In contemporary culture there are common guidelines  considering marriage as a "product of society," subject to all sorts of changes and also subject to extinction. [i] An analysis of the different forms of society, tribal or of ancient, feudal, industrial, postindustrial caste, we find a plurality of matrimonial forms, which vary according to factors such as the mode of production, social stratification, political power, religious believes, subcultures ...

     Variability of matrimonial forms

Certainly we note today the morphogenesis of new forms of family life. There are neo-structural forms, ie dual-career marriages, governed by principles of reciprocity between man and woman; neo-Communitary forms, characterized by a strong solidary push, both inside and out (participation in service groups); reconstructed forms, ie families that reunite with others subjects after being separated; alternative forms, such as homosexual unions or those with a single parent by choice; problematic forms in the sense of fragility and weakness of the bond; forms of commuter families, where there are weekend couples, and the members are meeting in a non-continuous way. It is growing the  number of families, but increasingly smaller:  the reducing  number of members affects all regions. The families formed by a single person are increasing,  as well a result of the progressive aging of the population.

      Can the finding of such variability lead to enhance the absolute change of the very idea of ​​marriage up to include the free love and same-sex unions? In other words, divorces, strong ties outside of marriage between persons of different sex or same sex, illicit trade, or child abuse are pathology or expressions of emotional relationships are all equally legitimate and homologable/verifiable to the wedding?

     Let us abandon the regret

The scolding frequently moved to the traditionalists to delay about the complaints and regrets is not entirely misplaced. The findings of the problematic issues should not go without a parallel emphasis on achievements and strong points that characterize the family.

      Problematic issues

     * We know that expectations about the duration of married life have remained the same more or less, since the marriage, which was once interrupted by the deaths due primarily to the births for girls and for men to wars, today is shattered for free willingness of the spouses (average duration of marriages that are ending: for separations 13 years, for divorce 17 years). If not, the improvement of health status, with the relative extension of average life, the almost disappearance of  died in childbirth and war would reasonably expect that many couples are able to celebrate 50 years of marriage. Marriages are ending when the contractors are agreed.

    * What means  the birth rate that makes the wonder of who in the world are accustomed to thinking to Italy as the "mama's boy"’s  country , having numerous families? Moreover, Italy is in line with European standards, although since 2000 there was a rising birth rates and some experts have promised that the 'long wave' of the recovery of fertility would last until 2010. The better is to take note that in the near future the country will have an adequate replacement for Italian citizens thanks to the immigrants who flock to our beaches, who accept to beat  the last steps/rungs of the social wide/ladder, who are struggling to learn the language and integrate, but they don’t give up the pleasure of procreation and the commitment of their children to study.

    * Another weak point of today's families, who questions the civil society and the Church, is the loneliness in relation to responsibility: young couple used to travel, sports, free time, peer group, are far from home with a child to grow up without the big family in agreement. Too many do not stand up to the abrupt change in lifestyle and marital relationships wear out.

     * Stress is a consequence of this imbalance between workload and loneliness of the spouses:  home, children, work, bureaucracy, small repairs, and participation in school, block of flats, district, the party, the parish ...

We can not forget the time needed to respond to your e mail and Internet use. We require very much to a  young couple who decide to start a family, but it still gives too short time in terms of protection of the most important asset they have: the unity of marriage and family, one that would need time and intimacy, solidarity to find the resources to renew and revitalize your taste  putting again  the love in the middle.

      * Widely shared is the weakening, if not the abandonment of the educational task, as a débacle of care, in favor of TV and the technological tools, while at the same time the traditional alliance between family and parish has reduced . In the research titled  Ragazzi telematici[ii] (Computerized Boys), teenagers certify  the freedom enjoyed by the parents ("They let me watch TV until the evening when I want," "When I surf the internet they don’t meddle with me" ...). The truth is clear: stressed parents are waiting  to take some  time to themselves, they have no desire to discuss with children: a "no" would require an educational effort that is best avoided.

     * Contemporary culture tends to split up and falling in love-love and institution, and it is valid to both civil and religious weddings. We think about how many young people who reject marriage as any public and formal bond … It's another challenge for the contemporary family, which tends to shut themselves up in the ghetto of the "two hearts and a hut." Now, if it is true that the union between a man and a woman is in itself pre-juridical and that the institutions  seal, but they can not inspire it is also true that without the institution love is fragile, the weaker part is  less defended, the society less committed to supporting the family tasks.

      Positive aspects

      Now we are considering some positive aspects that can not be underestimated.
     

      * Children in pre-modern societies were often "arms" or worse "work force" to work the land, which it says a lot about families. Even under the illusion there's too much on the spirit of mothers who - they say - did not work. As it has become established, the majority of mothers, especially of the lower classes, worked hard for the house, in the country, to help her husband getting by the shop. The children were assigned to aunts, older sisters, litigious wives, or even the shade of a tree ...  For the upper classes, the assignment to nurses was standard procedure and failed to provide satisfactory education. It seems therefore that the maternal spirit, in terms of constant presence beside the cot, it was not so sublime as it tends to describe. Today, the psychological research encourages mothers in personal care of their children. The studies about  paternity also recognize the need for paternal presence already starting with the prenatal life.

       * The personal hygiene and exterior care have reached optimum levels if not obsessive, that have significantly lowered the rates of morbidity and children’s mortality than when we lived in promiscuity, and even with animals of all kinds.

* You can not underestimate the importance of the affective agreement. The pre-modern couple was largely "combined" by the interests of parents, the calculation of the dowry, the work functions  Respect for the will, of the liability of the spouses is an achievement in the line of customized relationships. Many complain about the complete irrelevance of the parents, but now to form a family is an act of love and free choice, not a functional event. It takes less to protect women from public invisibility, the need to have a husband and the basic necessities thanks to his work. Getting married today is not so useful for the men, once encouraged to secure a maid-mother-lover, banishing the specter of an old age in solitude. Who is marring knows more than before that he/she has toe grant his/her own personality to that of another person and the task is not easy, there is less familiar and more family.

        * The widespread education has left behind the problems of illiteracy and ignorance. Marriage so has an advantage. It is still only the Church working for the formation of engaged, while civil society and the State underestimate this task, which should also be interested in their success, if only for the deleterious consequences bringing divorce on psychological balance, economy and especially on children.

* The internal hierarchy within the family once clearly defined roles, structuring them around the head of the family, sometimes tolerate up to its transformation into a small prison. Today, marital friendship and  free relationship with children setting out a better quality of relationships. You can not say that the refusal of hierarchy and respect for differences are translated automatically in family harmony. Today as yesterday, the task remains in the best way to give respect and love, differences and unity.

       * Women's work is a controversial topic (at one time women were not working or were not personally paid for their work). It is true that much work remains a real exploitation of women and that often it is an indirect explotation to economic needs, but it is also true that the work has given a sense of citizenship to women, the taste of pay, more education, updating, participation. It gave the possibility of a deeper level and equal dialogue between husband and wife and their children. On reconciling the two sides of human activity, family and work, are playing  family policy and scenarios of future family. There is no shortage of reasons for hope. Despite the increases in cohabitation, the fragility of the links in the PACS, divorces and separations, the Italian society is now more aware of a time that depends on the family the life of the Nation; it goes to extinction if it does not promote a family’s culture and a "familiar humanism."

       Complexity and discernment

       New familiar models include reconstituted families, in which it becomes more difficult to reconstruct the linear trajectory of a person and a single family group. The individual life prevails, which  weaves with one and more familiar experiences. The continuity between generations so is weakened. In addition, the pluralized of cultures and subcultures that coexist in a family, according to the different political social, and cultural and religious affiliations of the individual members, to require a stronger human and relational  maturity, if you want that the complexity doesn’t produce the breaking of the bond or pathology (mental illness, violence ...). Faced with the challenges of society and culture, families have to fight the individualistic culture of claims of freedoms and rights  (rights of young people, of women, children, fathers, elderly ...)  released by the family solidarity. They must learn to reorganize all the time. It is understood that, although in varying forms, the family refers to a basic ethical and natural stable, rooted in the desire to feel assured and ensure the continuity of the bond and mutual care and the need of care and education of children who require continuity and exclusivity of the union of love between parents. If therefore vary arrangements, role assignments, involvement of family, weight, social class, equality and inequality between the spouses, the marriage remains the guarantor institute  of a covenant between a man and a woman in a stable substance that acts as a ethics reference for all forms of social bonding.