Faith and Practice
Select one of the following sections to go to
Part III: Friends Practices
Chapter 4-Marriage
Marriage, if rightly conceived and faithfully maintained, is regarded by Friends as the most sacred of all social arrangements. The family was Jesus’ favorite illustration of the nature of the Kingdom of Heaven. He honored and blessed marriage as the truest example of divine-human cooperation in perfecting a social structure for the help and continuance of the human family and for the mutual assistance and comfort of both sexes, that they may be helpmates to each other in things temporal and spiritual. Marriage, therefore, should be entered upon discreetly, soberly, and in the fear of the God. It can never be truly accomplished by church formularies, legal sanctions, or ministerial pronouncements, but should be consummated as an inward voluntary, spiritual union of hearts, in the free initiative of mutual choice and outwardly expressed by the contracting parties. Sanctions of church and state are the social acknowledgments of the true marriage into which enter those whom God has joined together and are to be held in high regard and to be observed with strict fidelity.
Select one of the following sections to go to