What about those couples who cannot have children, or were older when they got married?
Well their marriage can still be fruitful, via helping others come to faith in the Lord.
Very good points. Others ill, physically or emotionally, can not responsibly have children (or sex).
Open to children does not mean fertile. It means you are willing to have children (as opposed to able to have them). You may not be able, but are you intentionally contracepting to minimize the possibility?
From the CIC:
QUOTE
Can. 1084 §1. Antecedent and perpetual impotence to have intercourse, whether on the part of the man or the woman, whether absolute or relative, nullifies marriage by its very nature.
§2. If the impediment of impotence is doubtful, whether by a doubt about the law or a doubt about a fact, a marriage must not be impeded nor, while the doubt remains, declared null.
§3. Sterility neither prohibits nor nullifies marriage, without prejudice to the prescript of can. 1098.
Can. 1098 A person contracts invalidly who enters into a marriage deceived by malice, perpetrated to obtain consent, concerning some quality of the other partner which by its very nature can gravely disturb the partnership of conjugal life.
END QUOTE
So, while impotence (the inability to have sex) is an impediment, infertility is not, unless one of the partners intentionally deceives the other.
absolutely...theirs is a blessed relationship, they have no intention of doing anything artificial to prevent pregnancy....they just happen to be in the large percentage of people who don't get pregnant.......sometimes life can be very enjoyable at that time!!!!!!!!!