When marriage is at its best

A family I had known for quite a while in one of my earlier parish assignments just had a wedding in the family.  Their younger daughter got married, but I was in no condition to be part of the ceremony, much as I would have loved to be there.  But I did send them a message on the social media, which was part of a whole list of congratulatory wishes and felicitations.  Almost all of their friends wished them wedded bliss and lifelong happiness, which is to be expected.  My message had instead something that reminded them what a sacrament of marriage was, and that their marriage was about Christ and showing him to the world through their sustained married, sacramental love.  Was I a killjoy?  I suppose if one only wants to hear ‘nice’ things on a wedding day, and nothing ‘serious’, then I may have cast a slight pall over what most want to be only a day of happiness and joy.  However, if we really come to think of it, what is it in a marriage that brings a deep, abiding joy and true happiness?  What is it that makes a sacramental marriage truly spectacular?  When is marriage at its best?

When two people truly are in awe that their very individual lives are nothing that they deserve and that they are living lives of a received grace, each marriage partner becomes not only respectful of the other person, but truly cherishes the gift that the other person is.  The world of each of the individuals in the marriage becomes enlarged to embrace all that the other person is, because Christ also becomes so visible in the other.  This is so different from the attitude where each of the partners in a marriage that doesn’t have Christ in its centre now views their world in a more constricted, enclosed, and self-centered way.  “You are now mine, and my happiness depends on how you serve my needs and meet my (silent) demands.  Through time, I hope such and such behavioral traits in you will change, and you become a ‘project’ for me to ‘fix’”.  Of course, these sentiments are hardly vocalized, let alone admitted to.  But to have them as a silent ‘lurker’ in the back of one’s ‘agenda’ in marriage is akin to have a time bomb ticking away in the basement of the marital home. 

How do we truly and generously then enlarge our world to truly embrace the differences of others in life?  I believe that when we begin to do this, that our vision of Christ in the world becomes very much clearer, but it will bring with it a certain pain and discomfort within ourselves.  Let’s face it – our individuality may be our greatest gift, but it is also a double-edged sword.  When we are too caught up in our righteous individuality, the downside is that we become almost intolerant, impatient and judgmental about others.  When we see how others are not behaving as we think they ought to, in society, in our circles of friends, in the church, during and outside of organized liturgy, we can waste a lot of time and energy pointing fingers and blaming someone for such ‘bad’ behavior. 

But do we really need to blame anyone for the differences that we live out in life?  I have yet to come across someone who actually dares to blame him or herself for the differences that they see in others.  Most of the time, it’s only a judgment call on the other person, while the one looking on seems to be wearing a shade called Brilliant White.  The differences in our lives can easily then become a source of irritation, division, resentment, acrimony, and bitterness, where there is very little possibility of being happy for the other person. 

What does it take for one to open one’s world to accept that there is something to celebrate in the differences that we are?  How is it that some people can overlook even the most staggering differences of opinions and unacceptable social behavior and say with conviction that there are good things to be thankful for in the other party and not just focus on the black spot on the whiteboard?  I think part of the secret has to lie in the fact that one has encountered God within one’s self in a very real way – this same God who has made the universe in such a diverse and splendid way, where no blade of grass is exactly the same shade of green and of the same shape and texture, where it would be so dull and boring if every person was a carbon copy of the next, and where everything is just so bland and uninteresting. 

True, these people are few and far between, but they are what the church have celebrated in mystics and truly holy people who prophetically dared to go beyond themselves because they truly encountered God who is at the same time at the heart of their very selves, and also outside at the furthermost reaches of this very diverse and wide universe. 

When a married couple dares to live such expanded lives where each truly embraces the other’s world and expands one’s whole horizon in life, they can truly begin to live Christ at the heart of their marriage.  And as Christ once said, “for man, it is impossible, but for God, anything is possible”.