P R A Y I N G W I T H T H E C H U R C H
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INTENTION : |
That the family - founded on the marriage of a man and a woman - may be recognized as the basic cell of human society.
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The family based on matrimony between a man and a woman is truly the fundamental cell of human society for all times and all places. What was considered the most natural thing in the past is now being questioned by people who try to distort the meaning of matrimony and family.
We cannot forget that matrimony was wanted and instituted by God himself, at the moment of creation (Gen. 1:27-28). God himself created man and woman in their complementarity, so that, in reciprocal giving, they might fulfil the communion of persons which is at the origin of the family.
Matrimony is a pact, the alliance which a man and a woman make in front of God for their entire lives, giving themselves reciprocally, totally, in the indissoluble faithfulness of a bond which makes them one flesh. Consequently it is not a matter of social convention or of a changeable historical event but is part of the essence of humanity.
In little daily things, in loving attention for one another, in the welcome and education of their children, families offer a vital example and truly show that they are the fundamental cells of human society. They are the living cells in which children are brought up to true values: to love, to solidarity, to peace, to a search for the common good, to be one day builders of a society renewed from within.
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