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Author Topic: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup  (Read 4519 times)

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Offline Jaynek

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Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
« Reply #60 on: July 06, 2018, 08:47:15 PM »
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  • It is implicit in the Catholic teaching that premarital sex is sinful. Catholics are to flee from all sɛҳuąƖ immorality as St. Paul clearly teaches in Corinthians 1, 7:2. Sex before marriage is an example of sɛҳuąƖ immorality. That is why the Catholic Church strongly encourages couples to be completely chaste until Marriage under pain of mortal sin. The only sɛҳuąƖ behavior that is licit is that between husband and wife (also within parameters of chastity). Other than that, there are only fornication and adultery. Both which are mortal sins and therefore, cause of eternal perdition.
    Teaching that premarital sex is sinful is not the same as the Church advising to marry a virgin.  Yes, the ideal is that the husband and wife are virgins at the time of the marriage because they have followed Catholic teaching.  But there is nothing in this teaching which implies that one should not marry a person who has been unchaste and repented.



    Offline TxTrad

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #61 on: July 06, 2018, 10:22:57 PM »
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  • It's a bad idea.


    Online Nadir

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #62 on: July 06, 2018, 11:10:35 PM »
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  • Despite my forum persona, I'm actually an extremely mild-mannered person.
    Umm... Your forum persona comes across to me as "actually an extremely mild-mannered person".
    :cheers:
    Help of Christians, guard our land from assault or inward stain,
    Let it be what God has planned, His new Eden where You reign.

    Offline Cantarella

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #63 on: July 06, 2018, 11:56:09 PM »
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  • Some are virgins because they were not particularly attractive to men and perhaps likely would have fallen had they been approached by some attractive man's advances.  Some who are virgins may not have been had their circuмstances been different; some who are not virgins may have been had their circuмstances been different.

    I believe that the exalted virgins praised by the Church were so, not out of mere necessity (just because they were ugly and no one wanted them, for instance); but out of a pure, a conscious choice to remain chaste. The merit is in the choice. The sacrifice. That is the virtue of purity which is really praised by the Church and worthy of sainthood.

    It is the same with men. For example, if a man remains faithful to his wife even though he has many opportunities to be with other women, that is truly heroic and should be praised. Not the same with a man who just happens not to ever have such opportunity or options; but if he actually did, he would surely commit adultery. There is no merit on that.

    St. Jerome said something on this regard:

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    If you introduce old women, and soothsayers, and prophets, and vendors of Jєωels and silken clothing, you imperil her chastity; if you shut the door upon them, she is injured and fancies you suspect her. But what is the good of even a careful guardian, when an unchaste wife cannot be watched, and a chaste one ought not to be? For necessity is but a faithless keeper of chastity, and she alone really deserves to be called pure, who is free to sin if she chooses. If a woman be fair, she soon finds lovers; if she be ugly, it is easy to be wanton. It is difficult to guard what many long for. It is annoying to have what no one thinks worth possessing.

    But the misery of having an ugly wife is less than that of watching a comely one. Nothing is safe, for which a whole people sighs and longs. One man entices with his figure, another with his brains, another with his wit, another with his open hand. Somehow, or sometime, the fortress is captured which is attacked on all sides.
    If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism and thus twists into some metaphor the words of our Lord Jesus Christ" Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit" (Jn 3:5) let him be anathema.

    Offline Cantarella

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #64 on: July 07, 2018, 12:57:58 AM »
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  • St. Jerome on chastity recommended to women:

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    It is the saying of a very learned man, that chastity must be preserved at all costs, and that when it is lost all virtue falls to the ground. This holds the primacy of all virtues in woman. This it is that makes up for a wife's poverty, enhances her riches, redeems her deformity, gives grace to her beauty; it makes her act in a way worthy of her forefathers whose blood it does not taint with bastard offspring; of her children, who through it have no need to blush for their mother, or to be in doubt about their father; and above all, of herself, since it defends her from external violation. There is no greater calamity connected with captivity than to be the victim of another's lust.

    The consulship sheds lustre upon men; eloquence gives eternal renown; military glory and a triumph immortalise an obscure family. Many are the spheres ennobled by splendid ability. The virtue of woman is, in a special sense, purity. It was this that made Lucretia the equal of Brutus, if it did not make her his superior, since Brutus learnt from a woman the impossibility of being a slave. It was this that made Cornelia a fit match for Gracchus, and Porcia for a second Brutus. Tanaquil is better known than her husband. His name, like the names of many other kings, is lost in the mists of antiquity. She, through a virtue rare among women, is too deeply rooted in the hearts of all ages for her memory ever to perish.

    Let my married sisters copy the examples of Theano, Cleobuline, Gorgente, Timoclia, the Claudias and Cornelias; and when they find the Apostle conceding second marriage to depraved women, they will read that before the light of our religion shone upon the world wives of one husband ever held high rank among matrons.

    http://sites.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/canttales/wbpro/jer-men.html
    If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism and thus twists into some metaphor the words of our Lord Jesus Christ" Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit" (Jn 3:5) let him be anathema.


    Offline Cantarella

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #65 on: July 07, 2018, 01:05:18 AM »
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  • I believe that the exalted virgins praised by the Church were so, not out of mere necessity (just because they were ugly and no one wanted them, for instance); but out of a pure, a conscious choice to remain chaste. The merit is in the choice. The sacrifice. That is the virtue of purity which is really praised by the Church and worthy of sainthood.

    This girl, a perfect example of true chastity:



    If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism and thus twists into some metaphor the words of our Lord Jesus Christ" Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit" (Jn 3:5) let him be anathema.

    Offline Jaynek

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #66 on: July 07, 2018, 10:52:00 AM »
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  • It's a bad idea.
    Other things being equal, it is probably better to marry someone who has been chaste all along rather than someone who was unchaste and repented. But I am not aware of any Church teaching that says that a person who has been unchaste in the past should never marry.  (There have, however, been times when that idea was applied to women as part of worldly culture.)

    Chastity is, of course, a wonderful thing.  Recognizing that people may have a second chance after repenting does not take away from the great value of chastity.

    Offline Cantarella

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    Re: Catholic Dowry or Sign a Prenup
    « Reply #67 on: July 07, 2018, 11:04:31 AM »
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  • But I am not aware of any Church teaching that says that a person who has been unchaste in the past should never marry.  (There have, however, been times when that idea was applied to women as part of worldly culture.)

    There is an explicit command in Leviticus 21 about marrying virgins. Granted, it is in the Old Testament and is addressing priests but I found it very interesting. I think it was so explicit because they were prohibiting marriage to widows; (as it was a given that most girls would not be undefiled before Marriage, anyway). 

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    10 The high priest, that one who is chief among his brethren, whose brow has been anointed with the holy oil, and his hands consecrated for the priestly office, who wears the sacred vestments, may never bare his head, or rend his garments,

    11 or go near a dead body upon any occasion. Though it be his father or mother, he must not expose himself to defilement,

    12 but keep within the Lord’s holy precincts, so as not to bring defilement on them, a man consecrated to his God by the holy oil that anointed him; the Lord’s own priest.

    13 And when he marries, he must marry a virgin;

    14 not a widow, or a rejected wife, or a harlot, or a woman dishonoured; she must be a virgin of his own clan,[3]

    15 so that the stock of his family is not debased by the blood of common folk; I, the Lord, have set him apart.


    24 All these commands Moses handed on to Aaron, and to his sons, and to the people of Israel.

    If anyone says that true and natural water is not necessary for baptism and thus twists into some metaphor the words of our Lord Jesus Christ" Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Spirit" (Jn 3:5) let him be anathema.