71 articles from the existing collection.
The Catholic Church presents continence as a vital aspect of chastity, a virtue that governs the proper use of human sexuality according to one’s state in life. In marriage, continence is not about suppressing desire but about ordering it toward the good of the spouse and the family. The Church teaches that human sexuality is a …
The Catholic Church’s stance on divorce is grounded in its understanding of marriage as a sacred, indissoluble covenant. Marriage, in Catholic theology, is not merely a human contract but a divine institution established by God. This understanding is articulated in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC 1601–1605), which desc…
The Catholic Church views marriage as a sacred covenant established by God, rooted in the mutual consent of the spouses. This understanding applies to all valid marriages, whether between Catholics or non-Catholics. For a marriage to be valid, it must meet certain conditions, such as free consent, the absence of impediments, and…
Marriage, in the Catholic tradition, is not merely a contract but a sacred covenant established by God. The Church teaches that Christ elevated marriage to the status of a sacrament, making it a visible sign of God’s grace ( Matthew 19:4-6 ). This sacramental nature requires that Catholics marry in the presence of a priest or de…
The Catholic Church holds that celibacy for priests and religious is a sacred commitment rooted in the example of Jesus Christ. Celibacy is not merely a discipline but a way of life that reflects a total gift of self to God and the Church. In the Latin Rite, priests take a vow of celibacy, while religious men and women profess v…
Marriage, in its essence, is a covenant rooted in the natural order, established by God for the mutual support of spouses and the procreation of children. The Catholic Church teaches that this natural institution was elevated by Christ to the dignity of a sacrament for baptized Christians (CCC 1601). This sacramental character d…
Doctors are not infallible, and irreligious doctors are often only too ready to please women by telling them that they are unable to fulfill the duties of motherhood. And as a matter of fact contraception normally has a worse effect upon a woman’s health than childbirth. She becomes a neurasthenic wreck in the end. But in any ca…
Because single men can give undivided attention to their duties, and have more time to study and know the law of God upon which they must base their advice. Then, too, people feel that one who has renounced earthly affections for the love of God has more opportunities of living a disinterested spiritual life, and that his words …
There is all the difference in the world between the two positions. A civil divorce claims to break the bonds of a valid marriage, bonds which the Catholic Church rigidly declares to be unbreakable. A decree of nullity does not break the bonds of a valid marriage at all. It declares that the marriage was never a true marriage an…
On November 6th, 1895, the Duke of Marlborough went through a marriage ceremony with an American girl, Consuelo Vanderbilt. Both were Protestants, and normally such a marriage would have been valid. However, Miss Vanderbilt had secretly promised to marry another man of her own choice, but the mother forced the girl to marry the …
Is it fair to ask the Church to admit to her Sacraments those of any religion or of no religion? People who are complete strangers to her cannot expect her to make as much of them as of those who are her own children. The parties do not resent their exclusion from the Altar nearly so much as the Church resents mixed marriages.
Do you mean that no one with human nature can be pure and chaste? That every young couple entering matrimony can be quite sure that the other has led an evil immoral life up to that moment? If you do not mean that, do you mean that a young man in the world can lead a good life, but suddenly becomes corrupt when he gives himself …
From the aspect of civil law the parties would contract certain civil obligations. But before God and in conscience the marriage would not be valid, and the Catholic party would be living in a sinful alliance, violating her conscience. She would be deprived of the Sacraments of the Church until she repented and had her marriage …
No. Who in this world could persuade thousands of good women to forego theatres, dances, and worldly amusements, and to take a strict vow of perfect chastity in the sight of God, merely that they might be at the service of Priests who offer them no remuneration, and who strangely enough bind themselves by similarly strict vows u…
No. It is divine law that no Catholic may hand over any child to what he or she knows to be a false religion.
As human beings—no; as called, not to the state of marriage, but to the Priesthood—yes. For this reason, whilst like all others who for one reason or another do not marry, they are obliged to avoid all sins against chastity; they also take upon themselves an additional obligation to do so under pain of sacrilege by vows of chast…
That is foolish, and will not better things. Will you neglect other obligations because you have failed in this, and give up religion on the principle that he who commits one sin might just as well commit a dozen sins? The only thing to do after failure is to repent as men do of other sins, and try again to be faithful.
It would not matter if the Bible did not forbid them. Not every detail of Christian practice is there. Christ gave the Church the power to make such legislation as she might think necessary at various times. However that God does not approve mixed marriages between people with the true religion and people without it is clear fro…
Ingersoll, as usual, makes many mistakes. Firstly, he forgot the theocratic nature of the nation of the Jews at that time. God was the direct ruler of the Jews, and idolatry was going over to the king’s enemies, and an act of treason, even in the temporal order. And God has full rights over life and death. Secondly, if Ingersoll…
Such considerations cannot affect the question. They are based upon the evil principle that the end can justify the means. You think you have a good purpose-let there be less of us to enjoy more. With this good end in view, you think to justify birth-control even though by immoral means! It cannot be done. The Church can never t…
If the child is brought up as a Protestant it has the same chance as any Protestant in similar circumstances from other points of view. If brought up as a Catholic, it has the additional helfs of the Catholic religion just as any other Catholic child, except that it has the bad example of a non-Catholic parent ignoring obligatio…
No. A civil divorce was granted in 1920, and both parties had married again before the case was put to Rome in 1926.
St. Paul does not say that a Bishop must be the husband of a wife, but insists upon the expression “one wife.” Had he meant that it was necessary to have a wife, he would have been violating the law himself. In the early Church, owing to the scarcity of single men eligible for the Priesthood, married men who wished to be ordaine…
She gives him right ideas of man’s true dignity, of the law of God, of the rewards and punishments attached to the keeping or breaking of that law. A good Catholic has also the special graces dispensed through the Mass and the Sacraments, absolution for past sins in confession, and Holy Communion, or the reception of Christ’s mo…
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