Catholics celebrate their marriage in a sacrament—the Sacrament of Matrimony—and promise to be faithful to each other until death. As the Church teaches, marriage is indissoluble. That means marriage is a life-long commitment.

There are situations that sometimes lead people to divorce. When a couple divorces, that is a civil action, not a Church action. In some cases, divorced Catholics seek an annulment. An annulment is a declaration by the Church that the marriage was not a real marriage. The reasons for giving an annulment may be that one of the people in the marriage was forced to marry the other; or that one of them was not open to having any children. If the Church finds sufficient reason and grants an annulment, then both parties are free to marry again in the Church.

If a couple who have celebrated the Sacrament of Matrimony divorce, they are still full members of the Church and can receive the sacraments. But if either spouse remarries without first receiving an annulment, then he or she is still a member of the Church but cannot receive the sacraments.   

Marriage is a vocation, and God offers his grace to help couples through difficulties. However, marriage is not easy, and we all should pray for married couples and do whatever we can to support and encourage them. We should also remember that divorce can be a very painful time for the couple and for their families. We should be compassionate and encouraging to those experiencing divorce and pray that in God they find healing and hope.

As Catholics, we know that the intentional ending of human life is against the fifth commandment. However, when all means to seek peace have failed in a conflict, the Church recognizes the right of self- defense and lists a number of conditions for engaging in war. Traditionally these have been know as the conditions for a “just war.” The Church also states necessary conditions during a war, including the humane treatment of prisoners of war and enemy combatants who are injured.

The Church asks all of us to pray for an end to wars which all involve killing and other evils. The Church also asks all leaders of governments and their citizens to avoid war by seeking peaceful and just ends to hatred and conflicts. The Church calls each of us to work for peace and justice by modeling peacemaking in the ways we handle conflict in our own lives—in our homes, our schools and our communities.

As the Church teaches, human life begins at the moment of conception—that is, the very instant a woman becomes pregnant. Therefore, the life growing inside of her is a person, made in the image and likeness of God, whose life is given by God and should only be ended by God.

Because an unborn child cannot speak for himself or herself, the Church has spoken publicly and consistently for these unborn children. The Church defends the right to life of these children and also assists pregnant women so that they choose to nurture the life of the child within them.

The Church asks all Catholics to pray for and to speak and act on behalf of unborn children. There are many parish, diocesan and national Church organizations and groups that offer support to pregnant woman. We are invited to help in those efforts by giving our time or donations to provide food, clothing, baby items or other support that can help these mothers and their children to live comfortably. 

The Church, from its beginning has always honored Mary as Mother of God’s only Son, as Mother of the Church, and as our Mother. Our devotion to Mary, however, is not the same as the worship we offer to God. In fact, we honor Mary precisely because she showed us how to truly worship God. She said “yes” to God and so can help us to say “yes” to God’s plan for us.

The Gospel story of the wedding at Cana is often used to explain Mary’s role in prayer. In that story, Mary sees the need at the wedding feast, and she asks her Son to take care of the need. We turn to Mary in prayer and tell her our needs, knowing in her love for us she will bring those needs to her Son.

We do not pray to Mary instead of praying to Jesus. Indeed, we pray to Mary so that we might grow closer to Jesus. As the first disciple and first among all the saints, who better to help us in our own discipleship than Mary?

As Catholics, we believe, as we pray in the Creed, "in life everlasting." Jesus’ own Resurrection is the promise of our own rising from death to eternal life.

When we die, we will be judged by God. In the Gospel, (Matthew 25:31-46) Jesus taught us how we will be judged. He explains that whatever we do to “the least brothers” of his, we do to Jesus. We will be judged on how we have loved God and our neighbor.

If we have lived lives of love, and we die in God’s grace and friendship and have been purified, then we will enter into heaven. If we die in God’s grace and friendship, but need purification from past sins and failures to love, then we enter Purgatory. We are assured of heaven once we have been purified and are ready to live in perfect love for all eternity.

Our belief in Purgatory is the reason we pray for those who have died. Our prayers can assist their purification and help them to enter heaven.