300. Matrimony: natural or supernatural?
300. MATRIMONY: NATURAL OR SUPERNATURAL?
Is Matrimony a universal natural law institution as well as a supernatural Catholic sacrament?
Whether matrimony (marriage) is of natural law?
Objection 1. It would seem that matrimony is not natural. Because the natural law is what nature has taught all animals. But in other animals the sexes are united without matrimony. Therefore matrimony is not of natural law.
Reply to Objection 1. The human species in so far as it is rational overflows its genus. . . (i.e.), the generic nature, though one in all animals, yet is not in all in the same way. . . . [T]he begetting of offspring is common to all animals, yet nature does not incline thereto in the same way in all animals, since there are animals whose offspring are able to seek food immediately after birth, or are sufficiently fed by their mother (alone); and in these there is no tie between male and female. . . . In those whose offspring need the support of both parents, although for a short time, there is a certain tie, as may be seen in certain birds. In man, however, since the child needs the parents’ care for a long time, there is a very great tie between male and female. . . .
Objection 2. Further, that which is of natural law is found in all men with regard to their every state. But matrimony was not in every state of man, for as Tully says, at the beginning men were savages and then no man knew his own children. . . .
Reply to Objection 2. . . . Holy Writ states that there has been matrimony from the beginning of the human race. (Tully’s and Hobbes’ and Rousseau’s “state of nature” is a myth.)
Objection 4. . . . [T]hose things without which the intention of nature can be maintained would seem not to be natural. But nature intends the preservation of the species by generation, which is possible without matrimony, as in the case of fornicators, therefore matrimony is not natural.
Reply to Objection 4. Nature intends not only being in the offspring, but also perfect (completed) being, for which matrimony is necessary (S41,1).
I answer that, A thing is said to be natural in two ways. (This is a very important distinction for modern moral arguments about “natural law” and “unnatural” acts.) First, as resulting of necessity from the principles of nature: thus upward movement is natural to fire. In this way matrimony is not natural, nor are any of those things that come to pass at the intervention or movement of the free will. Secondly, that is said to be natural to which nature inclines, even though it comes to pass through the intervention of the free will: thus acts of virtue and the virtues themselves are called natural. And in this way matrimony is natural, because natural reason inclines thereto in two ways.
First, in relation to the principal end of matrimony, namely the good of the offspring. (How often we forget this!) For nature intends not only the begetting of offspring but also its education and development. . . . Now a child cannot be brought up and instructed unless it have certain and definite parents, and this would not be the case unless there were a tie between the man and a definite woman, and it is in this tie that matrimony consists.
Secondly, in relation to the secondary end of matrimony, which is the mutual services which married people render to one another. . . . Among those works that are necessary for human life, some are becoming to men, others to women. Wherefore nature inculcates that society of man and woman which consists in matrimony. These are the two reasons given by the Philosopher (S41,1).
Matrimony is (1) the only sacrament which is also part of the natural law, (2) the first sacrament God instituted, in Eden, and (3) the most essential of all human relationships and social institutions. Its breakdown in our day is the surest possible sign of the future doom of our culture. Its restoration is the primary need and vocation in our secular society, and must begin in the Church. There is indeed a crisis of vocations today: there is a desperate need for more holy fathers and mothers.