Pope Francis: Traditional Marriage Is ‘The Image Of God’

Pope Francis I today delivered his regular weekly address before an estimated 45,000 people in St. Peter’s Square to preach the benefits of so-called traditional marriage. The popular 79-year old pontiff announced that the “image of God is the married couple — not just the man, not just the woman, but both.”

“Married couples carry out this vocation in a full and definitive communion of life. As ‘one flesh’, they become living icons of God’s love in our world, building up the Church in unity and fidelity,” Pope Francis I added. “When a man and a woman celebrate the sacrament of marriage, God is reflected in them.”

The National Catholic Reporter adds that the Pope called marriage a sacrament “which brings us to the very heart of God’s loving plan for the human family” and “introduces us to the design of God, who created man in his image, capable of loving.”

“The Triune God created us — men and women — in his image and calls us to mirror the mystery of his love,” the Pope continued, adding that “married couples carry out this vocation in a full and definitive communion of life.”

Highlighting how the vocation builds the Church in “unity and fidelity,” he explained that “Christian marriage also reflects the mystery of Christ’s own faithful and sacrificial love for his body, the Church.”

“Christian spouses thus receive a special consecration and a special mission: to manifest in simple and daily things the love of Christ for his Church, giving themselves in fidelity and service.”

No word on marriage of same-sex couples.