Family

(also called Domestic Society or Household).— The natural society constituted by a father, mother, and children.  In the order of nature, the family exists as an imperfect society that must be incorporated into the “perfect” (full and complete) society that is the political community, the latter of which must respect, in justice, the subsidiary role played by the family in the spiritual, moral, and intellectual formation of its members from natural birth to natural death.

Encyclopedia of Catholic Theology


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