As an essential requirement of love, “every human being is bound to live agreeably with those around him”.*

*Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 114, art. 2, ad 1. ["Whether this kind of friendship (affability) is a part of justice?"]

Saint Thomas Aquinas explains that “it is more proper to charity to desire to love than to desire to be loved”;* indeed, “mothers, who are those who love the most, seek to love more than to be loved”.**

*Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae, II-II, q. 27, art. 1, ad 2. ["Whether to be loved is more proper to charity than to love?"]
**Ibid., q. 27, art. 1.

Our reflection on Saint Paul’s hymn to love has prepared us to discuss conjugal love. This is the love between husband and wife,* a love sanctified, enriched and illuminated by the grace of the sacrament of marriage. It is an “affective union”,** spiritual and sacrificial, which combines the warmth of friendship and erotic passion, and endures long after emotions and passion subside.

*Thomas Aquinas calls love a vis unitiva (Summa Theologiae I, q. 20, art. 1, ad 3 ["Whether love exists in God?"]), echoing a phrase of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite (De Divinis Nominibus, IV, 12: PG 3, 709). [The previous citation is to a page-length, extended quote of a Martin Luther King Jr. sermon!]
**Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 27, art. 2. ["Whether to love considered as an act of charity is the same as goodwill?" Also, Francis's next citation is to Casti Connubii.]

After the love that unites us to God, conjugal love is the “greatest form of friendship”.*

*Thomas Aquinas, Summa Contra Gentiles III, 123 ["That matrimony should be indivisible"]; cf. Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 8 ["Friendship"], 12 (ed. Bywater, Oxford, 1984, 174). [This is quite good and true; cf. this Christendom college prof.'s lecture: "Friendship of Man and Woman According to Aristotle and St. Thomas."]

Saint Thomas Aquinas said that the word “joy” refers to an expansion of the heart.*

*Cf. Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 31, art. 3., ad 3. ["Whether delight differs from joy?"]

The very special form of love that is marriage is called to embody what Saint Thomas Aquinas said about charity in general. “Charity”, he says, “by its very nature, has no limit to its increase, for it is a participation in that infinite charity which is the Holy Spirit…Nor on the part of the subject can its limit be fixed, because as charity grows, so too does its capacity for an even greater increase”.*

*Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 24, art. 7. ["Whether charity increases indefinitely?"]

Excess, lack of control or obsession with a single form of pleasure can end up weakening and tainting that very pleasure* and damaging family life. A person can certainly channel his passions in a beautiful and healthy way, increasingly pointing them towards altruism and an integrated self-fulfillment that can only enrich interpersonal relationships in the heart of the family. This does not mean renouncing moments of intense enjoyment,** but rather integrating them with other moments of generous commitment, patient hope, inevitable weariness and struggle to achieve an ideal.

*Cf. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 32, art.7 ["Whether likeness is a cause of pleasure?"].
**Cf. Id., Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 153, art. 2 ["Whether no venereal act can be without sin?"], ad 2: “Abundantia delectationis quae est in actu venereo secundum rationem ordinato, non contrariatur medio virtutis” ["The exceeding pleasure attaching to a venereal act directed according to reason, is not opposed to the mean of virtue."].

Hence it is can no longer simply be said that all those in any “irregular” situation are living in a state of mortal sin and are deprived of sanctifying grace. [!!!] More is involved here than mere ignorance of the rule. … Saint Thomas Aquinas himself recognized that someone may possess grace and charity, yet not be able to exercise any one of the virtues well;* in other words, although someone may possess all the infused moral virtues, he does not clearly manifest the existence of one of them, because the outward practice of that virtue is rendered difficult: “Certain saints are said not to possess certain virtues, in so far as they experience difficulty in the acts of those virtues, even though they have the habits of all the virtues”.** [Being in the state of grace means having the freedom to exercise the virtues? This quote of St. Thomas seems to be a non sequitur; it appears he quotes the greatest theologian of the Church to rationalize living in sin!!]

*Cf. Summa Theologiae I-II, q. 65, art. 3 ["Whether charity can be without moral virtue?"] ad 2; De Malo, q. 2, art. 2 ["Whether sin consists only in the act of the will?"].
**Ibid., ad 3.

It is reductive simply to consider whether or not an individual’s actions correspond to a general law or rule, because that is not enough to discern and ensure full fidelity to God in the concrete life of a human being. [St. Thomas says that conscience is the act of applying abstract principles (e.g., "Thou shalt not commit adultery") to concrete situations in one's life (cf. Summa Theologica I q. 79 a. 13 c.). Thus, Francis says conscience "is reductive;" it's something we need to move beyond!] I earnestly ask that we always recall a teaching of Saint Thomas Aquinas and learn to incorporate it in our pastoral discernment: “Although there is necessity in the general principles, the more we descend to matters of detail, the more frequently we encounter defects… In matters of action, truth or practical rectitude is not the same for all, as to matters of detail, but only as to the general principles; and where there is the same rectitude in matters of detail, it is not equally known to all… The principle will be found to fail, according as we descend further into detail”.* It is true that general rules set forth a good which can never be disregarded or neglected, but in their formulation they cannot provide absolutely for all particular situations. [So, God has called us to do the impossible by giving us the "general rules" of the Ten Commandments (natural law)‽ God does not "suffer us to be tempted above that which we are able" (1 Cor. 10:13), as the Council of Trent reiterated in its Doctrine on the Sacrament of Matrimony.] At the same time, it must be said that, precisely for that reason, what is part of a practical discernment in particular circumstances cannot be elevated to the level of a rule. That would not only lead to an intolerable casuistry, but would endanger the very values which must be preserved with special care.**

*Summa Theologiae, I-II, q. 94, art. 4. ["Whether the natural law is the same in all men?"]
**In another text, referring to the general knowledge of the rule and the particular knowledge of practical discernment, Saint Thomas states that “if only one of the two is present, it is preferable that it be the knowledge of the particular reality, which is closer to the act”: Sententia libri Ethicorum, VI, 6 ["Wisdom, the Principle Intellectual Virtue," ¶1194] (ed. Leonina, t. XLVII, 354.)