What God has joined together....

Previously I posted on the letter from the seven bishops of the State of Michigan denouncing the federal district court’s recent decision to overturn the 2004 voter-approved Michigan Marriage Amendment, which upheld the truth that marriage can only ever be between one man and one woman. This judicial decision is further proof that the shared mind of American culture has darkened.

It was God Himself who created marriage when He created Adam and Eve and ordered them to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:22). Here the Father ordered marriage toward the transmission of human life. The Catechism of the Catholic Church instructs the faithful that marriage exists for the reciprocal good of the partners (husband and wife are called to help each other get to Heaven) and the procreation and education of children. These two purposes cannot be separated, for “What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder." (Mt 19:6).

Marriage belongs to God, and He has a design for it; thus, no one may interfere with His purpose. As the bishops wrote, “Marriage is and can only ever be a unique relationship solely between one man and one woman, regardless of the decision of a judge or future electoral vote. Nature itself, not society, religion or government, created marriage”. God strengthens husband and wife through the Sacrament of Matrimony so that their love, fixed in sacrifice for each other and their offspring, can witness God’s love for us. This is how married couples can take part in the new evangelization – to make God known to the world through honoring His plan for marriage.

In my book I discuss how contraception also interferes with God’s plan for marriage, separating as it does procreation from the marital act. So, too, same-sex “marriages” interfere with the Divine plan. God made male and female and blessed their joining together. As the bishops stated, life cannot originate from use of the sexual faculty by two people of the same gender: “The biological realities of male and female and the complementarity they each bring to marriage uniquely allows for the procreation of children”.

It is important for us to be well-founded in our understanding of marriage as being between one man and one woman, and be courageous in defending it, as the increasingly secular culture would undermine it if good people do nothing.

What is paramount is that marriage belongs to God and He has a plan for it: “For I know the plans I have for you, says the LORD, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” (Jer 29:11).

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