Argument

[Jart]

I was talking with someone who asked how sex could be impure. I told him outside the context of marriage and he came back and said “So you’re trying to tell me that the thousands of generations that existed before the invention of marriage, were impure? Preposterous.”

I need some help because that thought never crossed my mind.

 

[StCsDavid]

When was marriage invented? That would be with Adam and Eve. Seeing as they were the first two on the scene, where are these thousands of generations your friend speaks of?

God created marriage when he created man in His own image and likeness. Male and female he created them. Marriage was so important to God that it survived humanity’s fall from grace.

 

[Jart]

He might also bring up that priests, who marry a man and woman, didn’t come into the picture until years and years later.

 

[st_lucy]

He might also bring up that priests, who marry a man and woman, didn’t come into the picture until years and years later.

Well that is ridiculous. Is he talking about priest in the christian sense or is he talking about priest in the OT sense? Because the last time I checked priest have been around a very long time

Since he is arguing it is up to him to prove that there was no marriage for years and years. He’ll have a hard time with that one.

 

[StCsDavid]

The Catholic Church teaches that man and woman confer the sacrament of marriage upon themselves with the priest ordinarily serving as a witness for the Church. Priests didn’t invent marriage. That was God’s idea.

The dignity of a sacrament: Marriage between baptized persons is an efficacious sign of the union between Christ and the Church, and, as such, is a means of grace (see below for a more thorough discussion). The marriage of two non-baptized persons, or of one baptized person and one non-baptized person, is considered by the Church a “good and natural” marriage. While not sacramental, such marriages are holy unions that share in the same goods and purposes of sacramental marriage.

- Written by Christopher West
Read the entire article by clicking here
​

 

[Gardening_Mommy]

Arguments about Adam and Eve are all well and good, but I don’t think they’ll solve the OP’s problem.

You might instead point out that every society has forms for marriage of some kind, whether monogamous, polygamous, polyandrous (sp? one woman, several men), etc. They also have some very stiff penalties for adultery, however they define it.

What every primitive society understood was that it took some teamwork to raise kids successfully, and it behooved them to put some level of stability and responsibility on the pair bond. Contrary to the snotty brat I had in 9th grade CCD last year, “shacking up” is NOT the “natural” norm or even widely accepted until very recently.

So, yes, many generations did not stand up in a church and say, “I do,” but they had something that tried to approximate marriage, which only proves the importance of the sacrament! It’s in our very nature to seek marriage. In fact, I would argue that some of those societies did better at marriage than the Western world is doing today with 50% and worse divorce rates.

 

[brotherjoe]

Let’s say your friend believes in evolution. Even many species of animals take mates for life. The moral equivalent of “marriage” may be said to predate humanity, from this point of view.

 

[BlestOne]

He might also bring up that priests, who marry a man and woman, didn’t come into the picture until years and years later.

Who is more priestly than God? Did he not create woman for man?

 

[Zahmir]

Impure is a wrong word.

Marriage has been from the very beginning God’s own design. He created us male and female for a reason - so that we might share in his life and love in a very real way. In one way or another, cultures/religions have had a “marriage rite.”

Marriage, even before Christ, is by no means “impure.”

What Christ did, however, is raised marriage to the level of a Sacrament. Through the Sacrament, he gives his graces to the couple so that they might be perfected - with each other’s help - in him.

Sex is impure when love is not part of the equation - when TRUE love is not part of the equation. I think that covers all your bases.

 

[Fone_Bone_2001]

Arguments about Adam and Eve are all well and good, but I don’t think they’ll solve the OP’s problem.

You might instead point out that every society has forms for marriage of some kind, whether monogamous, polygamous, polyandrous (sp? one woman, several men), etc. They also have some very stiff penalties for adultery, however they define it.

What every primitive society understood was that it took some teamwork to raise kids successfully, and it behooved them to put some level of stability and responsibility on the pair bond. Contrary to the snotty brat I had in 9th grade CCD last year, “shacking up” is NOT the “natural” norm or even widely accepted until very recently.

So, yes, many generations did not stand up in a church and say, “I do,” but they had something that tried to approximate marriage, which only proves the importance of the sacrament! It’s in our very nature to seek marriage. In fact, I would argue that some of those societies did better at marriage than the Western world is doing today with 50% and worse divorce rates.

Exactly - you put it far better than I could. It’s foolish to think that there were “thousands of generations [of humans]” before “marriage was invented.” Marriage has had many forms throughout recorded history, but in some sense culturally accepted sexual relationships have always fit into some kind of standard, structural unit.

 

[ltbpoe43]

Regardless of when marriage was invented - there has for centuries been some form of recognition of a spousal unit of one man and one woman committed to each other monogamously.

Even the cave man dragged his honey around by the hair and the reason for the big club was to keep the other cavemen away.

 

[prodigal-sun]

From an anthropological point of view your friend has his head up his…! Most primitive societies (which had no resource to the OT or NT) had some form of marriage and still do. The biggest benefit of marriage is the family unit and the raising of any children to be well adjusted and useful adults.

Peace!

 

[trogiah]

I was talking with someone who asked how sex could be impure. I told him outside the context of marriage and he came back and said “So you’re trying to tell me that the thousands of generations that existed before the invention of marriage, were impure? Preposterous.”

I need some help because that thought never crossed my mind.

I would argue that all the generations that have followed since the invention of marriage have, like those before that “invention”, fallen short of perfect purity.

The desires that we feel, the desire to breathe air, to eat food, to have sex, are all God created and therefore are good. Our distortion of those desires makes us impure. Marriage is a valuable grace that helps men and women respond to the desire for intimacy and procreation in a way that gives life beyond the immediate fullfillment of our desires. None of us live it perfectly, so we are all to some extent “impure”.

Jim