Marriage, Sexual Acts, and Family Life. Sexual act refers to any act whatsoever—whether thought, word, or deed—in which someone intends, either as an end in itself or as a means to some other end, to bring about or maintain sexual arousal and/or to cause incomplete or complete sexual satisfaction, whether in himself or herself, in another, or both. Since sexual capacity enables human persons to participate in the good of marital communion, Christian married couples should engage in sexual acts which are conducive to that good and are otherwise reasonable, but should avoid all other sexual activity. If a sexual act is not marital, it violates the good of marriage, and so is not appropriate for any Christian. All intentional sexual acts that violate the good of marriage—and this includes all intentional sexual acts of the unmarried—are grave matter. However, not all acts leading to sexual satisfaction are intentional. Moreover, not all sins which intentionally violate the marital good are mortal, since mortal sin requires not only grave matter but sufficient reflection and consent. Chastity subordinates sexual desire and activity to love and reason, that is, to self- giving and the requirements of relevant intelligible human goods. Grace empowers every Christian to pursue chastity and attain it. In this question, the norms of chastity will be articulated only insofar as they follow from the good of marriage itself. Some wrongful sexual acts, whether done by married couples or others, violate one or more goods in addition to the good of marital communion; for example, contraception always is a contralife act (see 8. E. 2, above). Therefore, the treatment of such acts here should be studied in conjunction with their treatment in other chapters. Marital intercourse and sexual acts preparatory to it often are not only suitable but obligatory for married couples. But since even married couples can have various reasons for not engaging in sexual acts, the obligation is subject to exceptions. RSA 2000 Section 1 Chapter M-5 MARRIAGE ACT 2 HER MAJESTY, by and with the advice and consent of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta, enacts as follows: Definitions 1 In this Act, (a) repealed 2007 cV-4.1 s87; (b) “issuer. What is the marriage supper of the Lamb? Who is the wife of the Lamb and who are the guests at the marriage supper? Moreover, not all sexual acts within marriage are conducive to the good of marriage, and only those fully integrated with commitment to this good are chaste. Hence, Christian married couples should not consider themselves entitled to any and every sexual activity which they find mutually agreeable, but should engage in chaste acts of marital intercourse. A married couple’s sexual act can fail to be a marital act. The first marital intercourse consummates the marriage by making the husband and wife actually to be one flesh. Subsequent acts of marital intercourse express and foster conjugal love: This love is uniquely expressed and perfected through the marital act. The actions within marriage by which the couple are united intimately and chastely are morally good and fitting. Expressed in a manner which is truly human, these actions signify and foster that mutual self- giving by which spouses enrich each other with joyful and grateful hearts. But, as has been explained (in A. Therefore, marital acts must realize both the spouses’ open- ended community and their organic complementarity. The married couple’s open- ended community depends on their mutual consent, by which each spouse, in willing their common good, wills the other’s good for his or her own sake. Genuine marital acts therefore must be performed willingly and lovingly. They cannot involve coercion of either party by the other or of both by a third party; nor can they involve one party’s mere use of the other for selfish satisfaction or one’s mere manipulation of the other to attain some extrinsic end. At the same time, the couple’s willing and loving behavior must constitute the cooperation appropriate to realize their organic complementarity in respect to reproduction. SPECIAL ISSUE Kenya Gazette Supplement No. 4) REPUBLIC OF KENYA KENYA GAZETTE SUPPLEMENT ACTS, 2014 NAIROBI, 6th May, 2014 CONTENT Act— PAGE The Marriage Act, 2014 31 NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR LAW REPORTING RECEIVED. In most instances, of course, physiological conditions preclude conception. However, those conditions are not part of the human act of intercourse, for they are neither included in the couple’s behavior nor subject to their choice. So, the appropriateness of their human act of sexual intercourse to realize their organic complementarity depends, not on its being able to cause conception, but only on its being the pattern of behavior which, in conjunction with other necessary conditions, would result in conception. In Church teaching, this relationship between marital intercourse and organic complementarity is expressed by saying that a true marital act is “of itself suited to procreating human life” or is “open to new life.”1. Thus, a marital act expresses and fosters the couple’s marital communion precisely because, when they willingly and lovingly cooperate with each other in an act of itself suited to procreating, their mutual self- giving actualizes their one- flesh unity. If one or both spouses engage in a sexual act which does not realize one- flesh unity in this way, that act is not marital. This point can be expressed in other terms. The marital act’s character as willing and loving cooperation can be called its “unitive meaning,” and its suitability for generation can be called its “procreative meaning.” Using this terminology, the point is that the unitive meaning of marital intercourse includes its procreative meaning and is specified by it, just as the single good of marriage includes and is fulfilled by having and raising children. Thus, because the marital act’s procreative meaning is part of its unitive meaning, the two meanings are inseparable, for a whole cannot be without its parts. Since, as has been explained, the definition of the marital act follows from what marriage is, and the part- whole relationship between the marital act’s two meanings is a necessary implication of its definition, that relationship is determined by the features of human beings which determine what marriage is: the complementary capacities of male and female persons, the natural inclination of men and women to realize those capacities, and the principle of practical reason directing them to do so. Insofar as these features of men and women pertain to human nature, their source is God, the author of nature.
Thus, as Paul VI teaches, God established the connection between the conjugal act’s two inherent meanings, and people may not separate them. If people do so in some sexual act, it simply is not a marital act. In sum, a married couple’s sexual act can fail in either of two ways to be a marital act: (i) if at least one partner performs the act unwillingly or unlovingly (for example, if a third party compels a married couple to engage in intercourse, if a drunken husband forces his reluctant wife to submit, or if a wife has intercourse with her husband while deliberately wishing she were having intercourse with another man); or (ii) if either or both spouses do anything inconsistent with their act’s being of itself suited to procreating (for example, if spouses unable to engage in intercourse due to the husband’s impotence masturbate each other to orgasm, if a couple trying to prevent the transmission of disease use a condom, or if either or both spouses do something in order to impede conception). Provided the couple willingly and lovingly do what is suited to cause conception when the other necessary causal factors are given, their human act is marital even if they know that those factors will not be given—that they are infertile, temporarily or permanently—due to causes extrinsic to their action. Moreover, provided the husband and wife do what is of itself suited to procreating, their will to engage in true marital intercourse is the only intention they must have to make what they do a marital act. They may also intend to procreate, but, even if conception is possible, they need not; it is sufficient if they simply intend to actualize their one- flesh unity so that they can experience and enjoy it. Marital chastity empowers couples both to act and to abstain. Conjugal love is many faceted. It normally includes both erotic desire and emotional affection; moreover, for Christians living in God’s friendship, it is transformed and elevated by charity. However, the essence of conjugal love is the husband’s and the wife’s mutual and unselfish willing of the good of marital communion, and, for the sake of that good, of each other’s entire personal good (see GS 4. The willing of a good leads to the integration of acts with it, and the full integration of sexual acts in marriage with the good of marriage makes those acts reasonable and worthy. Hence, consistent and genuine conjugal love leads to reasonable and worthy sexual acts in marriage. Now, such sexual acts are chaste; so, conjugal love leads to marital chastity. Many people are attached to their personal independence, and some experience strong feelings of reserve and inhibitions against intimacy. Motivated by the unselfish willing of marital communion, marital chastity enables husbands and wives to overcome such attachments, feelings, and inhibitions, and so to engage in genuine marital acts and grow in marital communion. Marital chastity also enables a husband and a wife to abstain at appropriate times: when they are not together, when they lack privacy, when either reasonably prefers not to engage in intercourse, when intercourse might lead to new life but there are good reasons not to have a child (or another child), and so on. Marital chastity subordinates sexual pleasure to communion. The pleasurable sensations of sexual activity culminating in orgasm are in themselves a private and incommunicable experience. Hence, to focus attention on this experience and strive to intensify it as much as possible tends to make the other person into a means, a “sex object.” So, the Church teaches that spouses should pursue sexual gratification only in subordination to marital love. Marital chastity, by making the marital good itself central, makes it possible for the experience of loving cooperation in one- flesh communion to predominate and enjoyable sensations to take their proper, subordinate place in marital intercourse. Muslim Marriage Acts In India,Muslim Marriage Laws,Muslim Wedding Acts. The Muslim marriage is governed not by the Indian Majority Act, 1. Muslim law itself. According to Muslim Law, Marriage / 'Nikah' is a contract underlying a permanent relationship based on mutual consent. Essential Features of Muslim Nikah. Only if both the parties are Hindus can the marriage take place under the Hindu marriage Act. Same is the case with a contract. The terms of a marriage contract may also be altered within legal limits to suit individual cases. Although discouraged both by the holy Quran and Hadith, yet like any other contract, there is also provision for the breach of marriage contract. Requirements of Muslim Nikah. The solemnization of a Muslim marriage requires adherence to certain forms and formulas. They are called the essentials of a valid marriage. If any of these requirements is not fulfilled the marriage becomes either void or irregular, as the case may be. The essentials are as follows . Proposal and Acceptance. Competent Parties. No legal Disability. Absolute Prohibition. There is absolute prohibition of marriage in case or relationship of consanguinity which means the relationship of the person through his/her father or mother on the ascending side, or through his or her own on the descending side. Marriage among the persons related by affinity, ie, through the wife is not permitted. Marriage with foster mother and other related through such foster mother is also void. Relative Prohibitions. Unlawful conjunction Marrying a fifth wife Marrying a woman undergoing iddat Marrying non- Muslim. Absence of proper witnesses. Woman contracting a second marriage during the subsistence of the first marriage. The following marriages are also prohibited: Marrying pregnant women. Marrying own divorced wife. Marrying during pilgrimage. Procedure for Muslim Nikah. According to Muslim Law it is absolutely necessary that a man or someone on his behalf and the woman or someone on her behalf should agree to the marriage at one meeting and the agreement should be witnessed by two adult witnesses. The words conveying proposal and acceptance must be uttered in each other's presence or in the presence of their agents, who are called Vakils or Qazi. The words conveying proposal and acceptance must be uttered in each other's presence or in the presence of their agents, who are called Vakils or Qazi. There must be reciprocity between offer and acceptance. The acceptance must not be conditional. Under the Sunni Law, the proposal and acceptance must be made in presence of two males or one male and two female witnesses who are sane, adult and Muslim. Under Shia Law, witnesses are not necessary at the time of marriage. They are required at the time of dissolution of marriage. The parties contracting marriage must be acting under their free will and consent. Polygamy. The law permits a Muslim man four wives if he treats all of them equally. Since it is one of the religious practices it is claimed to be immune from any legislative enactment. Dower or Mahr. Dower or mahr is an obligation imposed upon the husband at the time of the marriage as a mark of respect to the wife. It can be received by the wife by instituting an action as if it was a debt due to her. Dower can be in cash or in kind. It is divided into two parts one called 'prompt' payable at the time of marriage before the wife can be called upon to enter into conjugal domicile and the other 'deferred' to be discharged when the specified event occurs and on demand made by the wife. Till the dower is paid the widow has the right to retain possession of her husband's property. Divorce. Marriage under Islam is only a civil contract and not a sacrament. A husband can leave his wife without any reasons merely by pronouncing the word . However, for a Muslim woman to obtain divorce certain conditions are necessary. The husband and the wife with mutual agreement can also put an end to the marriage.
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