SOME OTHER CHRISTIAN STATEMENTS
Westminster Confession of Faith, Chapter XXIV (1648)
Marriage was ordained for the mutual help of husband and wife,[1] for the increase of mankind with a legitimate issue, and of the Church with an holy seed;[2] and for preventing of uncleanness.[3]
[1] GEN 2:18 And the Lord God said, It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him an help meet for him.
[2] MAL 2:15 And did not he make one? Yet had he the residue of the spirit. And wherefore one? That he might seek a godly seed. Therefore take heed to your spirit, and let none deal treacherously against the wife of his youth.
[3] 1CO 7:2 Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband. 9 But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.
Roman Catholic Canon Law
- 1055 §1 The marriage covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of their whole life, and which of its own very nature is ordered to the well-being of the spouses and to the procreation and upbringing of children, has, between the baptised, been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament.
William Perkins (from Christian Oeconomie, 1590).
The end of marriage is fourfold;
The first is, procreation of children, for the propagation and continuance of the seed and posterity of man upon the earth, Gen 1.28 Bring forth fruit, multiply, fill the earth and subdue it. Gen 9.1; 1 Tim 5.14.
The second is the procreation of an holy seed, whereby the Church of God may be kept holy and chaste, and there may always be a holy company of men, that may worship and serve God in the Church from age to age. Malachi 2.15. And did he not make one ? Yet he had abundance of spirit; and wherefore one ? Because he sought a godly seed.
The third is, that after the fall of mankind, it might be a sovereign means to avoid fornication, and consequently to subdue and slake the burning lusts of the flesh, 1 Cor 7.2, Nevertheless for the avoiding of fornication, let every man have his wife, and every woman have her husband. V9 But if they cannot abstain let them marry, for it is better to marry, than to burn. And for this cause, some Schoolmen do err, who hold that the secret coming together of man and wife, cannot be without sin, unless it is done for the procreation of children. Lombard the master of the Sentences says the contrary, namely, that marriage before the fall was only a duty, but now since the fall it is also a remedy.
The fourth end is, that the parties married may thereby perform the duties of their callings, in better and more comfortable manner, Proverbs 31.11. The heart of her husband trusts her, and she shall have no need of spoil. V13 She seeks wool and flax, and labours cheerfully with her hands.
Oliver O'Donovan's alternative formulation: I – We – They.
"Marriage has importance as a state of the individual, meeting personal need; as the union of a couple in a reciprocal partnership of mutual trust and love, and as the basis of a wider community, the home into which children are born and in which they will be cared for. Each of these "three goods", in its own way, is what marriage is, and any order in which they are stated must be arbitrary". [in Kaye, p97].
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