The Marriage and the Missing Guest

True love always leads to God.

This post originated as a recent conversation between friends. My intention was for it to be short and thought-provoking, but it all works out as it should.

Praise be to God, now and forever.

The more one seeks to deepen one's union with God, the more one becomes like Him. The more time one spends at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the more one becomes faith-minded, and also church-minded. My oldest son and I frequently share stories of how our authentic Catholic practices have become so infused with our everyday lives that they have become inseparable and second nature. That is how it should be.

Often we have the impulse to genuflect before sitting down or before leaving our seats, even in restaurants and movie theaters. We pray before meals and sometimes, instead of saying grace, another prayer presents itself instead. Our family responds with laughter and incredible delight.

Does this happen to you as well?

Faith is a delightful gift from our most loving Creator, who remains with us, always. That having been said, though we may find ourselves being church-minded while not in church, nothing equals our presence and participation during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. No other activity is the same, no other place is the same.

As Catholics, we should grow in awareness of God's continual presence, and this should impact the decisions we make and the way we conduct ourselves. Our faith isn't something that we practice or witness for just one hour while at Holy Mass on Sundays (or twice a year at Christmas and Easter). It is meant to be a way of life, joyfully integrated into our very existence.

We must practice our faith, live it, be thankful for it, witness it to others, and grow in it, moment by moment, hour by hour, every single day, week by week, month by month, year by year, throughout all the circumstances of our lives.

Catholicism is a 24/7 religion. Know, love, and serve Him, all the days of your life.

We must actively seek to grow in holiness, not only for our own eternal benefit, but also for the eternal benefit of every single person whose lives are Divinely entwined with our own, even if only for a brief moment. Our witness also impacts people we may never meet or be aware of during our mortal lives. It's phenomenal, really.

Our witness either helps people or it hurts people. We get to decide. Know this for sure: our choices matter a great deal, and the effects of every single act of kindness extended in imitation of Christ resonates into eternity.

How we choose to conduct ourselves is an incredible responsibility, and also an incredible gift, for God does not need any of us. Yet He has given every single person He ever created a role in salvation history. That makes every single one of us a very special person.

You are God's VIP!

Most people never think about it, but every single one of us already began impacting the lives of other people the instant we were created, at conception, within our mothers' wombs!

Did you know that you were already so influential, way back then?

Our most loving God never forces our cooperation. He leaves the decision-making entirely up to us. That having been said, all throughout our lives He continues to lovingly pursue us, call us by name, guide us, and invite us into closer union with Him.

God is so in love with us!

Do you recognize His unfathomable, eternal, and miraculous love for you? It is a gift and He wants you to have it, but first you must be willing to accept it.

We all have moments when we shut God out for one reason or another. While our adversary tempts us to think that such matters are of no consequence to ourselves, and why even care about their effect on other people, our loving God is always present, ready to provide us with the graces we need to overcome such temptations against loving.

Seek Him, and we are guaranteed to find Him.

Seek Him in the right places!

So often, we limit God instead of pursuing Him in return. We often see Him and our circumstances on our own terms, or place God somewhere in our plans based on our limited understanding. We go about our business, integrating God where and when convenient. Sometimes we go to God only when things do not go according to our plans, and even then our intentions vary. Sometimes we don't go to God at all and instead, choose to blame Him for our problems and unhappiness.

Be sure to acknowledge God when things are going well. Be grateful, and thank Him. Accept, return, and share His love for you, in good times and in bad. Love Him and honor Him, all the days of your life.

How often we disregard or reject the rules God created so that mankind can experience the fullest joy possible during our mortal lives. How many times we hear Catholics, Catholics, say they refuse to follow Church teaching on this issue or that issue, for whatever reason, if they even have one. How few people talk about asking God His opinion regarding marriage, contraception, family size, abortion, what to wear or say, how to conduct ones self, or anything for that matter. And how many people wisely go on to follow His advice?

I recently read someone's interview with a well-known actor, also an unmarried father. When asked when he would marry the mother of his children, he responded that he would marry his girlfriend when everyone can marry.

Not everyone is called to the married life, I thought to myself. Then I thought for a moment more. What the man meant was that he would get married when the homosexual couples are legally allowed to marry. What this particular couple hopes will happen is in direct contradiction to the moral order established by God. His hope is that everyone accepts what God has determined to be immoral.

Just who do we think we are to place ourselves above God on anything! We give in to temptations of pride when we choose in favor of immorality and then argue that God does not exist, or when we state that the rules have somehow changed at some point or another. How many times we discount God to maintain our own way of thinking! How often we argue and neglect the facts, if we have even given serious thought to the topic at all. Wrong always remains wrong.

Sometimes we spend a lot of energy avoiding God's rules. And the result is that we end up unhappy and tired. This is energy that could be so much better spent being happy!

Our Father knows best, and He is so in love with us.

Recently I was having a conversation in my kitchen with the lovely mother of my son's friend, The subject was chastity, and she is a nurse. We agreed that chastity education is vital to the healthy physical, emotional, and spiritual welfare of young people in particular. And then we disagreed right after that, when she stated that she favors parents giving birth control to young people with the rationale that they are going to be promiscuous anyway. When I told her that we have absolutely no right to provide young people with contraception, she looked shocked. I reminded her that God gave us rules to follow. Then, she stunned me in return by responding, "Did He, REALLY?"

Yes, God gave us rules to live by. Really!


And He waits for us in church, so willing to give Himself to us, so eager to love us and forgive us, to show us by His example how to live and love and serve and suffer and be joyful and get to heaven.

He wants to bless us, our marriages, our families, and our friendships! He wants to bless us abundantly, and so many times, we refuse. God always seeks our greater good. He deserves our respect, reverence, and love in return.

In our era, we claim to know so much after making it a point to know so little.

Take a moment to reflect on why your obedience and humility is vital, and the value this has for countless others through your example. Give this careful consideration, every single day.

"But I am/we are happy," we sometimes say in defense of our immoral choices. The question then becomes, "But is God happy with the decisions you are making?"

And oh, how much happier we are when we obey our Creator.

Obeying is almost counter-cultural in our society. Beware that disobedience can blind us to the truth: God wants us to be so much happier than Satan cons us into thinking that we are. Often, we do not even realize that we are succumbing to temptations and committing sins of pride.

The good news is that we can become wiser, and our prayers for each other are instrumental in this process.

Satan wants us gullible, selfish, and stupid, because he wants us to spend eternity with him in hell. If you know anything about him, he is incredibly hateful, spiteful, mean, and angry, all the time. He is cunning and crude and vulgar and vindictive. His hate has no limits, and he wants to be your constant companion, forever and ever. There is no love in hell. There is no mercy or kindness or forgiveness there, either. No hope, only eternal despair.

God wants us to accept His love, return it, and share it with one another. He wants us to choose to grow in holiness and spend eternity in His most loving presence. Imagine eternal bliss in the company of the entire Blessed Trinity, our Blessed Mother, and all the angels and saints! Imagine what the encounter will be like when we meet our Savior face-to-face. Imagine what it means to Jesus when we choose to love Him in return and show our gratitude to Him thorough humility and obedience.

We get to decide which outcome we prefer. We will merit the outcome that fits the choices we have made.

Our adversary wants us to believe that we can act however we want and then, at the end of our lives, we will be able to choose our best outcome and it will all work out so grand for us. Wrong.

Or, he tempts us to become so busy we don't have time to think about our salvation and the salvation of others. It is very rewarding to our fallen human nature to get what we want when we want it. But oh, how vital it is to measure all things through God's eyes, and how empty our lives really are without Him.

Pray for wisdom.

And so it was that last week I had a conversation with a friend whose son is getting married. I joyfully asked, "When is the wedding? They are getting married soon.

"Do you want to know where they are getting married?" asked my friend. "St. John in the Virgin Islands," she responded. "Oh, how did they pick that particular church?" I asked her.

She went on to explain that they are getting married on the beach in Saint John, United States Virgin Islands.

This couple, like so many, have chosen to celebrate and begin their marriage without their loved ones around them, and not only that, they purposefully excluded them, to marry where they want, when they want, around who they want. More unfathomable than that even is that their Creator, the Love of Our Lives, their SAVIOR, is not included, either.

Catholics who choose not to celebrate and begin their marriage covenant in the context of the Sacrifice of the Mass send the message to everyone they know, on one of the most important days of their lives, that Holy Mass is WORTH MISSING. One Holy Mass is of infinite value to mankind! To think that some couples skip the Mass and disregard our real Treasure, and frequently then spend a fortune on their reception. And God is the missing guest.

God is the missing guest.

It has gotten so bad, that some people do not even know why they should care.

Here's why we should care, from the Catechism of the Catholic Church, regarding the Vocation to Chastity and The Integrity of the Person, in particular: "...either man governs his passions and finds peace, or he lets himself be dominated by them and becomes unhappy. Man's dignity therefore requires him to act out of conscious and free choice, as moved and drawn in a personal way from within, and not by blind impulses in himself or by mere external constraint. Man gains such dignity when, ridding himself of all slavery to the passions, he presses forward to his goal by freely choosing what is good and, by his diligence and skill, effectively secures for himself the means suited to this end." 1 ~CCC 2339

The divorce rate in the United States is 50%. That means that half of all marriages fail. Common sense says that couples should want to give their marriages the very best opportunity for success. The single most important thing couples can do is to invite God into their marriage and consult with Him on all things. We must commit ourselves to growing in selflessness, obedience, and humility.

If we are willing to exclude the Author of Love, what is that saying about us? What is that saying about our chances for success, not only within the context of our marriages but within the context of our families, communities, nations, and world?

If a couple has themselves convinced that they will be the within the 50% of marriages that make it, think about this. With most Catholic couples choosing to disregard Church teaching that banns artificial contraception, which opens the door to an abortion mentality, which opens the door to a very self-centered mentality, which then feeds into our modern era's constant, marketing driven promotion of materialism, consumerism, greed, disobedience, extreme business, arrogance, and disregard for the welfare of others, that leaves us with a society with very few truly holy marriages.

We were meant for so much better than this.

May we stop limiting God in our lives. May we include Him in everything, follow His rules, learn more about why He created them, and actively seek to grow in humility, obedience, selflessness, and proximity to God. Always strive to love in greater measure.

Live in imitation of Christ.

Keep in mind what Jesus accomplished at the Wedding of Cana, and be sure to invite Him to your wedding, into your heart, into your marriage, and into your family. If you are marrying someone who wants to exclude God, family, and friends on one of the most important, and what should be one of the happiest, occasions of your life, that should be a real warning sign. Chances are, more advancement in the spiritual life is necessary before a commitment to marriage should be made. Such individuals are not ready yet to be married.

Think about it: marriage requires sacrifice, and if the wedding day is driven by selfishness, that sets the tone for the marriage and is a strong indicator that unless things change, the marriage will eventually fail.


Imagine this: you have a child, and you love that child beyond human comprehension. One day, the child announces to you that he/she is going to get married. Then, you are informed that you are not invited to the wedding. Your child offers you this: "You are not invited, and my reason for not inviting you is justifiable because you know what is in our hearts."

We know the odds. Ninety percent of marriages that began with co-habitation fail. Fifty percent of first marriages end in divorce. Ninety five percent of all divorced people eventually remarry. Seventy six percent of second marriages fail within five years. Those who remarry quickly most likely have a higher failure rate. Eighty seven percent of third marriages fail, and 93 percent of fourth marriages fail.

The good news? Tremendous success is found in obedience to God! Only three percent of marriages who embrace Church teaching banning artificial contraception and practice natural family planning end in divorce (Physiciansforlife.org).

There is absolutely no denying that immorality is not only illogical, it destroys marriages, whereas holiness is logical and unifying. Holiness leads to happiness! Holiness leads to true and lasting joy, because God is love.

We can only wonder what that feels like to God to be excluded from so many lives, and from so many marriages. How can we even think of excluding the One who made us, the One who loves us, the One who gave up His only Son to suffer a brutal passion and death on the Cross for our Redemption. It is absolutely unthinkable.

This self-centered, separate one's self from God mentality some choose to begin their marriages with is also the divorce mentality. So many couples do not even realize it, but they begin their union with a divorce mentality. Why care? Because our choices impact those we invite into our lives as well as those we choose to exclude.

"Divorce is a grave offense against the natural law. It claims to break the contract, to which the spouses freely consented, to live with each other till death. Divorce does injury to the covenant of salvation, of which sacramental marriage is the sign. Contracting a new union, even if it is recognized by civil law, adds to the gravity of the rupture: the remarried spouse is then in a situation of public and permanent adultery..." 2 ~CCC 2384

"Divorce is immoral also because it introduces disorder into the family and into society. This disorder brings grave harm to the deserted spouse, to children traumatized by the separation of their parents and often torn between them, and because of its contagious effect which makes it truly a plague on society." 3 ~ CCC2385

Our culture has, in large measure, lost sight of how disgraceful, shameful, and ungrateful behavior profoundly harms people. In fact, it is often celebrated.

However, there is no true celebration without God as our guest.

As Catholics, we represent the Eucharist in our thoughts and in our deeds. Our priority should be to want what God wants.

We are obligated to live as models of love, obedience, charity, kindness, humility... What others can you add to this list?

Love has come to mean so many things in our culture, but what is authentic love, really? Authentic love comes from God. Authentic love is selfless, and places itself at the service of others while always seeking their greater good.

Love is patient, love is kind.
It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud.
It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking,
it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails...

1 Corinthians 13:4-8

Jesus, be Thou our saving Guest!

For more information on having your marriage convalidated in the Catholic Church, talk to a holy Catholic priest.

God is at work in you!
____________________
Sources:
1-3: Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Photos courtesy of PhotoXpress, unless otherwise noted.