Hm...what about a couple who gets married after the woman can no longer bear children? Their marriage has absolutely nothing to do with the begetting and raising of children. Are they not married?
And if they are, why wouldn't a younger couple who choose not have children be "really" married?
I can’t answer for him, but I can answer for me!
If a couple cannot have children due to infertility or age, that’s different (obviously...) than a couple who could have children but choose not to. There is more to marriage than child raising - companionship, love, a best friend you live with, for better and worse, and all that good stuff. If people want to space children out and not have set after set of Irish twins, it’s not hard to avoid sex during fertility. But of course there are always pregnancies anyway on the odd occasion. So a marriage in which the husband and wife are adamantly opposed to ever having children means they must use mechanical or other devices to prevent children, or get sterilized, or have abortions.
All very unnatural and harmful, in divers ways.
While an older couple may be known to be infertile, prior to marriage, they may still be validly married, since there comes a time for all married couples when the couple can no longer bear children. Like the latter couple, the former couple has not rejected their natural fertility.
For the term marriage to have any meaning, it must be defined. A natural marriage is the lifelong commitment between a man and a woman, for the two-fold purpose of begetting and raising children, and the mutual care of the spouses for each other.
This can be proven negatively, since any other definition, which leaves out any part of this definition, can be categorized as friendship, fornication, companionship, etc.
And if they are, why wouldn't a younger couple who choose not have children be "really" married?
The answer to this question depends upon whether you believe that the human reproductive system is correctly named.
Some people act as if intercourse is ordered only toward pleasure. But while the act is pleasurable, it is obvious that the act is designed to result in the generation of children, just as the act of eating is ordered toward nutrition, and not pleasure alone.
Consider the following analogy. Everyone understands that gorging and vomiting is wrong. But few bother to consider why. The reason is that the bulimic is separating the pleasurable aspect of eating from its overarching purpose, nutrition. (Not surprisingly, the practice results in medical complications, as does --surprise!-- artificial means of induced sterility).
When two fertile people commit to a lifetime together without children, i.e., with the intention to use permanent or temporary means of induced sterility, they are rejecting the natural end of the unitive marital act, and the natural end of marriage itself.
People who try to oppress or outlaw the majority because of the minorities who are exceptions to the rule -- instead of creating reasonable accommodations to the minority but not letting them dictate all terms, the way our courts have lately been doing -- are liberals.
People who try to oppress or outlaw the majority because of the minorities who are exceptions to the rule -- instead of creating reasonable accommodations to the minority but not letting them dictate all terms, the way our courts have lately been doing -- are liberals.