Vatican City, Feb 25, 2017 / 05:18 am (CNA/EWTN News).- On Saturday Pope Francis told a group of parish priests training on the new marriage annulment process to place strong emphasis on good preparation that isn’t limited to just a few courses, but extends even to the first few years after marriage.
“I ask myself how many of these youth who come to marriage preparation courses understand what ‘marriage,’ the sign of the union of Christ and the Church, means,” the Pope said Feb. 25.
“They say yes, but do they understand this? Do they have faith in this?” he asked, and voiced his conviction that “a true catechumenate is needed for the sacrament of marriage.”
Part of this formation process he said, means being thorough, not “to make preparation with two or three meetings and then go forward.”
During marriage prep, couples must be helped to understand “the profound meaning of the step that they are about to take.” This support must also continue through the celebration of marriage itself and even through the first years after, he said.
Marriage, he said, “is the icon of God, created for us by him, who is the perfect communion of the three persons of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.” The love of the Trinity and Christ’s love for his bride, the Church, must therefore be “the center of marriage catechesis and evangelization.”
Whether it’s through personal or communitarian encounters, and whether they are planned or spontaneous, “never tire of showing to all, especially to spouses, (the) great mystery” of God’s love, he said.
The Pope spoke to priests participating a formation course for the Tribunal of the Roman Rota, the Holy’s See’s main court, dedicated to the new marriage annulment process, which went into effect Dec. 10, 2016. Held in Rome, the course ran from Feb. 22-25, and was closed by an audience with the Pope.
The course follows a similar one held in March 2016, but which was directed specifically toward bishops.
In his speech, Francis said priests have a twofold responsibility when it comes to marital ministry: to always bear witness to the beauty of marriage, and to be a consistent support to couples, regardless of their marital status.
He noted that priests are often “the first interlocutors” of young couples who want to get married, and are also the first ones these couples go to when problems or crisis come up, including the request for an annulment of their marriage.
Faced with so many “complex situations” affecting families today, “no one knows better than you and is in contact with the reality of the social fabric in the area,” experiencing firsthand the complexity of various situations they encounter, including valid sacramental marriages; domestic partnerships; civil unions; failed marriages and families and youth, both happy and unhappy.
“For each person and each situation,” he said, “you are called to be travel companions in order to bear witness and to support.”
The Pope stressed that a priest’s first concern is that of “bearing witness to the grace of the sacrament of marriage and the primordial good of the family” by proclaiming that “marriage between a man and a woman is a sign of the spousal union between Christ and the Church.”
This witness is also shown when accompanying young couples on their journey “with care,” showing them how to live in times of “light and darkness, in moments of joy and those in fatigue,” always showing the beauty of marriage.
Francis told the priests that while bearing witness to the beauty of marriage, they must also care for and support “those who realize the fact that their marriage is not a true sacramental marriage and want to leave this situation.”
Because of the “delicate” nature of this type work, the Pope said priests must do it “in such a way that your faithful recognize you not so much as experts in bureaucratic actions or judicial norms, but as brothers who place themselves in an attitude of listening and understanding.”
He told them to imitate “the style” of the Gospel by meeting with and listening not only to engaged or married couples, but also youth who prefer to cohabitate rather than getting married.
People in these situations “are among the poor and little ones toward whom the Church, in the footsteps of her master and Lord, wants to be a mother who never abandons but who draws near and cares for them,” Francis said.
“Even these people are loved by the heart of Christ,” he said, telling priests to “have a gaze of tenderness and compassion toward them.”
This type of care and attention “is an essential part of your work in promoting and defending the sacrament of marriage,” the Pope said, adding that the parish is the place “par excellence” for the “salus animarum (salvation of souls).”
Pope Francis then pointed to a recent speech he gave to the Rota in which he told them to implement “a true catechumenate” of future spouses which covers all stages of the sacramental path, from the time of marriage preparation, the celebration of the sacrament and the first years immediately after.
“To you pastors, indispensable collaborators of the bishops, is primarily entrusted this catechumenate,” he said, and encouraged them to implement it “regardless of the difficulties you could encounter.”
Francis closed his speech by thanking the priests for their commitment to announcing “the Gospel of the family.”
He prayed that the Holy Spirit would help them “to be ministers of peace and consolation in the midst of the holy faithful people of God, especially the most fragile and those in need of your pastoral support.”
Article Archive
Marriage prep should be more than just a few courses, Pope tells priests
Related Articles • More Articles
null / Credit: Juthamat8899/ShutterstockWashington, D.C. Newsroom, May 1, 2024 / 17:05 pm (CNA).The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) released a new report on Wednesday highlighting the countries with the worst religious persecution in the world.From this report, which is released annually, USCIRF makes recommendations to the State Department on how to best advocate for religious freedom. The suggestions typically translate into sanctions from the U.S. against violating countries to pressure them to improve their religious tolerance. This year, the countries topping USCIRF's list of the world's most egregious religious freedom violators were Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Burma, China, Cuba, Eritrea, India, Iran, Nicaragua, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam.USCIRF recommends these nations be designated as "countries of particul...
The St. Louis Cathedral, the oldest Catholic cathedral in continual use in the United States, on April 9, 2020, in New Orleans. / Credit: Chris Graythen/Getty ImagesWashington, D.C. Newsroom, May 1, 2024 / 17:50 pm (CNA).A criminal investigation into the Archdiocese of New Orleans is based on a suspicion that it may be linked to child sex trafficking, according to allegations presented in a search warrant granted to Louisiana State Police.The affidavit requesting the search warrant, first obtained by the New Orleans-based WWL Radio, alleges that multiple sex abuse victims provided statements that claim they were transported to other parishes and outside of Louisiana, where they were sexually abused. It further alleges a scheme within the archdiocese in which abused children were instructed to provide "gifts" to certain priests, which were meant to signal that the children were targets for sexual abuse.According to the ...
Catholics in the Archdiocese of Baltimore pack the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen during a concluding listening session on the archdiocese's major parish restructuring plan on April 30, 2024. / Credit: Matthew BalanBaltimore, Md., May 1, 2024 / 18:10 pm (CNA).Hundreds of Catholic residents of Baltimore packed the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen on Tuesday evening to give their often-impassioned reactions to a process that could lead to the closure of nearly two-thirds of the city's parishes.Several parishes from the state's largest city organized large contingents to attend the April 30 meeting, which was the final of three listening sessions for the Archdiocese of Baltimore's "Seek the City" parish restructuring proposal. They made their presence known with custom-made T-shirts or ethnic attire, with some even carrying large banners that begged Archbishop William Lori to spare their churches.Parishioners from the Shrine of the Sacred Heart in the Mount Washington neighborhood of...