Pastoral Letter On Marriage

The section assigned to us of the “US Bishops Pastoral Letter on Marriage” addressed the definition of marriage, why a marriage must be between a man and a woman, the purpose of marriage, and the effect contraceptives have on a marriage. According to the letter, marriage is a mutually exclusive, voluntary, lifelong union of a man and a woman ordered to the benefit of the spouses and for reproductive purposes. It claims that marriage is not purely a human institution by stating that God himself is the author of marriage. If God is the author of marriage, then how is it that people who are not religious can be joined in marriage? Marriage, although initially rooted in religious practices is now a legal term endorsed by the state and can be

This purpose seems relatively reasonable if it is being examined by a conservative Christian. The church teaches that these two purposes cannot be separated, well that is until it contradicts itself by stating that married couples who are not able to have children are not “less married” than couples who can have children. So in that respect, if a man is to receive a vasectomy then he is not violating the holy purpose of marriage because he is physically unable to produce offspring? This leads to the next assertion made in the letter which is that the use of contraceptives is viewed as violating what makes intercourse a marital act. A condition of marriage, according to the church, is to be open to procreation, therefore any acts of contraception go against the institution of marriage. However, the Church then again contradicts itself by claiming that the contraceptive method which involved abstaining from sex during times when a woman is likely to become pregnant is not wrong. This begs the question, if the purpose of utilizing a condom and the purpose of abstaining from sex during certain time periods are both to prevent pregnancy then what differentiates one from the other in the sense of right and wrong other than an arbitrary command from