Marriage: A Sacrament or Contract?

The Catholic Thing ^ | June 2012 | Howard Kainz

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The Norwegian novelist, Sigrid Undset (1882-1949), baptized a Lutheran but raised by agnostic parents, and who emerged from a difficult seven-year marriage at age thirty-seven, converted to Catholicism in 1924.

In 1928, she received the Nobel Prize for Literature. Shortly after, a priest in Oslo asked her why, even before her conversion, she had referred to marriage as a “sacrament” in her novels of medieval Norway, although for a Protestant marriage is only a contract.

She replied that this would require a rather lengthy explanation, and she offered the explanation in an essay published in an Oslo Catholic magazine, Credo, which was later included as a chapter in her Stages on the Road (1934), and in 2006 reprinted in Through Moral Crises to Catholicism (Reply to a Parish Priest). with an Introduction by the late Fr. Stanley Jaki.

She writes that she had tended to regard all Christian marriage as having a sacramental character, but gradually came to realize this was not the case:

It seemed to me and to many who shared my views that logically it must be a dogma common to all evangelical Christianity, that for Christians there could be no question of anything but lifelong, indissoluble monogamy as the only permissible form of marriage. But we were faced with the historical fact that all the founders of Protestant sects had agreed in throwing this dogma overboard. They had all accepted the view that in certain circumstances marriage may be dissolved and that divorced persons may marry again, even during the lifetime of their former partner. Luther had flirted freely with the idea of polygamy and permitted persons of rank at any rate to take a secondary wife.

As I have mentioned in a previous article, one of the “unnecessary” sacraments that Luther and other reformers abrogated in the name of Christian freedom was the sacrament of matrimony, which was relegated largely to civil law rather than Church law. In Catholic doctrine, this sacrament is conferred not by a priest, but by a man and woman in the presence of a priest; and, if and when they are in the state of grace, offers special graces to the couple for a lifelong relationship that mirrors the mystical wedding of Christ and the Church. (Eph. 5:32) Undset found it hard to believe that Protestants would give short shrift to this sacramental aspect and treat marriage just as one other contract subject to civil laws:

As a sacrament – a means of grace – marriage must have been instituted primarily to help people on the road to eternal salvation. On no other assumption is it at all likely that men could ever have claimed that it is, and must be, an indissoluble union, in which both parties in the first place undertake duties towards God, and towards each other in God. Even while the Church’s doctrine of marriage was held to be objectively true and right practically all over Europe, adultery was quite an everyday occurrence; but the Church could say with full justification – marriage is a means of grace, but if men refuse to co-operate with grace, it is no use; men have none the less their free will to sin.

The Protestant reinterpretation of marriage, of course, was interconnected with the Protestant view downplaying mediation of God-given graces through the priesthood, as well as differing theological conceptions of grace and faith. Some of these differences have been resolved in ecumenical theological discussions during the last few decades; but the interpretation of Christian marriage still remains as a sharp difference.

According to Catholic theology, Catholic married partners are not just two Christians joined in the pursuit of salvation for themselves and their offspring, but just like ordained priests, partake of special actual graces bestowing a supernatural character on the duties of their state of life.

Fr. Henry Sattler has explained that sacramental grace in marriage “is the special mode of Sanctifying Grace which makes the receiver a habitual connatural principle of supernatural action in Marriage – which means that the love, and love-making, and housekeeping and work and worry of marriage are all deified.”

In other words, sacramental married life is not just a fulfillment of contractual arrangements, but a special vocation with supernatural assistance and supernatural significance provided continually to partners in the state of grace.

Theologians are divided as to just how the sacrament of marriage contains grace (ex opere operato). The sacrament of baptism frees the soul from original sin; the sacrament of Holy Orders bestows a special character on the recipient. If a partner with serious unconfessed sin enters into the sacrament of marriage, the act is sacrilegious; but confession and forgiveness of sin makes him or her eligible for all the graces connected with the marriage.

Sigrid Undset ends her essay with an appeal to fellow Catholics to be aware that European traditions, including traditions of marriage, have been derived from Catholic sources, but have in several respects evolved into pale imitations:

My intention in writing this article is in the first place this – to beg Catholics, here in Scandinavia and elsewhere, to understand that it cannot be otherwise. We must try to make this clear to ourselves – we have no right to assume that any part of European tradition, cultural values, moral ideas, emotional wealth, which has its origin in the dogmatically defined Christianity of the Catholic Church, will continue to live a “natural” life, if the people of Europe reject Christianity and refuse to accept God’s supernatural grace. One might just as well believe that a tree whose roots were severed should continue to bear leaves and blossoms and fruit.

Sigrid Undset presumably was not yet caught up in the social currents advocating gay “marriage” and polygamy, but if marriage is just a contract, such developments are quite conceivable. If, however, marriage is a sacrament mirroring and perpetuating the eternal espousal of Christ and the Church, such “extensions” are clearly sacrilegious.

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The Norwegian novelist, Sigrid Undset (1882-1949), baptized a Lutheran but raised by agnostic parents, and who emerged from a difficult seven-year marriage at age thirty-seven, converted to Catholicism in 1924. In 1928, she received the Nobel Prize for Literature.

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[Bob434]

‘Marriage’ is the longest sentence in the engrish language

[75thOVI]

A Sacrament or Contract? Embrace the healing power of “and”.

[CondoleezzaProtege]

A Sacrament or Contract? Embrace the healing power of “and”.

No. The problem today with 'gay' marriage and all the other variations thereof becoming acceptable even in churches...is that Christians have allowed for the 'contract' dimension to take PRECEDENT over the 'sacramental.'

[marron]

Christians have allowed for the 'contract' dimension to take PRECEDENT over the 'sacramental.'

Churches that have allowed this have failed an important litmus test. Its arguable that they are no longer Christian. Not due to that issue alone, but to get to that point you've already crossed other red lines.

[HangnJudge]

Oath is to God and Witnesses, so Both

[DesertRhino]

Annulment: Religious Sophistry or same as Divorce?

[themidnightskulker]

Marriage is a sacrament (blessing) from God bestowed by the Church.
Any civil union is bestowed by the State.There has been a deliberate confusion of Marriage and Civil Unions;up to and including clergy participating in Civil Unions.
Civil unions occur so people can receive Government recognition and benefits. A Marriage is the joining of a man and woman before God for the purpose of producing children.
(I know this sounds archaic, but it is how things were done for centuries. What about arranged marriages you ask? Civil Union.)

[cdcdawg]

” ... although for a Protestant marriage is only a contract.” Yet the Catholic Church still recognizes them as being valid marriages. “Only” is an incredibly dishonest choice of words.

[Boogieman]

It doesn’t meet the legal definition of a contract, at least, not anymore.

[Nifster]

Exactly

[Redwood71]

“... Christians have allowed for the ‘contract’ dimension to take PRECEDENT over the ‘sacramental.”

One area that is the original marriage is common law. In history, there were no sacramental or contractual marriages recognized when the Council of Trent in 1563 ruled that no marriage thenceforth would be valid in the eyes of the Roman Catholic Church unless it were solemnised by a priest. (Jews and Quakers were released from this)

So when the colonies got into it common law marriage continued in the future United States until individual states abolished it. But there are still eight U.S. states and the District of Columbia; plus two other states that recognise domestic common law marriage after the fact for limited purposes. And it doesn’t even require a contract, just saying the right things. So if a guy wanted to be progressive he’d marry a successful race horse and take half the winnings in the divorce. Sodom and Gomorrah we are. Moralities went out the door with the decision for Madalyn Murray O’Hair.

rwood

[chajin]

This Lutheran does not think of sacred marriage as a contract, but a calling (klesis). This is the implication of Jesus saying that some are called to celibacy, which implies that the remainder are called to marriage. A calling is not a sacrament, though God intervenes in the fulfillment of a calling--this is also implied, in the OT verse that a threefold cord is not quickly broken.

[MurphsLaw]

Oath is to God and Witnesses, so Both

So Judge.... you find yourself in Vegas - after some fun filled days and higher than normal BAC levels, you run into a hottie - LOVE at first sight ! - and she wants to get married (she thinks you have money)... So what the heck- you decide to get married ! - tie the knot ! Right there in the 24 hr Jesus Chapel on the Vegas strip... Mr. and Mrs......

Do you really think that is a valid marriage in God's view?
If the answer is yes...it doesn't say much for marriage.
Has God really "joined" them... so that no man should put asunder to??

Enter Canon Law, stage left.

[HangnJudge]

...Do you really think that is a valid marriage in God’s view?

Under the tradition I was raised under, Marriage occurred when the Couple becomes ONE FLESH, at time of sex. Not and oath, Not a contract, One Flesh. Under that tradition, one is very cautious as to whom they connect A and B together with and mix well. This would be why adultery prevents one from entering into the Kingdom

So, yes, unless she raped him involuntarily, they are permanently ONE FLESH. The oath to witnesses creates a contract, different matter-civil

[MurphsLaw]

Under the tradition I was raised under, Marriage occurred when the Couple becomes ONE FLESH,....

Ah yes... the shotgun weddings.... well same applies for one of the couple to be coerced into marriage as well as a quickie in Vegas... Marrying someone out of free will -and not against their choice not to be married to the one-night-stand. (Which will end up in divorce anyway)I just think Marriage should be thought of as something of a higher nature...as in a Sacrament.

The point is since the Ressurrection and the institution of the Church, some authority has to say - define- what is valid and what isn't.

Back to your tradition of "consumation" though, it really doesn't seem viable in these times since virginity for the majority of people has gone by the wayside. Not judging either way... I think the laws of CHASTITY are much further gone down the road then those of divorce--- but there is time...though all the same human dignity and practicality have to enter into it somehow.

CS Lewis has good quote on marriage vows in that they are intended to be kept - AS A PROMISE TO GOD...not just your spouse. Its downright treachery then to put away your wife cause you find a newer model.. !!

[Secret Agent Man]

ask any man who’s been to “family” court

[HangnJudge]

The tradition I was raised under has worked very well for us, One Partner, forever until death. Divorce does not exist, neither does “annulment” after consummation.

I cannot help that the world has blinded itself to God, it is our task to be beacons, to light candles, to be the city on the hill. it does not help that even God’s people are openly flaunting God’s Law and Purpose.

The most damning statement an unbeliever can make is the shear hypocrisy of His Church. His People. The witness is severely diminished.

[DFG]

Groucho Marx quotes about marriage:

“Marriage is the chief cause of divorce.”

“Marriage is a wonderful institution, but who wants to live in an institution?”

“I was married by a judge. I should have asked for a jury.”

“The husband who wants a happy marriage should learn to keep his mouth shut and his checkbook open.”