Marriage

We need to make a few distinctions.  First, law is an ordinance of reason for the common good of society and its members.  Particular laws may need to be altered to deal with a change in conditions but no new law, if it is truly a law (for the good of society and its members) can ignore that good.  Otherwise, it turns into a species of violence forcing society’s members to embrace what is harmful. The invention of the roundabout assisting movement of motor traffic, required a law giving a right of way to a car which had entered the roundabout over the right of other drivers.   A law which, for instance, gave right of way to the fastest car to enter a roundabout, would inevitably bring harm to other road users and would be a bad law. But there is another and even more important distinction.  The essence of marriage—i.e., what marriage is—is not something determined by human law.  It is prior both in time and in reality to any human law.  Long before any state or government ever existed, before written laws were produced, men and women married.  They did so as a consequence of their nature. Posited laws (statutes, regulations) may determine the conditions to be met for a marriage to be lawful and valid.  They may provide for its celebration and its recording.  But such laws simply put legal flesh on a natural institution. In 1534, King Henry VIII prevailed on his parliament to pass a law ‘legalising’ his own unilateral act of putting aside his marriage to his Queen, Catherine of Aragon, and another law compelling his subjects to recognise this unilateral action. In doing this, he sought to make subject to human will what was prior to human will. His action succeeded in disturbing the foundations of marriage through the brutal enforcement of these ‘laws’ by his henchman, Thomas Cromwell, and because of the subsequent success of the revolt against the guardian of the moral law, the Catholic Church, in the British Isles. The precedent of making marriage subject to the will of man as to its permanence led inevitably to the view that marriage is subject to man’s will as to its essence.  It is this view which is at the heart of the push to allow those of the same sex to marry.

The law that determines marriage’s essence is a law of nature not of human making.  Just as a man is not free to change his own essence (what he is), neither is he free to change the essence of marriage. To complete the argument, man is determined by nature both as to what he is and how he operates.  If he attempts to break that mould, to force nature to meet his demands, he will inevitably come to grief.

Hence, it does not follow that because nature allows a man and a woman to marry, homosexuals should be allowed to solemnise their unnatural ‘union’ in analogous fashion. Homosexual couples may formalise some sort of union between them but such a union is not marriage because it breaches the definition of marriage (the conjugal union of a man and a woman for the procreation of children).  It is impossible, moreover, that such a union could produce offspring naturally (per se), only through artifice or adoption (per accidens).  Nor is it possible for the union to result in the good per se of the two, even if there should result some good per accidens.

Love has many facets: philia is true disinterested love for mankind. That is, love of friendship (e.g. an abortion sidewalk counsellor who is detached from emotion and the circumstance of a girl/woman contemplating abortion, demonstrates philia love for her because abortion is wrong and will leave her wounded and her child dead.  Agape means brotherly love as in a family or church. As Pope Emeritus Benedict notes, agape expresses the experience of a love which involves a real discovery of the other, moving beyond the selfish character that prevailed earlier. Love now becomes concern and care for the other. No longer is it self-seeking, sinking in the intoxication of happiness; instead it seeks the good of the beloved: it becomes renunciation and it is ready, and even willing, for sacrifice. Eros implies the sentiments and emotions that lead on to sexual love. Eros, reduced to pure sex, has become a commodity, a mere thing to be bought and sold, or rather, man himself becomes a commodity. In order to exist, eros is dependent upon the situation and circumstances. As long as a couple is enjoying a romantic situation, eros can thrive. But, as soon as hurtful words or actions appear, eros simply evaporates. Eros is also held captive to each person’s perception. Therefore, eros cannot provide a reliable basis for building a deep and meaningful relationship since it is so fickle and dependent upon perception and circumstances.

Countless studies show that both genders make important gender-related contributions to marriage and family life. For decades, the social sciences have provided clear and convincing evidence that not all family structures are the same with respect to facilitating healthy family environments. Refer to Scholar Studies references below.