Pius XI, 1922-1939

Christian Marriage ¹

[From the Encyclical, "Casti Connubii," Pius XI, Dec. 31, 1930]

2225. First, then, let this remain as an unchangeable and inviolable basis; marriage was not instituted or restored by man but by God; not by man but by the very author of nature, God; and by the restorer of the same nature was it fortified, confirmed, and elevated through laws; and these laws, therefore, cannot be subject to any decision of man and not even to any contrary agreement on the part of the spouses themselves. This is a doctrine of Holy Scripture [Gen. 1:27 f.; 2:22 f.; Matt. 19:3 ff.; Eph. 5:23 ff.]; this is the continued and unanimous tradition of the Church; this is the solemn definition of the sacred Council of Trent, which declares and confirms [sess. 24; see n. 969 ff.] that the perpetual and indissoluble bond of marriage, and the unity and the stability of the same emanate from God as their author.

But, although marriage by its nature was instituted by God, nevertheless man's will has its own role, and a most noble one in it; for, every individual marriage, inasmuch as it is a conjugal union between a certain man and a certain woman, it arises only from the free consent of both spouses, and indeed this free act of the will, by which both parties hand over and accept the rights ² proper to matrimony, is so necessary to constitute a true marriage that it cannot be supplied by any human power.³ Yet such freedom has this purpose only, to establish that contracting parties really wish to enter upon marriage and wish to do so with a certain person or not; but the nature of marriage is wholly removed from the freedom of man, so much so that as soon as man has contracted marriage he is subject to its divine laws and essential properties. For the Angelic Doctor, discussing good faith in marriage and offspring, says: "These things are so effected in marriage by the conjugal agreement itself that if anything contrary were expressed in the consent which makes the marriage, it would not be a true marriage." ⁴

By wedlock, then, souls are joined and made as one, and the souls are affected earlier and more strongly than bodies; not by any transient affection of the senses or the spirit, but by a deliberate and firm decision of the will; and from this joining of souls, with God so decreeing, a sacred and inviolable bond arises.

This entirely proper and peculiar nature of this contract makes it completely different not only from the connections of animals performed by