at times becomes difficult
for married people and requires sacrifice,
mortification and self-denial, the same
can happen to celibate persons, and
their fidelity, even in the trials that
may occur, should strengthen the fidelity
of married couples.[43]
These reflections on virginity or celibacy
can enlighten and help those who, for
reasons independent of their own will,
have been unable to marry and have then
accepted their situation in a spirit
of service.
17. The family finds in the
plan of God the creator and redeemer
not only its identity, what it is, but
also its mission, what it can and should
do. The role that God calls the family
to perform in history derives from what
the family is; its role represents the
dynamic and existential development
of what it is. Each family finds within
itself a summons that cannot be ignored
and that specifies both its dignity
and its responsibility: Family, become
what you are.
Accordingly, the family must go back
to the "beginning" of God's
creative act if it is to attain self-knowledge
and self-realization in accordance with
the inner truth not only of what it
is, but also of what it does in history.
And since in God's plan it has been
established as an "intimate community
of life and love,"[44] the family
has the mission to become more and more
what it is, that is to say, a community
of life and love in an effort that will
find fulfillment, as will everything
created and redeemed, in the kingdom
of God. Looking at it in such a way
as to reach its very roots, we must
say that the essence and role of the
family are in the final analysis specified
by love. Hence the family has the mission
to guard, reveal and communicate love,
and this is a living reflection of and
a real sharing in God's love for humanity
and the love of Christ the Lord for
the church, his bride.
Every particular task of the family
is an expression and concrete actuation
of that fundamental mission. We must
therefore go deeper into the unique
riches of the family's mission and probe
its contents, which are both manifold
and unified.
Thus, with love as its point of departure
and making constant reference to it,
the recent synod emphasized four general
tasks for the family:
I. Forming a community of persons;
II. Serving life;
III. Participating in the development
of society;
IV. Sharing in the life and mission
of the church.
I. FORMING A COMMUNITY OF PERSONS
18. The family, which is founded
and given life by love, is a community
of persons: of husband and wife, of
parents and children, of relatives.
Its first task is to live with fidelity
the reality of communion in a constant
effort to develop an authentic community
of persons.
The inner principle of that task, its
permanent power and its final goal,
is love: Without love the family is
not a community of persons and, in the
same way, without love the family cannot
live, grow and perfect itself as a community
of persons. What I wrote in the encyclical
Redemptor Hominis applies primarily
and especially within the family as
such: "Man cannot live without
love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible
for himself, his life is senseless,
if love is not revealed to him, if he
does not encounter love, if he does
not experience it and make it his own,
if he does not participate intimately
in it."[45]
The love between husband and wife and,
in a derivatory and broader way, the
love between members of the same family--between
parents and children, brothers and sisters
and relatives and members of the household--is
given life and sustenance by an unceasing
inner dynamism leading the family to
ever deeper and more intense communion,
which is the foundation and soul of
the community of marriage and the family.
19. The first communion is the
one which is established and which develops
between husband and wife: By virtue
of the covenant of married life, the
man and woman "are no longer two
but one flesh" 46 and they are
called to grow continually in their
communion through day-today fidelity
to their marriage promise of total mutual
self-giving.
This conjugal communion sinks its roots
in the natural complementarity that
exists between man and woman and is
nurtured through the personal willingness
of the spouses to share their entire
life project, what they have and what
they are: For this reason such communion
is the fruit and the sign of a profoundly
human need. But in the Lord Christ God
takes up this human need, confirms it,
purifies it and elevates it, leading
it to perfection through the sacrament
of matrimony: the Holy Spirit who is
poured out in the sacramental celebration
offers Christian couples the gift of
a new communion of love that is the
living and real image of that unique
unity which makes of the church the
indivisible mystical body of the Lord
Jesus.
The gift of the spirit is a commandment
of life for Christian spouses and at
the same time a stimulating impulse
so that every day they may progress
toward an ever richer union with each
other on all levels--of the body, of
the character, of the heart, of the
intelligence and will, of the soul[47]
--revealing in this way to the church
and to the world the new communion of
love, given by the grace of Christ.
Such a communion is radically contradicted
by polygamy: This, in fact, directly
negates the plan of God which was revealed
from the beginning, because it is contrary
to the equal personal dignity of men
and women, who in matrimony give themselves
with a love that is total and therefore
unique and exclusive. As the Second
Vatican Council writes: "Firmly
established by the Lord, the unity of
marriage will radiate from the equal
personal dignity of husband and wife,
a dignity acknowledged by mutual and
total love."[48]
20. Conjugal communion is characterized
not only by its unity, but also by its
indissolubility: "As a mutual gift
of two persons, this intimate union,
as well as the good of children, imposes
total fidelity on the spouses and argues
for an unbreakable oneness between them."[49]
It is a fundamental duty of the church
to reaffirm strongly, as the synod fathers
did, the doctrine of the indissolubility
of marriage. To all those who in our
times consider it too difficult or indeed
impossible to be bound to one person
for the whole of life, and to those
caught up in a culture that rejects
the indissolubility of marriage and
openly mocks the commitment of spouses
to fidelity, it is necessary to reconfirm
the good news of the definitive nature
of that conjugal love that has in Christ
its foundation and strength.[50]
Being rooted in the personal and total
self-giving of the couple and being
required by the good of the children,
the indissolubility of marriage finds
its ultimate truth in the plan that
God has manifested in his revelation:
He wills and he communicates the indissolubility
of marriage as a fruit, a sign and a
requirement of the absolutely faithful
love that God has for man and that the
Lord Jesus has for the church.
Christ renews the first plan that the
creator inscribed in the hearts of man
and woman, and in the celebration of
the sacrament of matrimony offers "a
new heart": thus the couples are
not only able to overcome "hardness
of heart,"[51] but also, and above
all, they are able to share the full
and definitive love of Christ, the new
and eternal covenant made flesh. Just
as the Lord Jesus is the "faithful
witness,"[52] the "yes"
of the promises of God[53] and thus
the supreme realization of the unconditional
faithfulness with which God loves his
people, so Christian couples are called
to participate truly in the irrevocable
indissolubility that binds Christ to
the church, his bride, loved by him
to the end.[54]
The gift of the sacrament is at the
same time a vocation and commandment
for the Christian spouses, that they
may remain faithful to each other forever,
beyond every trial and difficulty, in
generous obedience to the holy will
of the Lord: "What therefore God
has joined together, let not man put
asunder."[55]
To bear witness to the inestimable
value of the indissolubility and fidelity
of marriage is one of the most precious
and most urgent tasks of Christian couples
in our time. So, with all my brothers
who participated in the Synod of Bishops,
I praise and encourage those numerous
couples who, though encountering no
small difficulty, preserve and develop
the value of indissolubility: Thus in
a humble and courageous manner they
perform the role committed to them of
being in the world a "sign"--a
small and precious sign, sometimes also
subjected to temptation, but always
renewed--of the unfailing fidelity with
which God and Jesus Christ love each
and every human being. But it is also
proper to recognize the value of the
witness of those spouses who, even when
abandoned by their partner, with the
strength of faith and of Christian hope
have not entered a new union: These
spouses too give an authentic witness
to fidelity, of which the world today
has a great need. For this reason they
must be encouraged and helped by the
pastors and the faithful of the church.
21. Conjugal communion constitutes
the foundation on which is built the
broader communion of the family, of
parents and children, of brothers and
sisters with each other, of relatives
and other members of the household.
This communion is rooted in the natural
bonds of flesh and blood and grows to
its specifically human perfection with
the establishment and maturing of the
still deeper and richer bonds of the
spirit: The love that animates the interpersonal
relationships of the different members
of the family constitutes the interior
strength that shapes and animates the
family communion and community.
The Christian family is also called
to experience a new and original communion
which confirms and perfects natural
and human communion. In fact the grace
of Jesus Christ, "the firstborn
among many brethren,"[56] is by
its nature and interior dynamism "a
grace of brotherhood," as St. Thomas
Aquinas calls it.[57] The Holy Spirit,
who is poured forth in the celebration
of the sacraments, is the living source
and inexhaustible sustenance of the
supernatural communion that gathers
believers and links them with Christ
and with each other in the unity of
the church of God. The Christian family
constitutes a specific revelation and
realization of ecclesial communion,
and for this reason too it can and should
be called "the domestic church."[58]
All members of the family, each according
to his or her own gift, have the grace
and responsibility of building day by
day the communion of persons, making
the family "a school of deeper
humanity":[59] This happens where
there is care and love for the little
ones, the sick, the aged; where there
is mutual service every day; when there
is a sharing of goods, of joys and of
sorrows.
A fundamental opportunity for building
such a communion is constituted by the
educational exchange between parents
and children,[60] in which each gives
and receives. By means of love, respect
and obedience toward their parents,
children offer their specific and irreplaceable
contribution to the construction of
an authentically human and Christian
family.[61] They will be aided in this
if parents exercise their unrenounceable
authority as a true and proper "ministry,"
that is, as a service to the human and
Christian well-being of their children
and in particular as a service aimed
at helping them acquire a truly responsible
freedom, and if parents maintain a living
awareness of the "gift" they
continually receive from their children.
Family communion can only be preserved
and perfected through a great spirit
of sacrifice. It requires, in fact,
a ready and generous openness of each
and all to understanding, to forbearance,
to pardon, to reconciliation. There
is no family that does not know how
selfishness, discord, tension and conflict
violently attack and at times mortally
wound its own communion: Hence there
arise the many and varied forms of division
in family life. But, at the same time,
every family is called by the God of
peace to have the joyous and renewing
experience of "reconciliation,"
that is, communion re-established, unity
restored. In particular, participation
in the sacrament of reconciliation and
in the banquet of the one body of Christ
offers to the Christian family the grace
and the responsibility of overcoming
every division and of moving toward
the fullness of communion willed by
God, responding in this way to the ardent
desire of the Lord: "that they
may be one."[62]
22. In that it is, and ought
always to become, a communion and community
of persons, the family finds in love
the source and the constant impetus
for welcoming, respecting and promoting
each one of its members in his or her
lofty dignity as a person, that is,
as a living image of God. As the synod
fathers rightly stated, the moral criterion
for the authenticity of conjugal and
family relationships consists in fostering
the dignity and vocation of the individual
persons, who achieve their fullness
by sincere self-giving.[63]
In this perspective the synod devoted
special attention to women, to their
rights and role within the family and
society. In the same perspective are
also to be considered men as husbands
and fathers, and likewise children and
the elderly.
Above all it is important to underline
the equal dignity and responsibility
of women with men. This equality is
realized in a unique manner in that
reciprocal self-giving by each one to
the other and by both to the children
which is proper to marriage and the
family. What human reason intuitively
perceives and acknowledges is fully
revealed by the word of God: The history
of salvation, in fact, is a continuous
and luminous testimony to the dignity
of women.
In creating the human race "male
and female,"[64] God gives man
and woman an equal personal dignity,
endowing them with the inalienable rights
and responsibilities proper to the human
person. God then manifests the dignity
of women in the highest form possible,
by assuming human flesh from the Virgin
Mary, whom the church honors as the
mother of God, calling her the new Eve
and presenting her as the model of redeemed
woman. The sensitive respect of Jesus
toward the women that he called to his
following and his friendship, his appearing
on Easter morning to a woman before
the other disciples, the mission entrusted
to women to carry the good news of the
resurrection to the apostles--these
are all signs that confirm the special
esteem of the Lord Jesus for women.
The apostle Paul will say: "In
Christ Jesus you are all children of
God through faith . . . There is neither
slave nor free, there is neither male
nor female; for you are all one in Christ
Jesus."[65]
23. Without intending to deal
with all the various aspects of the
vast and complex theme of the relationships
between women and society and limiting
these remarks to a few essential points,
one cannot but observe that in the specific
area of family life a widespread social
and cultural tradition has considered
women's role to be exclusively that
of wife and mother, without adequate
access to public functions, which have
generally been reserved for men.
There is no doubt that the equal dignity
and responsibility of men and women
fully justifies women's access to public
functions. On the other hand the true
advancement of women requires that clear
recognition be given to the value of
their maternal and family role, by comparison
with all other public roles and all
other professions. Furthermore, these
roles and professions should be harmoniously
combined if we wish the evolution of
society and culture to be truly and
fully human.
This will come about more easily if,
in accordance with the wishes expressed
by the synod, a renewed "theology
of work" can shed light upon and
study in depth the meaning of work in
the Christian life and determine the
fundamental bond between work and the
family, and therefore the original and
irreplaceable meaning of work in the
home be recognized and respected by
all in its irreplaceable value.[66]
This is of particular importance in
education: For possible discrimination
between the different types of work
and professions is eliminated at its
very root once it is clear that all
people in every area are working with
equal rights and equal responsibilities.
The image of God in man and in woman
will thus be seen with added luster.
While it must be recognized that women
have the same right as men to perform
various public functions, society must
be structured in such a way that wives
and mothers are not in practice compelled
to work outside the home, and that their
families can live and prosper in a dignified
way even when they themselves devote
their full time to their own family.
Furthermore, the mentality which honors
women more for their work outside the
home than for their work within the
family must be overcome. This requires
that men should truly esteem and love
women with total respect for their personal
dignity, and that society should create
and develop conditions favoring work
in the home.
With due respect to the different vocations
of men and women, the church must in
her own life promote as far as possible
their equality of rights and dignity:
and this for the good of all, the family,
the church and society.
But clearly all of this does not mean
for women a renunciation of their femininity
or an imitation of the male role, but
the fullness of true feminine humanity
which should be expressed in their activity,
whether in the family o
