CATHOLIC MORAL TEACHING
PRE-MARITAL SEX, 'TRIAL MARRIAGES' AND CATHOLICS
A Pastoral reflection by Michael Pfeifer OMI
Bishop of San Angelo, West Texas, USA
Couples living together before Marriage is becoming more common in our modern society. The response of parish leaders to this growing phenomenon requires respect and patient understanding for such couples. At the same time, faithfulness to the sacred values and ideals of Christian marriage and family lifee is also needed. These "trial marriages" present a serious pastoral concern to clergy and all those responsible for passing on Catholic teaching and traditions to couples seeking to enter the life long commitment of Christian marriage.
Some Statistics Today, living together often delays or substitutes for marriage. The rate of those who live together prior to marriage has risen from only about ten percent in 1960 to nearly fifty percent in 1996. When asked why they choose to live together rather than choose marriage most couples respond with something like: "In today's society, with so much divorce, it only makes sense to really get to know each other much more fully; this is why we believe it is important to live together right now... so we can be sure about whether or not it is wise to get married in the future."
Yet, the hard reality is that several studies made since the mid 1980s have come to the conclusion that it is couples who have not lived together who, in fact, have better "marriage adjustment" scores one year after their marriage than did those who lived together before they married. Another study shows that those who lived together before they married scored lower in the "perceived quality of marital communication and marital satisfaction" than those who did not live together prior to their marriage. Still another study shows that the divorce rate is about thirty-eight percent higher among couples who live together prior to their marriage than for those who have not lived together prior to marriage.
It is understandable that couples considering marriage are cautious because they have seen far too many divorces; often their own parents are divorced. Their decision to live together can well be seen as a sensible effort to avoid the failures of too many couples who have gone before them. Their decision to live together may be a very well intended effort to "test" the marital waters before diving into the total commitment of Christian marriage.
This understanding helps to put a finger on the problem. The couple who opts to live together as a way of "testing" the relationship is - by the very fact of living together - leaving a back door open. The very definition of "living together" is that there is an agreement that either person has a right to leave the relationship at any point. Living together is an attempt to live an intimate relationship with an agreement that either person can leave the relationship at any point, for any reason. This is why many of these relationships seem to work very well. For some it seems better than a marriage in which one or both of the spouses has lost interest in "working at" the relationship.
But the fact is that Christian marriage is about commitment. This means sticking with one another and sticking with the relationship, through not only the easy and happy times but also through the hard and sometimes most unhappy times. Commitment only begins when a person (hopefully both persons) chooses to close all the doors and freely chooses to stay with the other person and the relationship in a never-ending way. This freely chosen permanency is a critical element of Christian marriage because only such a stable environment has proven best for raising children. Christian marital commitment means freely choosing to love another person - and eventually one's children - in the way that God chooses to love us.
... forever... without end... no conditions. Unfortunately, there is no way to tip toe into this kind of reality. Commitment can never be "safe" or "without risk". Like an electrical connection, it is either "on" or "off' - there is no middle ground. One is either committed fully, or one is not really committed. And that is the heart of the matter. No amount of living together will ever "prove" one's ability to be committed to another person.
At its best, living together proves that "I am staying with you even though I could leave." But the only way to say "I am going to stick with you and with this relationship for life time" is to stand before one's family and friends and the larger Christian community and profess the vows of Christian marriage - to promise to love and to be faithful in good times and in bad times, in sickness and in health - until death. This is commitment. There is no substitute and no half way place.
Catholic Teaching The Catholic Church has always valued the total commitment of Christian marriage. Not every Christian marriage is a blissful life. Sickness, financial difficulties, problems with children, disappointments with one another... hundreds of kinds of "hard times" are waiting for every couple who dares to vow unconditional love and total commitment to one another in Christian marriage. The amazing fact is not how many marriages end in divorce, but rather how many couples stick with their commitment through situations that very often seem quite hopeless. Catholic couples testify that it is not always the strength of their personal skills, but it is God's own love and grace that empowers them through the hardest times of marriage and family life.
Experienced married couples say they believe that it is their willingness to sacrifice everything in their efforts to love one another that they experience God giving them the grace they need to do what they did not know they could do. The key is trusting in God's grace and commitment. ... the decision to give all of one self, so unconditionally, to one's spouse.
This also explains why the Church has always believed that living together - and all sexual intercourse other than with one's spouse - is a contradiction. Why? Because very early in Christian tradition, it was seen that sexual intercourse could and should be a sign of two people not merely giving pleasure to another but giving their whole selves to one another. Thus the Catholic Church has always viewed sexual intercourse as the most important sign of what Christian marriage is: namely, two people who are willing to give and receive all of themselves to one another... bodies, pleasure, thoughts, hopes, dreams, fears, failings, plans, difficulties, bank accounts, bad moods, in-laws, etc. In the tradition of the Church, there is no such thing as "pre-marital sex". There is only "marital sex", a sign of commitment, and "sex without commitment", which is promiscuity. This is why the Church teaches that couples who love another should not engage in sex before marriage and/or live together before marriage.
A Pastoral Approach
RELIEVING HUMAN FRAILTY
In the elaborate rules for the hearing of confessions we find a spirit of affirmation of man's dignity and of the legitimacy of the expression of his whole self. Along with such an attitude we find the notion of the imitation of Christ, widespread as early as the twelfth century, and a belief that man could aspire to be like God. The rules for confessors showed a great understanding of the concrete situation of the individual and gave recognition to subjective individual differences. They did not treat sin as the weight by which the individual should be weighed down and humiliated, but as human frailty for which one should have understanding and respect.
- Erich Fronim, The Fear of Freedom, 1960 p.62Pope John Paul II offers an overall pastoral approach towards couples living together. Pastors and pastoral leaders should, he recommends, examine each situation case by case. Moreover, they ought to make tactful and respectful contact with those couples and enlighten them patiently, correct them charitably, and show them the witness of Christian family life in such a way as to smooth a path for them to regularise their situation.
When couples who are living together approach the parish requesting to be married in the Church it is important for the parish staff to treat them with hospitality and to assume their motives are sincere, namely recognise that they are seeking to profess their love for one another in the vows of sacred and sacramental Christian marriage.
When the fact of their living together becomes known to the parish ministers, it is important to make sure that those delegated to prepare them for Christian marriage are competent in dealing with this added complexity. To confront the couple immediately and directly condemn their behaviour starts the marriage preparation process off on a sour note and risks further alienating couples who may already be "marginal Catholics". The wise minister will first build a relationship of hospitality and trust in order to set the couple at ease before attempting to address the issue of their living together.
After a meaningful pastoral relationship has been established, then the minister will try to address all the important issues of marriage, and this will include the critical concept of "commitment". It is in this context that the minister can engage the couple in a discussion and dialogue about their understanding of marital commitment and ask questions about how their current situation of living together "fits" with the concept of marital commitment. In a tactful and pastoral manner the Church's reasons for not living together need to be explained to the couple. The minister should strongly encourage the couple to live apart in an appropriate way, stressing that living apart would allow the space needed to be more objective about their relationship. The ministers should emphasise that the Church is always willing and able to assist the couple living together with any reconciliation that may be important or necessary. The couple is reminded that it has long been a part of our tradition to receive the Sacrament of Penance before receiving the Sacrament of Marriage because the Church has never assumed that we human beings are not without sins and failings! The minister should gently encourage the couple to pray and share Scripture together, and to attend Mass.
In addition, it should be said that the couple's living together has traditionallly been considered a situation of public scandal. This is best said to the couple in the form of a question "Have you considered that your situation of living together prior to marriage has caused family members or other people to be uncomfortable?" Depending on their response, then it is possible to initiate a dialogue about what is the best way for them to deal with this issue of giving scandal to others during the time they are preparing for the sacred commitment of Christian marriage.
Some couples will be open and mature enough to discover in their responsibilities to God's norms and the larger community a motivation to live apart during the final months or weeks as they prepare for the life-long commitment of Christian marriage. Others may not. The pastoral leaders may not always understand or agree with their decisions, but will always strive to lead them to a higher level and support their best efforts to be honest with one another and with their Lord in prayer and guide them toward the Sacrament of Penance if that seems appropriate.
In dealing with couples living together, it is helpful to remember that couples have a natural right to the Sacraments. If the couple can otherwise be married validly and licitly, their living together is not an adequate reason to deny the marriage as living together is not a canonical impediment to marriage. The minister's role is to offer the couple the best preparation for marriage in accord with Church teaching. If the couple does not separate, the minister need not postpone or refuse the continuation of their marriage preparation. However, if there is not sufficient awareness on the couple's part of the essential commitment and other obligations of the marriage they are entering into, the marriage should be postponed until such an awareness has been developed.
If the couple's decision is to continue living together throughout the marriage preparation period, then it should be conveyed to them that from the perspective of society and the Church, they are choosing to "appear" as husband and wife to the community. Therefore, generally their wedding should reflect this choice and be small and simple.
The entire faith community is urged too reach out to couples who are currently living together and invite them into a closer union with God through the Church. Guided in prayer by the Holy Spirit, the clergy and others should do what they can to open the door for these couples to regularise their situation. Hopefully this will be in the direction of formal and public Christian marriage. No one should presume to judge the inner spiritual state of these couples; such judgment belongs to God alone.
While we are faithful to the tradition of the Church in reminding such couples that the deepest meaning of sexual intercourse is possible only within the free and full commitment of Christian marriage, we are also guided by the highest law which is love. Obedient to the command of Jesus, we never cease to love others even when they do not live up to the ideals of Christian living. The ultimate purpose of the Church is to be the Saving Hand of God, not the community of condemnation. In the last analysis, it is the Holy Spirit and our reaching out to one another in love and with compassion that will inspire couples living together to deepen their faith and to arrive at a truly Christian vision of Christian marriage.
From "Annals Australia" June 1998
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