A keresztény házasság szentségi jellege
The Sacramental Nature of Christian Matrimony

Summary/Abstract: Martin Luther, in his work entitled ”De captivitate babilonica ecclesiae” (1520) contested the fact that the Church emphasized the legal interpretation of matrimony, overstating the rules and the laws which regarded it. He declared that matrimony is a ‘very wordly’ thing, without knowing that this statement had been already made, more than 250 years before, by another great theologian, St. Thomas of Aquino. The latter even went further than Luther, saying that matriomony is the most wordly sacrament. Indeed in this sacrament human wishes, passions and the most natural features are sanctified by faith. Throughout history the Church had to defend the institution of matrimony from different movemements and spiritualizing sects which were attacking it. The great number of official statements in this direction prove the deepest concern of the Church in this field. Matrimony was declared officially ‘sacramentum’ for the first time in Verona (1184). This statement was later reinforced by St. Thomas and the Council of Florence. During the time of Reformation a strong debate took place between the Catholic and the Protestant churches, because the latter denied the sacramental nature of matrimony, relying on the idea that only two sacraments were instituted by Christ (Baptism and Eucharist). Luther’s idea of a sacrament was thus much tighter than that of the Catholic Church. The Council of Trent declared: “ septem sunt sacramenta novae Legis a Domino nostro Jesu Christo instituta” and they acknowledged the institution of this sacrament by Christ on the analogy of the institution of the Church. The Church is the sacrament of Christ himself, and all the other sacraments arise from Him. The Second Vatican Council underlined that the legal aspect of matrimony (materia, forma) is not the most important but the symbolic one. Matrimony is not simply a contract , but much more than that - a covenant. A man and a woman living together and loving each other as Christ loved his Church are a sign in the society, they testify God’s love towards his people and the covenant that links them together.

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