VATICAN CITY (CNS): Pope Benedict XVI has denounced “pseudo-marriages” between persons of the same sex as “expressions of an anarchic freedom”.
He encouraged Church members to help couples in crisis and to reaffirm Church teaching that marriage between a man and a woman is the only legitimate basis for family life.
The Pope was addressing the Diocese of Rome’s annual convention at the Basilica of St John Lateran on June 6.
He told the convention that contrary to what many people think today marriage is not a “casual sociological construction”, but a reflection of the truth about the human person, the meaning of life and the relationship of human beings with the God who created them out of love and for love.
A lifelong pledge of fidelity between a man and a woman and the openness to having children also are a reflection of the identity of the human person as an “indissoluble” unity of body and spirit.
When a man and a woman say “yes” to each other, they are pledging their entire being to one another — body and soul, he said.
Saying “yes” implies using one’s freedom to make a choice and a commitment.
