“This is a mystery”

[Doom]

But I mean in reference to Christ and his Church

I have heard that the Greek word translated “mystery” is “mysterion” which in the Vulgate is translated “sacramentum”.

Does this passage in which Paul talks about marriage and calls marriage a “mystery” sacramental language? Is he explicitly calling matrimony a sacrament in this passage? (Even granting that the way I just described it is anachronistic because “sacrament” didn’t become a popular term until Tertullian and the modern definition “a visible sign of an invisible reality which conveys what it symbolizes” wouldn’t arrive until Augustine)”.)

[VeryTas]

How do we know Paul is calling human-to-human marriage the mystery? "This is a great mystery, but I speak in reference to Christ and the church." -Ephesians 5:32

[Doom]

That is my question: does "mystery" imply "sacrament"? The fact that the Vulgate translates "mysterion" as "sacramentum" would seem to suggest it.

[peregrinator]

Even today Greek Catholics and Orthodox refer to sacraments as "mysteries"

[Doom]

Yes, so is St Paul saying in this passage that marriage is a sacrament? If this is the implication; then it is the best proof text for the sacramental nature of marriage. The only other proof text I have heard of for this position is the wedding at Cana, where it said that Jesus "blessed" marriage, but there is a difference between blessing something and raising it to the level of a sacrament.

[gherkin]

I wouldn't think of this as a text that would convince a Protestant of the sacramental nature of marriage, but I don't think there's any doubt that we as Catholics should see here a reference to that. St. Thomas, for example, reads it as straightforwardly sacramental language:

He goes on to interpret this mystically, and he says 'This is a great sacrament', it is the symbol of a sacred reality, namely, the union of Christ and the Church. “I will not hide from you the mysteries of God” (Wis. 6:24).

Notice here that four Sacraments are termed great. Baptism by reason of its effect, since it blots out sin and opens the gate of paradise; Confirmation by reason of its minister, it is conferred only by bishops and not by others; the Eucharist because of what it contains, the Whole Christ; and Matrimony by reason of its signification, for it symbolizes the union of Christ and the Church.

A contemporary exegete schooled in historical-critical methodologies isn't going to be impressed with the way St. Thomas reads the Scriptures, but of course modern methods of exegesis are desiccated and largely skeptical, so who cares what such an exegete would say?

[Obi-Wan Kenobi]

Modernists

[Doom]

I’m not interested in convincing Protestants, many don’t believe in the idea of a sacrament, while the ones who do (such as Lutherans and Anglicans) are unlikely to be convinced by a proof text, for the same reason Catholics are not convinced by proof texts for Protestant doctrines.