Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 7—November 6,1980
Synod Message To Christian Families
VATICAN CITY (NC) - Here is the official English
version of “A Message to Christian Families in the Modem
World,” issued by the 1980 world Synod of Bishops at the
close of the synod Oct. 25:
I. Introduction
1. We have come to the end of the synod. For the past
month we bishops from all over the world have met here
in Rome in union with the holy father and under his
leadership. Before returning to our own countries, we
wish to address these few words to you. It is not our
intention to give answers to all the complex questions
raised in our day about marriage and the family. We only
want to share with you the love, confidence, and hope
which we feel. As your bishops and pastors, who are also
your brothers in the faith, we have been united with you
during these weeks; nor have we forgotten that we too
grew up in families with all their joys and sorrows. To you
and to our own families we are deeply grateful.
II. The Situation of Families Today
2. In our discussions of family life today we have
found joys and consolations, sorrows and difficulties. We
must look first for the good things and seek to build on
them and make them perfect, confident always that God
is present everywhere in his creatures and that we can
discern his will in the signs of our times. We are
encouraged by the many good and positive things that we
see. We rejoice that so many families, even in the face of
great pressure to do otherwise, gladly fulfill the God-given
mission entrusted to them. Their goodness and fidelity in
responding to God’s grace and shaping their lives by his
teaching gave us a great hope.
The number of families who consciously want to live
the life of the Gospel, giving witness to the fruits of the
Spirit, continues to grow in all our lands.
3. During this past month we have learned much about
the many and varied cultural conditions in which
Christian families live. The church must accept and foster
this rich diversity, while at the same time encouraging
Christian families to give effective witness to God’s plan
within their own cultures. But all cultural elements must
be evaluated in light of the Gospel, to ensure that they are
consistent with the divine plan for marriage and the
family. This duty - of acceptance and evaluation - is part
of the same task of discernment.
4. A more serious problem than that of culture is the
condition of those families who live in need in a world of
such great wealth. In many parts of the globe, as well as
within individual countries, poverty is increasing as a
result of social, economic and political structures which
foster injustice, oppression and dependence. Conditions in
many places are such as to prevent many young men and
women from exercising their right to marry and lead
decent lives. In the more developed countries, on the
other hand, one finds another kind of deprivation: a
spiritual emptiness in the midst of abundance, a misery of
mind and spirit which makes it difficult for people to
understand God’s will for human life and causes them to
be anxious about the present and fearful of the future.
Many find it difficult to enter into and live up to the
permanent commitment of marriage. Their hands are full,
but their wounded hearts are waiting for a Good
Samaritan who will bind up their wounds, pouring on
them the wine and oil of health and gladness.
5. Often certain governments and some international
organizations do violence to families. The integrity of the
home is violated. Family rights in regard to religious
liberty, responsible' parenthood and education are not
respected. Families regard themselves as wards and victims
rather than as human beings responsible for their own
affairs. Families are compelled - and this we oppose
vehemently - to use such immoral means for the solution
of social, economic and demographic problems as
contraception or, even worse, sterilization, abortion and
euthanasia. The synod therefore strongly urges a charter
of family rights to safeguard these rights everywhere.
6. Underlying many of the problems confronting
families and indeed the world at large is the fact that
many people seem to reject their fundamental vocation to
participate in God’s life and love. They are obsessed with
the desire to possess, the will for power, the quest for
pleasure. Instead of looking upon their fellow human
beings as brothers and sisters, members of the human
family, they regard them as obstacles and adversaries.
Where people lose their sense of God, the heavenly
Father, they also lose their sense of the human family.
How can human beings see one another as brothers and
sisters if they have lost their consciousness of having a
common Father? The fatherhood of God is the only basis
for the unity of the human family.
III. God’s Plan for Marriage and the Family
7. God’s eternal plan (cf. Eph. 1, 3ff) is that all men
and women should participate and share in the divine life
and being (cf. 1 Jn. 1, 3; 2 Pt. 1, 4). The Father summons
people to realize this plan in union with their fellow
human beings, thus forming the people of God (cf.
“Lumen Gentium” - Dogmatic Constitution on the
Church - 9).
8. In a special way the family is called to carry out this
divine plan. It is, as it were, the first cell of the church,
helping its members to become agents of the history of
salvation and living signs of God’s loving plan for the
world.
God created us in his own image (cf. Gn. 1, 26), and he
gave us the mission to increase and multiply, to fill the
earth and subdue it (cf. Gn. 1, 28). To carry out this plan
man and woman are joined in an intimate union of love
for the service of life. God calls spouses to participate in
his creative power by handing on the gift of life.
In the fullness of time, the Son of man born of woman
(Gal. 4, 4) enriched marriage with his saving grace,
elevating it to the level of a sacrament and causing it to
share in the covenant of his redemptive love sealed with
his blood. Christ’s love and gift to the church and those of
the church to Christ become the model of the mutual love
and selfgiving of man and woman (cf. Eph. 5, 22-32). The
sacramental grace of matrimony is a source of joy and
strength to the spouses. As ministers of this sacrament,
they truly act in the person of Christ himself and bring
about their mutual sanctification. Spouses must be
conscious of this grace and of the presence of the Holy
Spirit. Each day, dear brothers and sisters, you must hear
Christ saying to you: “If only you recognized God’s gift”
(cf. Jn. 4,10).
9. This divine plan shows us why the church believes
and teaches that the covenant of love and seif-giving
between two people joined in sacramental marriage must
be both permanent and indissoluble. It is a covenant of
love and life. The transmission of life is inseparable from
the conjugal union. The conjugal act itself, as the
encyclical “Humanae Vitae” (Of Human Life) tells us,
must be fully human, total, exclusive and open to new life
(“Humanae Vitae,” 9 and 11).
10. God’s plan for marriage and the family can only be
fully understood, accepted and lived by persons who have
experienced conversion of heart, that radical turning of
the self to God by which one puts off the “old” self and
puts on the “new.” All are called to conversion and
sanctity. We must all come to the knowledge and love of
the Lord and experience him in our lives, rejoicing in his
love and mercy, his patience, compassion and forgiveness,
and loving one another as he loves us. Husbands and
wives, parents and children, are instruments and ministers
of Christ’s fidelity and love in their mutual relationships.
It is this which makes Christian marriage and family life
authentic signs of God’s love for us and of Christ’s love
for the church.
11. But the pain of the cross, as well as the joy of the
resurrection, is part of the life of one who seeks as a
pilgrim to follow Christ. Only those who are fully open to
the paschal mystery can accept the difficult but loving
demands which Jesus Christ makes of us. If because of
human weakness one does not live up to these demands,
there is no reason for discouragement. “Let them not be
discouraged, but rather have recourse with humble
perseverance to the mercy of God” (“Humanae Vitae,”
25).
IV. The Family’s Response to God’s Plan
12. Just as we are doing, you also are seeking to learn
what your duties are in today’s world. In looking at the
world, we see facing you certain important tasks of
education. You have the tasks of forming free persons
with a keen moral sense and a discerning conscience,
together with a perception of their duty to work for the
betterment of the human condition and the sanctification
of the world. Another task for the family is to form
persons in love and also to practice love in all its
relationships, so that it does not live closed in on itself but
remains open to the community, moved by a sense of
justice and concern for others as well as by a
consciousness of its responsibility toward the whole of
society. It is your duty to form persons in the faith - that
is, in knowledge and love of God and eagerness to do his
will in all things. It is also your task to hand on sound
human and Christian values and to form persons in such a
way that they can integrate new values into their lives.
The more Christian the family becomes, the more human
it becomes.
13. In fulfilling these tasks the family will be, as it
were, a “domestic church,” a community of faith living in
hope and love, serving God and the entire human family.
Shared prayer and the liturgy are sources of grace for
families. In fulfilling its tasks the family must nourish
itself on God’s word and participate in the life of the
sacraments, especially reconciliation and the Eucharist.
Traditional and contemporary devotions, particularly
those associated with the Blessed Virgin, are rich sources
of growth in piety and grace.
14. Evangelization and catechesis begin in the family.
Formation in faith, chastity and the other Christian
virtues, as well as education in human sexuality, must
start in the home. Yet the outlook of the Christian family
should not be narrow and confined only to the parish; it
should embrace the whole human family. Within the
larger community it has a duty to give witness to Christian
values. It should foster social justice and relief of the poor
and oppressed. Family organizations should be
encouraged to protect their rights by opposing unjust
social structures and public and private policies which
harm the family. Such organizations should also exercise a
healthy influence on the communications media and build
up social solidarity. Special praise is due those family
organizations whose purpose is to help other married
couples and families appreciate God’s plan and live by it.
This like-to-like ministry should be encouraged as part of
comprehensive family ministry.
15. Out of a sense of fidelity to the Gospel, the family
should be prepared to welcome new life, to share its goods
and resources with the poor, to be open and hospitable to
others. Today the family is sometimes obliged to choose a
way of life that goes contrary to modern culture in such
matters as sexuality, individual autonomy and material
wealth. In the face of sin and failure, it gives witness to an
authentically Christian spirit, sensitive in its life and in the
lives of others there to the values of penance and
forgiveness, reconciliation and hope. It gives evidence of
the fruits of the Holy Spirit and the Beatitudes. It
practices a simple style of life and pursues a truly
evangelical apostolate toward others.
V. The Church and the Family
16. During the synod we have grown in awareness of
the church’s duty to encourage and support couples and
families. We have deepened our commitment in this
regard.
17. Family ministry is of very special interest to the
church. By this we mean efforts made by the whole
people of God through local communities, especially
through the help of pastors and lay people devoted to
pastoral work for families. They work with individuals,
couples and families to help them live out their conjugal
vocation as fully as possible. This ministry includes
preparation for marriage; help given to married couples at
all stages of married life; catechetical and liturgical
programs directed to the family; help given to childless
couples, single-parent families, the widowed, the separated
and divorced, and, in particular, to families and couples
laboring under burdens like poverty, emotional and
psychological tensions, physical and mental handicaps,
alcohol and drug abuse, and the problems associated with
migration and other circumstances which strain family
stability.
18. The priest has a special place in family ministry. It
is his duty to bring the nourishment and consolation of
the word of God, the sacraments, and other spiritual aids
to the family, encouraging it and in a human and patient
way, strengthening it in charity so that families which are
truly outstanding can be formed (cf. “Gaudium et Spes” -
Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World
- 52). One precious fruit of this ministry, along with
others, ought to be the flourishing of priestly and religious
vocations.
19. In speaking of God’s plan, the church has many
things to say to men and women about the essential
equality and complementarity of the sexes, as well as
about the different charisms and duties of spouses within
marriage. Husband and wife are certainly different, but
they are also equal. The difference should be respected
but never used to justify the domination of one by the
other. In collaboration with society, the church must
effectively affirm and defend the dignity and rights of
women.
VI. Conclusion
20. As we reach the end of our message, we wish to say
to you, brothers and sisters, that we are fully aware of the
frailty of our common human condition. In no way do we
ignore the very difficult and trying situation of the many
Christian couples who, although they sincerely want to
observe the moral norms taught by the church, find
themselves unequal to the task because of weakness in the
face of difficulties. All of us need to grow in appreciation
of the importance of Christ’s teachings and his grace and
to live by them. Accompanied and assisted by the whole
church, those couples continue along the difficult way
toward a more complete fidelity to the commands of the
Lord.
“The journey of married couples, like the whole
journey of human life, meets with delays and difficult and
burdensome times. But it must be clearly stated that
anxiety or fear should never be found in the souls of
people of good will. For is not the Gospel also good news
for family life? For all the demands it makes, is it not a
profoundly liberating message? The awareness that one
has not achieved his full interior liberty and is still at the
mercy of his tendencies and finds himself unable to obey
the moral law in an area so basic causes deep distress. But
this is the moment in which the Christin, rather than
giving way to sterile and destructive panic, humbly opens
up his soul before God as a sinner before the saving love
of Christ.” (Pope Paul VI, Address to the Teams of Our
Lady, May 4, 1970).
21. Everything we have said about marriage and the
family can be summed up in two words: love and life. As
we come to the end of this synod, we pray that you, our
brothers and sisters, may grow in the love and life of God.
In turn we humbly and gratefully beg your prayers that
we may do the same. We make St. Paul’s words to the
Colossians our final words to you: “Over all these virtues
put on love, which binds the rest together and makes
them perfect. Christ’s peace must reign in your hearts,
since as members of the one body you have been called to
that peace. Dedicate yourselves to thankfulness” (Col. 3,
14-15).
BY JERRY FILTEAU
VATICAN CITY (NC) - The 1980 world Synod of
Bishops had two parts.
One consisted of controversial, high-visibility issues,
such as artificial contraception and divorce and
remarriage, which attracted the most public concern and
media attention.
Then there were the less controversial issues, important
to Catholic family life and treated seriously and at length
by the synod fathers but buried in the flood of news of
the high-visibility question.
These included the family’s role in education and sex
education, the family’s apostolate and family spirituality,
families in difficult circumstances, family associations,
and comments on the growing modern phenomenon of
extramarital living arrangements.
Theme of the synod was: “The Role of the Christian
Family in the World of Today.”
Here is a look at what the synod’s secret final
propositions, obtained by NC News, said on the less
controversial issues.
On education:
“The responsibility for education affects parents first
of all.” It is their first task and an inalienable right that
cannot be refused by them.
Parents are to educate their children in faith, in “the
mystery of life,” and a spirit of obedience, responsibility,
justice, love, peace, and prayer. They are to assist children
prudently in their choice of vocation.
To help parents fulfill their duties of educating
children in the faith “it is useful to have a catechism text
available for family use that is clear, short and easy to
memorize.”
“Education in faith includes education to true love.
The family as a community of love and life is the special
place for education to love,” including education in
sexuality and affectivity.
Because the family is the primary place for sex
education “the church firmly opposes a certain sex
education which more often is nothing other than an
introduction into the methods of acquiring sensual
pleasure and doing so without danger. In so far as the
school cooperates in sex education it must strenuously
observe the law of subsidiarity and cooperate with the
parents in the same spirit.”
In pastoral work education has a major place.
Collaboration between parents and the Christian
community is necessary. Catholic schools must be
renewed and the parents’ right to choose an education in
accord with their religious faith must be protected.
“Where ideologies opposed to the Christian faith are
taught in the schools” families must work together to
fight this forcefully and wisely. In such cases the church
has a special duty to aid the families.
Social and cultural roles of the family:
Strong Christian families are needed to build up a
civilization of love.
The tasks of the Christian family in the social and
cultural spheres include cooperating in constructing a
more human world, preserving cultural values, developing
attitudes of love and communion and a habit of dialogue
and respect for others in their children, special love for
the poor and those in need, preservation of natural goods
through simplicity and austerity of life, the fostering of
ethics and justice in public life, and cooperation in
developing a new international order.
Families, especially those without children, should help
the children of others, by adoption or by other means of
assistance.
Families in special circumstances:
The synod drew up a long list of families in adverse
circumstances who deserve special help from the church:
“families of migrants, specifically of migrant workers,
military families, refugee and exile families, the
marginalized families of the large cities, homeless families,
incomplete families, families who have handicapped
children or children addicted to drugs, families of
alcoholics, families that have lost their social and cultural
roots, families discriminated against politically or in other
ways, ideologically split families, families suffering for the
faith, families with spouses who are minors.”
Beside comprehensive pastoral care these families need
assistance from the church and society in “a renewal of
public conscience, and thence of structures - cultural,
economic, social and juridical.”
The apostolic role of the family:
“Future evangelization depends in great part on the
domestic church (the family.)” The apostolic mission of
the family is based on baptism; and families must form
children to participate in the appostolate, whatever their
vocations.
(An earlier proposition on Christian vocations says,
“Virginity and celibacy for the sake of God’s kingdom not
only do not contradict the theology of matrimony but
presuppose and confirm it . . .Where matrimonial faith is
not esteemed, virginity cannot exist either. Where
sexuality is not considered a great good given to men by
the creator there is lacking a sense of man renouncing its
use for the sake of the kingdom of Heaven.”)
The family apostolate is fulfilled especially in
preferential love for the poor and can be fulfilled
effectively through apostolic movements.
Family spirituality:
The family is the “domestic church,” the community
of faith and love.
Parents open to life are examples of a spirituality of
creation and build up the community. By their
faithfulness they witness a covenant of spirituality. In
their self-giving and daily trials they witness the
spirituality of the cross and resurrection.
The Christian family also stands as a sign against
destructive values present in society.
On the other hand, “often the atmosphere and
appropriate time and place for genuine spirituality is
lacking for families.” Families are encouraged to seek
growth in spirituality through such things as family
prayer, observation of popular piety, and family
participation in community celebrations, particularly in
the most significant liturgical times and those related to
special family events.
The family is the special place in which a person grows
and forms conscience.
On family associations:
These serve to strengthen Christian values and should
be promoted. They do not serve to separate their
members from the rest of the Christian community, but
rather to become a “light” and a “leaven” for all.
Extra-marital living arrangements:
The phenomenon of so-called “trial marriages” is
growing rapidly. Experiments are to be performed on
things, not people, and even human reason must reject
trial marriages. In the light of faith, the giving of one’s
body is a real and deep symbol of the whole person, and
this cannot be done without the help of Christ’s love
through the sacrament of matrimony.
Children should be formed to understand the nature of
sexuality and the human person in its totality.
“The reasons behind this phenomenon should be
investigated under their sociological and psychological
aspects as well, so that an appropriate therapy may be
found.”
Another rapidly growing phenomenon is that of
“so-called free unions,” marked often by a rejection of
repudiation of marriage and social norms or by a
consumerist attitude towards sex.
“The moral and social consequences are disastrous: An
irreparable wound is inflicted on the sense of fidelity and
its social witness; the very cell of society is
destroyed . . .The religious sense, to be cultivated in the
light of God’s covenant with his people, is lost.”
The church should exercise great pastoral care with
persons in these situations, trying to develop in them a
moral and religious sense of fidelity as the basis of true
freedom.
Political authorities should be called on to resist these
tendencies with effective means “not only for the stability
of society itself but also for the dignity, security and
sound health of citizens.”
SYNOD ENDS -- Pope John Paul II precedes
bishops descending the Scala Regia in the Vatican
at the conclusion of the world Synod of Bishops
(NC Photo)
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