§371God created man and woman together and willed each for the other. the Word of God gives us to understand this through various features of the sacred text. "It is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him a helper fit for him."242 None of the animals can be man's partner.243 The woman God "fashions" from the man's rib and brings to him elicits on the man's part a cr…

§1605Holy Scripture affirms that man and woman were created for one another: "It is not good that the man should be alone."92 The woman, "flesh of his flesh," i.e., his counterpart, his equal, his nearest in all things, is given to him by God as a "helpmate"; she thus represents God from whom comes our help.93 "Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife…

§1652"By its very nature the institution of marriage and married love is ordered to the procreation and education of the offspring and it is in them that it finds its crowning glory."160 Children are the supreme gift of marriage and contribute greatly to the good of the parents themselves. God himself said: "It is not good that man should be alone," and "from the beginning (he) made…

1. Little children who go daily to their teachers receive their lessons, and repeat them, and never cease from this kind of acquisition, but sometimes employ nights as well as days, and this they are compelled to do for perishable and transient things. Now we do not ask of you who have come to age such toil as you require of your children; for not every day, but two days only i…

Analysis of the Biblical Account of Creation Last Wednesday we began this series of reflections on the reply Christ gave to his questioners on the subject of the unity and indissolubility of marriage. As we recall, the Pharisees who questioned him appealed to the Mosaic Law. However, Christ went back to the "beginning," quoting the words of Genesis. The "beginning" in this ca…

The Second Account of Creation: The Subjective Definition of Man With reference to Christ's words on the subject of marriage, in which he appealed to the "beginning," we directed our attention last week to the first account of man's creation in the first chapter of Genesis. Today we shall pass to the second account, which is frequently described as the "Yahwist," since it uses…

The Meaning of Man's Original Solitude In the last reflection of the present cycle we reached an introductory conclusion, taken from the words of Genesis on the creation of man as male and female. We reached these words, that is, the "beginning," to which the Lord Jesus referred in his talk on the indissolubility of marriage (cf. Mt 19:3-9; Mk 10:1-12). But the conclusion at w…

Thus the heavens and the earth were finished. Moses now teaches that the work of creation was accomplished not by one continued act, but was distributed through six days, for the purpose of accommodating the work to our capacity. God rested on the seventh day, not because he was weary, but to invite us by his own example to the contemplation of his works. The Sabbath therefore …

In the state of innocence, would there have been generation? Would generation have been through coition? Article 1. Whether in the state of innocence generation existed? Objection 1. It would seem there would have been no generation in the state of innocence. For, as stated in Phys. v, 5, "corruption is contrary to generation." But contraries affect the same subject: also there…

Those who have the gift of celibacy from heaven, so that from the heart or with their whole soul they are pure and continent and are not aflame with desire, let them serve the Lord in that calling, as long as they shall feel endued with that divine gift; and let them not lift up themselves above others, but let them serve the Lord continuously in simplicity and humility. But th…