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THE FAMILY IN GOD'S PLAN
The nature of the family
2201 The
conjugal community is established upon the consent of the spouses.
Marriage and the family are ordered to the good of the spouses and to
the procreation and education of children. The love of the spouses and
the begetting of children create among members of the same family
personal relationships and primordial responsibilities.
2202
A man and a woman united in marriage, together with their children,
form a family. This institution is prior to any recognition by public
authority, which has an obligation to recognize it. It should be
considered the normal reference point by which the different forms of
family relationship are to be evaluated.
2203
In creating man and woman, God instituted the human family and endowed
it with its fundamental constitution. Its members are persons equal in
dignity. For the common good of its members and of society, the family
necessarily has manifold responsibilities, rights, and duties.
* The Christian family
2204 "The
Christian family constitutes a specific revelation and realization of
ecclesial communion, and for this reason it can and should be called a domestic church."9
It is a community of faith, hope, and charity; it assumes singular
importance in the Church, as is evident in the New Testament.10
2205
The Christian family is a communion of persons, a sign and image of the
communion of the Father and the Son in the Holy Spirit. In the
procreation and education of children it reflects the Father's work of
creation. It is called to partake of the prayer and sacrifice of
Christ. Daily prayer and the reading of the Word of God strengthen it
in charity. The Christian family has an evangelizing and missionary
task.
2206 The relationships within the family
bring an affinity of feelings, affections and interests, arising above
all from the members' respect for one another. The family is a privileged community
called to achieve a "sharing of thought and common deliberation by the
spouses as well as their eager cooperation as parents in the children's
upbringing."11
9 FC 21; cf. LG 11.
10 Cf. Eph 5:21b: 4; Col 3:18-21; 1 Pet 3:1-7.
11 GS 52 § 1.
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