I've been reading, praying, and discerning much about the Holy Family during this Advent Season and the age old questions related to Mary's Perpetual Virginity have been running through my head as of late. Allow me to state that I do not deny Mary's Perpetual Virginity but I've been thinking quite a bit about Joseph and his role in the Holy Family now more than ever.
Here is something I'm hung up on, particularly after having begun reading the booklet "Saint Joseph: Fatima and Fatherhood." If Mary had taken a vow of lifelong virginity prior to her betrothal to Joseph and he still agreed to marriage, it would suggest that he would esstentially be a lifelong virgin so long as they were married. Of course God had other plans, the Incarnation of course. Using Mary and Joseph's intentions as an example, well wouldn't they fly in the face of the Church's teaching regarding Holy Matrimony and that marriage needs to be ordered toward procreation?
I'm trying to grasp what the timeframe Mary & Joseph lived in was like so far as marriage and marital relations are concerned as well as how that may apply to the Church's teachings since then, certainly in our time.
Here is something I'm hung up on, particularly after having begun reading the booklet "Saint Joseph: Fatima and Fatherhood." If Mary had taken a vow of lifelong virginity prior to her betrothal to Joseph and he still agreed to marriage, it would suggest that he would esstentially be a lifelong virgin so long as they were married. Of course God had other plans, the Incarnation of course. Using Mary and Joseph's intentions as an example, well wouldn't they fly in the face of the Church's teaching regarding Holy Matrimony and that marriage needs to be ordered toward procreation?
I'm trying to grasp what the timeframe Mary & Joseph lived in was like so far as marriage and marital relations are concerned as well as how that may apply to the Church's teachings since then, certainly in our time.