The Bishop of Shrewsbury has invited the Catholics of his diocese to confidently propose the Christian vision of marriage to people as a proposal ever new.
In the first annual diocesan Mass in celebration of marriage since the lockdown of 2020, the Rt Rev. Mark Davies noted that recent statistics indicated it was not an exaggeration to suggest traditional marriage was now in “cataclysmic decline” and at risk of effectively disappearing as an institution from the social landscape of the country.
He warned the congregation in St Columba’s Church, Chester, that the consequences of the collapse of marriage in the UK “are only beginning to be worked out, not least for the well-being of children”.
In his homily, Bishop Davies reminded couples gathered with their families to celebrate landmark wedding anniversaries that the promises they made to each other represented the embarkation on a vocation “lived from the beginning and written into the very nature of man and woman, a vocation raised by Christ to be a sacrament of salvation and held holy by the Church for 2,000 years”.
“The promises you made were not merely recognised by British society as the most vital of its institutions and the greatest of social goods, this was a commitment in which society uniquely promised to support you in numerous ways,” said the Bishop, adding, however, that such commitments had in recent years become more and more “exceptional”.
The witness of every Christian marriage, Bishop Davies explained, was a declaration of Christian faith in marriage as a “Divine calling, lived out in human relationships which bear the disorder and frailties of sin, yet with the promise of unfailing grace and the hope of salvation”.
It is by living the Christian vocation to marriage, the Bishop said, that lay Catholics can continue to reveal the truth of such a divine calling in all its beauty, and thereby invite new generations to follow them in holiness and happiness and the creation of stable and loving homes for children.
Bishop Davies said: “It is hard to imagine in little more than half a century the promises you made, the vocation you embraced would become more and more exceptional. So exceptional in these early years of this 21st Century that most recent statistics show a 61 per cent decrease of marriages in our land; the lowest number of couples entering marriage for almost two centuries; and the first time in our history that more children are born outside of marriage than in a married home.
“The headlines do not seem to exaggerate when they speak not merely of a cataclysmic decline but of marriage disappearing in Britain. The social consequences of such a loss are only beginning to be worked out, not least for the well-being of children.”
The Bishop said: “At a moment in our history when marriage is increasingly being lost sight of, the witness you have given simply by living the promises of marriage through every trial and difficulty is no small thing and today shines out more and more brightly.
“The Christian vocation of marriage stands out as an invitation to new generations to believe and set out along the same path; to have the courage to make the same awesome promises; to build a stable and loving home for their children by their very faithfulness; and with the same prayer that the Lord may protect their unity of heart and bring them to old age together.”
In his opening remarks, Bishop Davies observed that together the couples attending the Mass have amassed “1,275 years of marriage faithfully lived,” which he described as an “incalculable good”.
The Mass was attended by Lloyd and Sheila Hayes, parishioners of Our Lady and St Christopher’s, Romiley, Cheshire, who this year celebrate 70 years of marriage, having wed at the church aged 20 and 18 respectively and going on have eight children, 23 grandchildren and nine great grandchildren.
Five other couples were celebrating 60 years of marriage, 10 were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversaries, four their 40th, three their 30th and three their 25th.
Mr and Mrs Hayes (pictured) said their advice to young people about to embark on married life was “not to give in so quickly”.
“It didn’t occur to us to be anything else but committed,” said Mr Hayes, “and we have had a wonderful family.”
Pamela and Stuart Hodgson, parents of four and grandparents to four, and parishioners of St Hugh’s, Timperley, Cheshire, attended the Mass because this year they celebrate their golden wedding anniversary.
Pamela said: “Marriage is a real blessing. It gives you stability and someone to be with – to share the good times and the bad.”
Jacinta and Grant Adonis (pictured below), parishioners of St Winefride’s, Neston, the Wirral, attended with their four children, having celebrated their silver anniversary.
Jacinta said Catholics should “keep God at the centre of our lives” if they wished their vocations to marriage to succeed.
The Marriage Foundation (marriagefoundation.org.uk) has consistently shown in its research that marriages between men and women are inherently more stable and enduring than any other form of relationship.
One of the most recent studies by the charity, founded in 2012 to respond to “epidemic levels of family breakdown”, has revealed that by the age of 14 years, some 46 per cent of children in the UK are not living with both natural parents. While a third of these children have experienced the collapse of their parents’ marriages, almost half (46 per cent) have witnessed the separation of parents who were unmarried.
Among teens whose natural parents are still together, the majority of parents are married (84 per cent) with only a small minority unmarried (16 per cent).
The Marriage Foundation maintains that UK government family police is now focused on the provision of childcare and encouraging all parents into work instead of supporting marriage, even though the institution is proven to be the most secure for children. Aside from regulatory changes, the Government almost entirely avoids making distinctions between married and cohabiting couples in both tax and benefits systems, the charity contests, and it is nine years since any cabinet minister gave a serious speech discussing marriage.
The only remaining financial advantage in getting married is a £252 tax allowance for low-income couples introduced in 2015, according to the Marriage Foundation. This is dramatically offset, however, by a substantial “couple penalty” for low-income couples who stand to lose thousands of pounds in welfare payments if they move in together or marry. Campaigners for marriage have argued that this is a serious barrier to marriage among the poorest which has been completely neglected by politicians and that marriage is increasingly the preserve of the better off.
During the pandemic of 2020, a temporary ban on weddings followed by tight restrictions in England and Wales saw the number of marriages collapse by 61 per cent, the sharpest fall in any country in Europe.
The Government further weakened the traditional understanding of marriage when the 2013 Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act redefined the institution to make it juridically equivalent to radically different types of union.
Theresa May, then Home Secretary in the Government of Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, declared that the change in the law would mean “homosexuals will be missionaries to the wider society and make it (marriage) ‘stronger’”.
The only robust sociological evidence presented to the House of Commons predicted the opposite, however, and warned politicians that the redefinition of marriage would undermine the institution by reinforcing the idea that marriage is irrelevant to parenthood.
A 22-page paper submitted to MPs by Dr Patricia Morgan, a distinguished sociologist and author, contained a detailed analysis of marriage trends in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Spain, Belgium, Canada and some US states where same-sex marriage has been legalised, and showed how traditional marriage in such jurisdictions was in freefall.
Spain in particular saw a “precipitous” downward acceleration in the numbers of all marriages by 15,000 a year in first three years that followed the legalisation of same-sex marriage by the Socialist government in 2005, then the decline doubling to 34,000 fewer marriages per annum in the years that followed.
(Photos by Simon Caldwell)