Pavol Dancák
Family and Polis. The Socio-Philosophical Legacy of Plato and Aristotle at the Present Time
The current debate on family is subject to rapid social changes which have had colossal negative impact on economy itself and on the economy of entire countries. The purpose of social and family life is not to bound, but to develop the human being. Thoughts about the future of the family are associated with education in the very sense that is pointed out by human experience. It can be said that Aristotle’s legacy is as follows: for subject, it is necessary to reflect pro futuro basic demand of how to be “together with others,” to act “with others” and, on which depends realization and completion of the subject’s being.
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Krzysztof Wieczorek
The Family in the Contemporary World. Catholic Social Teaching and Gender
Contemporary man confronts a dilemma. In search of his or her own identity and a model of life in human community, an individual can choose between two attitudes which exclude each other. The first one is shaped by the Catholic Social Teaching and is based on a foundation of Christian anthropology. It leads to self-identification within the framework of a double model of the human being: man and woman. Consequently, someone identified with his or her biological sex tends toward self-fulfillment in the traditional social and cultural role. The second attitude is based on the postmodern deconstruction of the category of sex. It leads to a blurred vision of one’s own sexual identity, denial of opposition and complementarity of man and woman and rejection of traditional criteria of choosing one’s way of life. This paper presents the arguments of these two attitudes and the probable consequences of choices made within the framework of both options discussed.
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Helena Hrehová
The Role of the Women in the Development of Human Rights
This paper reflects upon the task of women in the context of the development of human rights. Human rights are depicted as something that is recognized personally. Since women have felt injustice for centuries, they constantly sought to solve this ethical problem by referring to the biblical, anthropological, philosophical, historical, and legal context. Even in our times the inequality is still evident in the field of human rights; however, not so de iure as in practice. Equality and human rights are for all. Inequality is embarrassing. Contemporary phase in the development of human rights, which includes massive gender ideology, rights of LGBT people, and practices of juvenile justice, becomes dangerous not only for women and men, but for children and families as well. Wide-spread construction of gender theories comes shoulder to shoulder with an ambivalent effect, which includes dismemberment of society, loosing personal identity, disintegration of families, incomprehension of the institute of marriage and thus leads to the dominance of minorities. European society looses rationality, which is substituted by manipulation.
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Aneta Gawkowska
New Feminism as a Response to the Modern Crisis of Community
The article presents and analyzes a number of chosen major arguments of the New Feminists which base their theories on John Paul II’s theological anthropology of sexuality and theology of woman. The New Feminism is a kind of personalist humanism which centers its attention on the human person realizing his or her nature within relations of personal self-giving. Assumptions of male and female equality, difference, and complementarity together with the specific female sensitivity towards the human and relationships form the basis for the New Feminist theoretical argumentation and practical postulates. The New Feminism is also a theologically inspired social response to the modern crisis of community and the deficit of affirmation of values such as person or human relations. By offering a serious correction or completion of the modern perspective of freedom and independence with its vision of fulfillment of freedom by love, the New Feminism seems to constitute a necessary kind of social philosophy which does not try to substitute the one-sided concept of freedom with any equally one-sided view of the social bond or addiction to others, but it rather attempts at the reconciliation of values which seem to be complementary.
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Yosyp Veresh
Love as a Gift of Self. Call to Holiness in Christian Marriage in the Light of Eastern Monasticism
Perhaps more than ever before, Christian spouses in the contemporary world encounter challenges and difficulties in living out their call to holiness. In the history of Christianity monasticism has always represented a model of a life according to the Gospel. Monastic life has been a living icon of holiness for all Christians in the world striving for perfection. This paper considers some characteristic aspects of the spiritual life of the monastic community and their possible application to the spiritual community life of Christian marriage. The two primary sources of this paper are the writings of St. Basil the Great and St. John Paul II. Beginning with a consideration of the call to holiness, the paper proceeds to explore some fundamental and characteristic values of the monastic koinonia and of the communio personarum of Christian marriage, which leads to a discussion of the inner discipline of love as a gift of self. The paper concludes by a short eschatological reflection.
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Witold Kania
Moral Issues of Advance Directives
The letter Gratissimam Sane stresses that contemporary civilization based on utilitarianism treats people like “objects” and not like “persons.” The civilization of use potentially can affect family life. In this context, the paper considers the problem of advance directives. The first part the article offers a historical outline of advance directives which are related to the euthanasia movement and controversial legal battles over patients who lost their capacity to decide. The main reasons for having a living will or health care proxy follow. The second part of the article describes the clinical case of Mr. A., which illustrates the problems regarding the application and interpretation of advance directives. The last part presents a discussion of the case. It focuses on the dignity and autonomy of patient and physician and limits of the proxy decisions.
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Andrzej Pastwa
“Common Good of Marriage and the Family.” Canonical Reflections
The initial thesis of the study is John Paul II’s proclamation in the Letter to Family (1994), which states that an individual can exist “for himself” through the sincere gift of self— and, at the same time, fulfill himself as “common good”: “the common good of the whole of the society” and “the common good of marriage and the family” (nn. 10, 11). These latter words give an impulse to undertake an attempt of transforming the profound theological thought of the papal document into conclusions on the canon law plane. The most fundamental ones seem to be: (1) a considerable meaning for the Church matrimonial discipline has its foundation on a realistic vision of a human being; (2) a basis of the contemporary theological and legal doctrine de matrimonio et familia is the structural (ethical) principle of love; (3) the acceptance of the appropriate premises of the juridical anthropology of marriage gives life to all attempts of setting the personalistic dimension of marriage against its legal value; (4) the indissoluble character of marriage is the basis of the common good of the family.
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Tomasz Gałkowski
Sovereign Family
The point of departure for the deliberations is the Letter to Families written by John Paul II presenting threats to understanding, existing, and functioning of the family in the contemporary world. The author of the study discusses the problem of sovereignty of the family. He depicts it from a wider point of view of its identity and subjectivity, indicating that these three elementary dimensions of family’s existence have impact on its inalienable, fundamental, and universal rights independent of any human authority. For this reason, he analyzes the concepts of identity, subjectivity, and sovereignty of the family, their relationships with each other, their basis which lies in marital covenant, as well as legal and political consequences for the existence of the family within a wider social community.
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Piotr Majer
The Significance of the Canonical Form of Marriage
The paper offers arguments for the canonical form of contracting marriage ad validitatem matrimonii which has been obligatory since the Council of Trent.
Responding to critique and postulates for abolishing the obligatory character of the canonical form, the Author presents its stricte ecclesiastical significance. In the face of the secularization of marriage, the canonical form of contracting marriage should allow the Church not only to exercise church jurisdiction over the marriage, but, first of all, to be a tool of testimony about the sacramentality of marriage and the guarantee of authenticity of the matrimonial sign towards both the future spouses and, ad extra, the world.
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Stanislav Přibyl
Effects of Matrimonial Canon Law: Pastoral Aspects
The value changes in the Western world since the 1960s have been markedly strong as regards the youth towards marriage. This situation was reacted to already in the 1983 Code of Canon Law promulgated by Pope John Paul II. Canon law can thus more effectively become a relevant tool in the pastoral care for the betrothed and married spouses in the Catholic Church. However, the basis for such pastoral ministry is a thorough preparation of couples for marriage and their permanent spiritual accompaniment. Legal tools referred to in the present paper can contribute to solving unusual or difficult situations of the spouses and enabling them access to sacramental life.
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Piotr Kroczek
Church Teaching on Marriage and Family as an Instruction for the State Legislator in the Context of Poland
The Church has the right and duty “always and everywhere to proclaim moral principles, even in respect of the social order” (can. 747 § 2), and the faithful are “to ensure that their actions are permeated with the spirit of the Gospel, and they are to heed the teaching of the Church proposed by the magisterium” (can. 227). The 20th anniversary of the publication of the Letter to Families from Pope John Paul II Gratissimam Sane is a great opportunity to recall the document and to bring to light some thoughts on family that would be useful instructions for those who, in the context of Poland, are bearing the legislative power. The paper presents five important ideas on marriage and family that must be, from catholic point of view, in some way present in state law. The ideas concern: marriage as sovereign society, marriage as heterosexual union, the threats of gender ideology for the family, the proper relations between the parents and children, and the professional work and the work within the family unit.
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Lucjan Świto
Family as a Subject of Protection in the State Family Policy
This article analyzes the subject of the state family policy and whether it really serves the protection of the family on the example of Poland. The research carried out leads to the conclusion that the existing state of affairs results in a “blurring” of the traditional culturally and historically conditioned concept of the family, implicitly introducing its “mental redefinition.” Behind the facade of support for the family, various forms of common coexistence are protected with increasing boldness, which also includes―pursuant to the LGBT gender perspective― same-sex couples. The current family policy is not a policy that perceives the family in a comprehensive perspective and is used for the full protection of all family life. The family, although it is a social value with established constitutional position, is not a subject of state protection and support that would be relevant for this position. The existing legal norms rather protect the interests of individual persons belonging to the family than the family as a whole. At the same time, the range of persons making up a family―according to a trend to extend the definition of a family―is increasingly widening.
