Pastoral Care for Catholic Couples in Their First Years of Marriage According to The Encyclical Amoris Laetitia. Case Study: The Central Deanery of Suratthani Diocese

Abstract

The purposes of this research were to study: (1) the living situation of the Catholic couples in their first years of marriage and (2) the pastoral guidelines for Catholic couples in their first years of marriage according to the Encyclical Amoris Laetitia. The respondents came from two groups. The first were ten Catholic couples in their first years of marriage, and the second were seven experts. The data were collected by using semi-structured interviews, and topics for the focus group. Methodology: 10 simples of the marriage couples in the central deanery of Suratthani Diocese and 7 advisory, whose data were analyzed and described in the few ways, including frequency, percentage, and content analysis. The results were as follows: The marriage couples live in the first year of marriage couple by with love, understanding, endurance, comfort, encouragement, forgiveness, respect, faithfulness, sincerity, listening to each other’s reasons, consulting each other, living daily life together, giving each other religious freedom, believing a child is gift from God, parenting a child in accordance with religious teaching, and being good citizen; however most of the married couples lack the knowledge on natural family planning according to the teaching of the Catholic Church. The findings were as follows: 1. Parents should support the development of the virtue of love for the child. 2. The parish priest should accompany the young married couples in their journey of faith by counselling and giving advice on religious observances, the importance of attending Mass and other devotions. 3. The parish priest should offer formation to the young married couples to help them deepen their faith, hope and love. 4. The parish priest, religious and catechists personnel should accompany the young married couples in their journey of faith by counselling and giving advice on religious observances, the importance of attending Mass and other devotions. 5. The Catholic school should follow up on the children of these married couples on religious education, preparation for sacrament. 6. Diocesan ministry should frequently offer retreats on family life. 7. At the national level, the Church should have a unified program to support married couples and families through promotion of Holy Childhood, youth ministry, formation programs and camps, which will help their doctrinal and moral formation to be good Christians in the future. 8. The diocesan youth ministry should offer formation to the youth on themes such as preparation of Pro-Life and Pro-Love, and vocation of pre-married life for the future.