In today’s address, the Holy Father turned specifically to the issue of “the contemporary crisis of marriage and the family, and, more generally, of the Christian vision of human sexuality.”<\/p>\n
Benedict called attention to the “powerful political and cultural currents seeking to alter the legal definition of marriage,” and he said that the Church needs to give a “reasoned defense of marriage as a natural institution consisting of a specific communion of persons, essentially rooted in the complementarity of the sexes and oriented to procreation.”<\/p>\n
“Sexual differences cannot be dismissed as irrelevant to the definition of marriage,” he affirmed. “Defending the institution of marriage as a social reality is ultimately a question of justice, since it entails safeguarding the good of the entire human community and the rights of parents and children alike.”<\/p>\n