Una Caro: Where Are the Families?

–        A Doctrinal Reflection on Monogamy Today

 

Last full month, we, the priests of the parish of Santi Silvestro e Martino in Milan, resumed our Christmas family visits, which had been suspended for a few years due to the Covid-19 pandemic. For me, this was the first time. It might seem like a superficial and almost magical gesture, because the rooms, furniture, and kitchen don’t need blessing. But in reality, I realize once again how profound this moment is for some people who don’t attend Holy Mass or parish life. I’m delighted to discover that the welcome is better than I could have imagined, accompanied by the surprise of seeing a priest offer a smile and a handshake on the threshold of their home. The brief words we manage to exchange at this time often help us priests grasp something of the family’s concrete life.

On the one hand, I have found myself gathering tears for a recent bereavement, listening to the sadness of ancient loneliness, breathing in the joy of young couples who are not yet thinking about marriage but are already expressing an intense and fresh love, meeting many wonderful young university students away from home who have felt at home talking in English and conveyed to me the seriousness of their studies and the vitality of their twenties, listening to the profound questions of those who, perhaps for years, have been waiting to meet a priest in whom they can confide, and ensuring prayers for the pregnant girl. On the other hand, I have witnessed a countable number of persons living together, responding to me “abito con un compagno,” not wanting to get into family life but having a dog or cat in the place of children. Not to judge, but to state the reality – where are the families?

It is precisely against this lived reality that the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) released Una Caro. Elogio della monogamia. Nota dottrinale sul valore del matrimonio come unione esclusiva e appartenenza reciproca (“One Flesh: In Praise of Monogamy. Doctrinal Note on the Value of Marriage as an Exclusive Union and Mutual Belonging”) on 25 November 2025. Pope Leo XIV approved the text in forma specifica on 21 November 2025 and ordered its publication. The document was released only in Italian, yet its reflection on marriage as a unique, exclusive, and mutually belonging union speaks profoundly to the realities we encounter in parish life today. Experiencing the reality of contemporary family life first-hand, I can see how timely and urgent such a reflection is for guiding, accompanying, and inspiring both married and future families.

Three Main Reasons

This document emerged for three main reasons:

1. As a response to pastoral questions from African bishops who continue to confront the persistence of polygamy;
2. Against the backdrop of Western societies experiencing a rise in “public forms of non-monogamous unions,” often identified as “polyamory”; and
3. In light of a technological culture that encourages individuals to imagine themselves as “creatures without limits,” thereby undermining stable and exclusive commitments.

Amid such realities, the DDF frames Una Caro as a proactive initiative. As Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández explains at the very beginning, the intention is “to extract from Sacred Scripture, from the history of Christian thought, from philosophy, and even from poetry, reasons and motivations that lead to choosing a unique and exclusive union of love, a rich and all-encompassing mutual belonging.”

Major Contributions of Una Caro

It is worth noting some of the main core messages of this document in order to uphold “the matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life and which is ordered by its nature to the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring, has been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament between the baptized” (Can. 1055§1).

1) The Unitive Nature of Marriage

The central affirmation of the doctrinal note is clear: “Every authentic marriage is a unity composed of two individuals, requiring a relationship so intimate and totalizing that it cannot be shared with others” (no.5). This unity is grounded in the biblical concept of becoming “one flesh” (no.1), understood not as fusion but as reciprocal self-giving. Thus, the document emphasizes: “Only two people can make a complete and personal gift of themselves to one another.” If shared among many, such a gift becomes “partial” and fails to respect the dignity of the partner.

As St Augustine says: “The first natural bond of human society is that between man and woman. Nor did God create each of them separately and then join them as if they were strangers; rather, He created the one from the other… The side of the man from which the woman was taken and formed signifies the strength of their union. For those who walk together and look together toward the same goal are joined side by side” (no. 36). Thus, the document emphasizes marriage as an “exclusive union and mutual belonging,” insisting that such unity is neither a cultural leftover nor a moral burden but a reality that “opens to eternity.”

2) Mutual Belonging as the Key to Unity

A second major contribution of Una Caro lies in its careful articulation of mutual belonging as the inner principle that sustains the unitive and lifelong character of marriage. The document clarifies that authentic unity does not arise merely from emotional attachment or social commitment, but from a freely chosen reciprocity in which each spouse belongs to the other in dignity and freedom.

Crucially, the Note distinguishes mutual belonging from distorted notions of possession or control. As it explains, belonging “never means possession, domination, or the supremacy of one over the other,” but rather denotes a harmony rooted in respect, esteem, and total reciprocity, free from manipulation or hidden strategies. In this sense, belonging is not something imposed but something received and offered. The document further deepens this insight by grounding mutual belonging in self-gift. The spouses’ unity flows from their voluntary decision to give themselves to one another, not as an external obligation but as an interior law of love. As the Note observes: “The common law of their love … springs from their own attitude of voluntarily giving themselves in possession, and therefore is not a law imposed from outside.”

Drawing implicitly on the theological vision of Hans Urs von Balthasar (no.49), the text presents this mutual self-giving as generating a reality that transcends the individual spouses. Their love “rises above both of them as a third fruitful, creative reality,” animated by the Spirit, which both unites and guides them. In this pneumatological dimension, mutual belonging becomes not only the foundation of marital unity but also its enduring source of fruitfulness and fidelity.

3) Cultural Challenges and the Social Mission of Marriage

The document elevates conjugal love as “the greatest friendship,” characterized by patience, knowledge of the other, intimacy, understanding, and shared care. Prayer is described as “a precious means” that allows spouses to “sanctify themselves and grow in love.” Sexuality, understood “in body and soul,” is framed as “a marvellous gift of God,” oriented toward self-giving love. The note clarifies that marriage “retains its essential character even if it is childless” and recognizes the legitimacy of respecting natural periods of infertility.

It also addresses contemporary challenges that threaten the integrity of marital love. It critiques the present “postmodern consumerist individualism” that separates sexuality from interpersonal meaning, and the social media culture where “modesty vanishes and symbolic and sexual violence proliferate.” In response, Una Caro calls for “a new pedagogy” of love that teaches the young to understand love as responsibility, fidelity, and hope.

Beyond personal enrichment, married love is also a social reality. Couples are called to shared projects that serve the community. Pope Leo XIV affirms that the poor are “a family matter.” This social openness serves as an antidote to the “self-absorption” that weakens relational bonds. In this way, monogamy integrates the personal, conjugal, and societal dimensions of love, demonstrating that marital commitment is not only a private gift but also a contribution to the common good.

The Message for Families and Society Today

While reading this document, one can find five concrete invitations offered to contemporary married couples and those preparing for marriage:

1. To rediscover monogamy not as an archaic restriction but as “the possibility of a love that opens to eternity,” made possible “with the help of grace.”
2. To cultivate a “holy fear” of violating the other’s freedom, rejecting every form of domination, jealousy, manipulation, or control, and learning to grant legitimate spaces of solitude without insecurity.
3. To allow conjugal charity to become “the greatest friendship,” a place where spouses feel profoundly “at home in each other” while continuing to mature as distinct persons.
4. To resist the consumerist and technological temptation to treat persons as interchangeable or as means of self-fulfilment, remembering that “numbers dissolve the names; they disperse the unity of the loving impulse.”
5. To open their “we two” toward social fruitfulness, especially toward the poor, who, in the words of Pope Leo XIV repeatedly cited, must be considered “a family matter” rather than merely “a social problem.”

It is finally hoped that, as mentioned in the document (no.10), this Note on the value of monogamy, addressed primarily to Bishops and devoted to a theme that is at once so important and so beautiful, may be of help to married couples, engaged couples, and young people who are considering a future union, enabling them to grasp more fully the richness of the Christian proposal concerning marriage. It is true that, for many, such a message may sound strange or countercultural; nevertheless, the following words of Saint Augustine can be applied to it: “Give me a heart that loves, and it will understand what I say.” Finally, let us always remember that in love, the “right” person does not exist; what matters is learning to choose another who is unique, just as we are, and thus to make a couple’s life a long novel.

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Fr. M. Titus Mohan, from the diocese of Kuzhithurai, now pursues his Doctoral research in Moral Theology, Milan.