It is a sacrament
of the fusion of two personalities, whereby they are at once
individually and mutually enriched, and at the same time mystically
and spiritually knit together in such a way as to become in the sight
of GOD indissolubly one: the unity of husband and wife being
comparable, according to a famous saying of S. Paul, to the unity
which exists between Christ and His Church. Now, although, from this
point of view, the significance of married life is to a great extent
impoverished and frustrated, if intercourse is so regulated as to
render the marriage childless not in fact merely, but in intention,
yet it does not follow that procreation must be directly in view on
every individual occasion, since the mystical value of intercourse as
a spiritual sacrament of love may still exist in independence of such
intention. It is nevertheless, surely, clear that a Christian man and
his wife are morally precluded from coming together except with a deep
sense of the sacredness of what they do and of its intimate connexion
with the mysteries of life and birth, and a corresponding readiness,
in the event of conception taking place, to accept the ensuing
responsibility for the child as a sacred trust from GOD, "the Father
from whom all fatherhood in heaven and on earth is named.
Pages:
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213