AN INITIATIVE OF
THE UNITED STATES CONFERENCE
OF CATHOLIC BISHOPS
May. 13, 2012
In honor of Mother’s Day, here are a few quotes from Bl. John Paul II’s apostolic letter On the Dignity of Women (Mulieris Dignitatem) about the unique vocation of motherhood:
Bl. John Paul II: “Motherhood involves a special communion with the mystery of life, as it develops in the mother’s womb. The mother is filled with wonder at this mystery of life, and ‘understands’ with unique intuition what is happening inside her. In the light of the ‘beginning’, the mother accepts and loves as a person the child she is carrying in her womb. This unique contact with the new human being developing within her gives rise to an attitude towards human beings – not only towards her own child, but every human being – which profoundly marks the woman’s personality.”
. . .
“Motherhood implies from the beginning a special openness to the new person: and this is precisely the woman’s ‘part’. In this openness, in conceiving and giving birth to a child, the woman ‘discovers herself through a sincere gift of self’.”
. . .
“Human parenthood is something shared by both the man and the woman. Even if the woman, out of love for her husband, says: ‘I have given you a child’, her words also mean: ‘This is our child’. Although both of them together are parents of their child, the woman’s motherhood constitutes a special ‘part’ in this shared parenthood, and the most demanding part. Parenthood – even though it belongs to both – is realised much more fully in the woman, especially in the prenatal period. It is the woman who ‘pays’ directly for this shared generation, which literally absorbs the energies of her body and soul. It is therefore necessary that the man be fully aware that in their shared programme of parenthood he owes a special debt to the woman.”
- Bl. John Paul II, Apostolic Letter Mulieris Dignitatem (1988), no. 18
About this series:
Every Sunday, the Marriage: Unique for a Reason blog will feature a short quote from either our current Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, or our late Holy Father, Bl. John Paul II (or occasionally another pope). These two men have given the world an immense treasury of wisdom about marriage, love, and the meaning of the human person, all of which are topics integral to the Church’s witness today. Their words are well worth reflecting on, as we have much to learn from these wise successors of St. Peter.
May. 6, 2012
Today’s Sunday Pope Quote comes from Bl. John Paul II, in honor of his beatification anniversary earlier this week (May 1). The quote comes from a series of scholarly essays given by John Paul II before he was Pope, so under his baptismal name Karol Wojtyla. Here are present many “seeds” of his later teaching on the theology of the body.
“The category of gift (the disinterested gift of self) takes on special meaning in the marriage covenant. The spouses ‘mutually give themselves to an accept each other’ in a manner proper to the marriage covenant, a manner that presupposes their difference in body and sex and, at the same time, their union in and through this difference. This is a relationship that can be analyzed and interpreted in a variety of ways; the category of gift, however, has a key meaning here. Without it, there would be no way to properly understand and interpret either the marriage relationship as a whole or the acts of conjugal intercourse that are part of this relationship and have a strict causal connection to the emergence of the family.”
. . .
Seeing marriage through the lens of gift “is not an idealistic picture, but a realistic one. The Gospel in a special way demands such realism of us in our appraisal of the marital bond. Man and woman were created as they were (according to the Book of Genesis), different in body and sex, so that through this difference they would be able to make a gift to one another of the specific richness of their respective humanity.”
- Karol Wojtyla (Bl. Pope John Paul II), “The Family as a Community of Persons,” in Person and Community: Selected Essays, trans. Theresa Sandok, OSM (New York: Peter Lang, 1993), p. 324, 325, emphasis original
May. 1, 2012
Video source: The Apostleship of Prayer
Each month Pope Benedict XVI chooses two prayer intentions: a general intention and a mission intention. He invites Christians throughout the world to pray with him for these specific needs. For the month of May, the Holy Father’s general intention is for the family:
“…that initiatives which defend and uphold the role of the family may be promoted within society.”
The video above, from the Apostleship of Prayer website, draws on recent addresses by Pope Benedict on the family to explain how important the family is to him. It also points out that May’s liturgical calendar includes a number of married saints, some of which we’ll feature right here on this blog in the coming days.
We invite you to join with us – and Pope Benedict! – this month in praying for the family.
Read more of Pope Benedict’s teachings on marriage and the family.
Apr. 29, 2012
Apr. 29, 2012
Today’s Sunday Pope Quote is from the 1963 Encyclical Letter of Bl. Pope John XXIII, Pacem in Terris: “On Establishing Universal Peace in Truth, Justice, Charity, and Liberty.”
Bl. John XXIII begins the Encyclical: “Peace on Earth—which man throughout the ages has so longed for and sought after—can never be established, never guaranteed, except by the diligent observance of the divinely established order.” (1)
This “order,” John XXIII observes, “predominates in the world of living beings and in the forces of nature [...] And it is part of the greatness of man that he can appreciate that order, and devise the means for harnessing those forces for his own benefit.” (2)
The Catholic Church teaches that the family, as the union of one man and one woman together with their children, is a part of the natural order; it is essential and foundational for the organization of a humane society.
Bl. Pope John XXIII: “The family, founded upon marriage freely contracted, one and indissoluble, must be regarded as the natural, primary cell of human society. The interests of the family, therefore, must be taken very specially into consideration in social and economic affairs, as well as in the spheres of faith and morals. For all of these have to do with strengthening the family and assisting it in the fulfillment of its mission.”
Bl. Pope John XXIII, Pacem in Terris (no. 16)
About this series:
Every Sunday, the Marriage: Unique for a Reason blog will feature a short quote from either our current Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, or our late Holy Father, Bl. John Paul II (or occasionally another pope). These two men have given the world an immense treasury of wisdom about marriage, love, and the meaning of the human person, all of which are topics integral to the Church’s witness today. Their words are well worth reflecting on, as we have much to learn from these wise successors of St. Peter.
Apr. 22, 2012
Bl. John Paul II: “Love then is not a utopia: it is given to mankind as a task to be carried out with the help of divine grace. It is entrusted to man and woman, in the sacrament of matrimony, as the basic principle of their ‘duty,’ and it becomes the foundation of their mutual responsibility: first as spouses, then as father and mother. In the celebration of the sacrament, the spouses give and receive each other, declaring their willingness to welcome children and to educate them. On this hinges human civilization, which cannot be defined as anything other than a ‘civilization of love’.”
- Letter to Families, no. 15 (emphasis added)
About this series:
Every Sunday, the Marriage: Unique for a Reason blog will feature a short quote from either our current Holy Father, Pope Benedict XVI, or our late Holy Father, Bl. John Paul II (or occasionally another pope). These two men have given the world an immense treasury of wisdom about marriage, love, and the meaning of the human person, all of which are topics integral to the Church’s witness today. Their words are well worth reflecting on, as we have much to learn from these wise successors of St. Peter.
Apr. 15, 2012
During his recent apostolic journey to Mexico and Cuba, Pope Benedict spoke beautifully about the importance of marriage and the family to society:
Pope Benedict XVI: “The mystery of the Incarnation, in which God draws near to us, also shows us the incomparable dignity of every human life. In his loving plan, from the beginning of creation, God has entrusted to the family founded on matrimony the most lofty mission of being the fundamental cell of society and an authentic domestic church. With this certainty, you, dear husbands and wives, are called to be, especially for your children, a real and visible sign of the love of Christ for the Church. Cuba needs the witness of your fidelity, your unity, your capacity to welcome human life, especially that of the weakest and most needy.”
Homily in Santiago de Cuba during Pope Benedict’s Apostolic Journey to Mexico and Cuba (March 26, 2012)
Apr. 6, 2012
Today is Good Friday, part of the “Easter Triduum,” the Church’s remembrance of and participation in Jesus’ Passion, death, and Resurrection. On Good Friday we remember Jesus’ crucifixion, death, and burial.
In his apostolic exhortation Familiaris Consortio, Bl. John Paul II reflected at length on the connection between marriage and the cross:
“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,’ and, freeing man from his hardness of heart, he makes man capable of realizing truth it 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; the marriage of baptized persons thus becomes a real symbol of that new and eternal covenant sanctioned in the blood of Christ.
. . .
“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.”
Bl. John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio (no. 13, emphasis added)
Apr. 5, 2012
Today the Church celebrates Holy Thursday or Maundy Thursday, commemorating Jesus’ last supper with his disciples and the institution of the Eucharist. The evening of Holy Thursday marks the beginning of the “Easter Triduum,” the three days of intense recollection of Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection.
In his 2007 apostolic exhortation about the Eucharist, Sacramentum Caritatis, Pope Benedict devotes one section to explaining the connection between marriage and the Eucharist. His words provide a fitting reflection for Holy Thursday.
The Eucharist, a nuptial sacrament
“The Eucharist, as the sacrament of charity, has a particular relationship with the love of man and woman united in marriage. A deeper understanding of this relationship is needed at the present time. Pope John Paul II frequently spoke of the nuptial character of the Eucharist and its special relationship with the sacrament of Matrimony: ‘The Eucharist is the sacrament of our redemption. It is the sacrament of the Bridegroom and of the Bride.’ [MD, 26] Moreover, ‘the entire Christian life bears the mark of the spousal love of Christ and the Church. Already Baptism, the entry into the People of God, is a nuptial mystery; it is so to speak the nuptial bath which precedes the wedding feast, the Eucharist.’ [CCC, 1617] The Eucharist inexhaustibly strengthens the indissoluble unity and love of every Christian marriage. By the power of the sacrament, the marriage bond is intrinsically linked to the eucharistic unity of Christ the Bridegroom and his Bride, the Church (cf. Eph 5:31-32). The mutual consent that husband and wife exchange in Christ, which establishes them as a community of life and love, also has a eucharistic dimension. Indeed, in the theology of Saint Paul, conjugal love is a sacramental sign of Christ’s love for his Church, a love culminating in the Cross, the expression of his ‘marriage’ with humanity and at the same time the origin and heart of the Eucharist. For this reason the Church manifests her particular spiritual closeness to all those who have built their family on the sacrament of Matrimony. The family – the domestic Church – is a primary sphere of the Church’s life, especially because of its decisive role in the Christian education of children. In this context, the Synod also called for an acknowledgment of the unique mission of women in the family and in society, a mission that needs to be defended, protected and promoted. Marriage and motherhood represent essential realities which must never be denigrated.”
Pope Benedict XVI, Sacramentum Caritatis (no. 27, emphasis added)
Apr. 1, 2012
Today’s Sunday Pope Quote comes from a message sent by Pope Benedict about a year ago to Latin American and Caribbean bishops who were meeting in Bogota, Columbia. The Holy Father remarks how central the family is to Latin American and Caribbean culture, and then continues:
One notes, however, with sadness, that homes are coming under increasingly adverse conditions caused by rapid cultural changes, by social instability, by the flows of migrants, by poverty, by educational programs that trivialize sexuality and by false ideologies. We cannot remain indifferent to these challenges. In the Gospel we find the light needed to respond to them without losing heart. Christ with his grace urges us to work with diligence and enthusiasm to accompany each one of the family members in discovering God’s plan of love for the human person. No effort is therefore wasted in promoting anything that can help to ensure that each family, founded on the indissoluble union between a man and a woman, accomplishes its mission of being a living cell of society, a nursery of virtues, a school of constructive and peaceful coexistence, an instrument of harmony and a privileged environment in which human life is welcomed and protected, joyfully and responsibly, from its beginning until its natural end.
Message on the Occasion of the Meeting of Bishops Who Head Episcopal Commissions for the Family and Life in Latin America and the Caribbean (March 28, 2012, emphasis added)
Mar. 25, 2012
The Church teaches that a valid marriage bond is indissoluble, that is, it’s unable to be broken: “The love of the spouses requires, of its very nature, the unity and indissolubility of the spouses’ community of persons, which embraces their entire life: ‘so they are no longer two, but one flesh’” (CCC, no. 1644). In today’s Sunday Pope Quote, Pope Pius XII gives a beautiful word-picture of what indissolubility does and why it is a gift and a blessing.
Pope Pius XII: In the face of such a law of indissolubility, human passion in every age, chained and repressed in the free satisfaction of its inordinate appetites, has sought in every way to throw off its yoke. Passion sees in this law only a hard tyranny, arbitrarily weighing down conscience with an unsupportable burden, with a slavery repugnant to the sacred rights of the human person. It is true; a bond can at times constitute a burden, a slavery, like the chains which bind the prisoner. But it can also be a powerful aid and a sure guarantee, like the rope which binds the alpine climber to his companion during the ascent, or the ligaments which unite the parts of the human body, making its movements free and easy. This is clearly the case with the indissoluble bond of marriage” (emphasis added).
- Audience with newlywed couples on April 22, 1942, from Dear Newlyweds: Pope Pius XII Speaks to Married Couples, trans. James F. Murray Jr. and Bianca M. Murray (Kansas City, MO: Sarto House, 1961), p. 88.
