Cardinal Burke: Defending marriage and family may require martyrdom

Cardinal Burke: Defending marriage and family may require martyrdom

At the 10th anniversary of Amoris Laetitia, Cardinal Raymond Burke has repeated themes of the necessity of defending the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony even to ‘martyrdom.’

Cardinal Raymond Burke celebrates the pilgrimage Summorum Pontificum for the tenth anniversaryemanuelecapoferri/Getty Images

 

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Wed Aug 5, 2026 - 3:29 pm EDT

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(LifeSiteNews) — In late July, Cardinal Raymond Leo Burke preached a homily at the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe in La Crosse, Wisconsin, calling Catholics to a renewed defense of the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony and the family even to the point of “martyrdom.”

Preaching on the Feast of St. James the Greater, the cardinal drew on the example of the apostle who was the first of the 12 to shed his blood in witness to Jesus Christ, urging the faithful to embrace both red and white martyrdom in fidelity to the Church’s teaching on marriage.

“Inspired by the example of Saint James the Greater and aided by his intercession, let us resolve to take up with new enthusiasm and new energy the spiritual practices by which our hearts dwell fully and securely in the Heart of Jesus for the transformation of the world by means of the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony and its incomparable fruit, the family,” proclaimed the former prefect of the Supreme Tribunal of the Apostolic Signatura, who was made a cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010.

“Let us be ready for martyrdom, if not the red martyrdom of blood, certainly the white martyrdom of faithful witness to Our Lord in the face of indifference, ridicule, and persecution,” he implored.

The homily came as the Church marks the 10th anniversary of Pope Francis’ highly controversial post-synodal apostolic exhortation Amoris Laetitia, which was released in the spring of 2016.

Additionally, Pope Leo XIV is convening a meeting of the presidents of the world’s episcopal conferences and heads of Eastern Catholic Churches in Rome from October 7 to 14 to reflect on the document and discern pastoral steps for families “in light of Amoris Laetitia.”

Since its release, Amoris Laetitia has been thoroughly challenged by theologians and pastors as containing significant departures from divine law, which is not subject to change by even the highest authority of the Catholic Church.

Voice of the Family, for example, argued shortly after the document’s release that while some passages reflect Catholic teaching, others undermine doctrine on mortal sin, conscience, and the absolute exclusion of those living in public adultery from receiving the Holy Eucharist.

Later that year, moral theologians John Finnis and Germain Grisez wrote to Pope Francis listing eight positions contrary to the faith that find support in Amoris Laetitia’s ambiguities, including the notion that some of the faithful are too weak to keep God’s commandments yet, despite such behavior, may nonetheless live in a state of grace, and that there are exceptions to exceptionless moral norms.

In September 2017, over 60 Catholic clergy and lay scholars from 20 countries publicly released an originally private “Filial Correction” addressed to Pope Francis asserting he had supported heretical positions about marriage, the moral life, and the Eucharist that are causing a host of “heresies and other errors” to spread throughout the Catholic Church.

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For his own part, soon after the release of Amoris Laetitia, Cardinal Burke warned of growing confusion within the Church regarding the indissolubility of marriage and access to the sacraments.

In a May 7, 2016, address at the Rome Life Forum, the cardinal made reference to the seriousness of the challenges facing faithful Catholics and the grave necessity of preserving the truth with regard to marriage and the moral life, even to the point of the shedding of one’s blood.

Drawing from the thought of Servant of God Father John A. Hardon, S.J. at the time, he said, “Observing the great confusion and error, also within the Church, in the present time, Father Hardon frequently reminded all of the faithful that they must prepare themselves to suffer greatly, even to undergo martyrdom, in order to be faithful to the teaching of Christ in His Church.”

In that same 2016 speech, Burke echoed the teaching of Pope St. John Paul II rejecting any suggestion that the grace of marriage is merely an “ideal” to which couples more or less conform. “Christian marriage is not an idea; it is a sacrament that confers grace upon a man and woman to live in faithful, permanent and procreative love of each other,” he affirmed.

The cardinal also underscored the principle of non-contradiction: The Church cannot simultaneously profess the indissolubility of marriage and admit to the sacraments those who publicly live in violation of that bond without undermining either the sacrament of Matrimony or the Eucharist and Penance.

Looking toward Pope Leo XIV’s October convocation on the “valuable teachings” of Amoris Laetitia, Christendom College theology professor Matthew Tsakanikas wroteoptimistically that “Ambiguous and deleterious compromises” from this document “can be corrected” and that its further implementation “must not be done without clear forbiddance of Communion for the divorced and remarried. Sacramental marriage is indissoluble.”

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