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Nuptial Mass Homily for Madelyn Simmons
& Ronald Marchessault
Read: Gen 2, 18-24; 1 Cor 12, 31- 13, 8a;
Mt. 5, 1-12a
It was not so long ago that people said, almost without thinking,
“here is a marriage made in heaven.” Those were not idyllic times, for suffering and disappointment were part
of life also then. Yet there seemed to exist in those times a popular understanding that marriage was sacred, that notwithstanding
the vicissitudes of history and of life, marriages were indeed a matter of heavenly vocation. A couple knew that it was not
only human attraction that brought them together, but a divine attraction, an attraction which, in better and in worse, would
keep them together.
Today there is a lot of talk about marriage being in crisis. That’s natural: if you take God and His heaven out
any dimension of life, crises are only logical, if not inevitable. But the bad news about marriage is not the only news about
marriage. There is also good news, which goes all too hidden and unnoticed: there are those who still celebrate their diamond
jubilees; there are still those who hold hands; there are still those who celebrate their married love in countless and creative
ways. Indeed, there are still those who know God to be the heart of their married lives and who honor Him as such; there are
still those able to suffer and persevere because they know their love is deeper than their pain since that love is grounded
in God; there are still those fully open and generous without condition to God’s plan for their unity of embrace and
for their diversification in the gift of children; yes, there are still those who know their marriage has been made in heaven.
Today one of those couples is here before you, before society, before the Church and before God. The first time Madelyn,
Ron and I met to make the immediate preparation for today, I asked them how first they
met. It could have been anywhere, anyhow, anytime. But in fact it was here, in this Cathedral, and it was in the context of
the Holy Mass, and, just perhaps, I was there too. I think I still remember seeing them at first sit apart, not far from each
other. Then I noticed them sit together. At first they were in line for Holy Communion a few people apart from each other;
then Madeleine’s radiant countenance was almost always immediately followed by Ron’s even more radiant aspect.
For those of us who believe in marriage as a divine vocation and not merely as a civil accommodation –and there are
still many of us who do so believe- it is difficult not to conclude that the celebration of the sacrament of marriage between
these two fervent Catholics today has indeed been made in heaven.
God Himself made man and woman for each other, as our first reading teaches us. The spiritual, psychological and corporal
complementarity of man and women is God’s own work, design and will. Once consummated in the flesh, that spousal complementarity
“shall not be put asunder”. One can no more separate husband and wife than one can cut a human being in two. Indeed,
the deep communion of loving and life-giving surrender between husband and wife imitates and shares in God’s own inner
unity of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. It also imitates and shares in God’s loving surrender to the universe He has created,
especially to mankind, His bride, the jewel, high-point and purpose of the rest of creation.
You will ask: is not this ideal just too idealistic? Well, I counter by asking: are not contemporary attitudes to marriage
often too cheap and banal? How many marriages that break apart wish they had been able to sustain their initial love? How
many children with complexes of disadaptation will not tell you that they would have been OK if their parents had just tried
to forgive one another and stay together? And even if grave and irreversible reasons do set in to disturb a marriage covenant,
are we really to exalt the breakdown of marriage as the ideal, instead of mutual and lasting fidelity? Can the exaltation
of marriage as breakable be an ideal: indeed, is to do so even realistic? St. Paul was not unaware of all that could undermine true love, but he was also aware that true love proved
its truth, its faithfulness, only by remaining true in the midst of all threats against it. The beautiful hymn to love which
was our second reading today sings of the invincibility of true love. For true love is God’s love in your love and in
my love, in the love of husband and of wife, in the love of Ron and Madelyn. Is true love ever really temporary? Can it ever
really fail? If love were to fail, how could anything survive? As it is, neither life nor death, neither sickness, poverty
nor affliction, can ever come between us and the love of God made visible in Christ Jesus our Lord. Married love is a sign
of that love and makes that love truly present: that is the meaning of the sacrament of marriage.
Marriage before Christ was a natural sign of God’s image in mankind: it was the sign par excellence of God’s
presence in creation, of His love as Creator, a sign that brought oneness, order, creativity and fidelity to social relationships.
As God created male and female, so male and female themselves now pro-create male and female, but for God. As God is irrevocable in his commitment to create in love and fidelity, so man and woman in marital union
commit themselves irrevocably to pro-create in love and fidelity.
But with the coming of Christ, the Son of God creates for Himself His own human body; He brings creation into and unto
Himself. God is no longer faithful to us only from the “outside”, but as an “insider”, as one of us.
His marriage to humanity is now consummated in the flesh, for He becomes flesh and flesh becomes God. He betroths to Himself
in His human body, through suffering, death and Resurrection, the whole of humanity, especially those who believe in Him,
that is, who return His love through trustful surrender to Him in faith. Christ and the Church thus become the prime example,
the founding paradigm of all marriage. Indeed, all marriages now find their chief reference point no longer in God’s
act of creation but in Christ’s act of redemption. Christ’s giving of Himself, in total and faultless love, in
both spirit and flesh, as He cries out, “it is consummated!”, launches the new creation of man and woman. The
sacrament of marriage now symbolizes and makes present the mutual love which seals the new and everlasting covenant between
the Redeemer and the Redeemed. Christ takes the human and Christian love of this man and this woman and catches them up into
the bond uniting Him with the Church and with humanity. They no longer live nor love on their own account or for themselves:
it is Christ the Groom and His Bride the Church who live and love in them. Hence their marriage is sacred, it flows from and
points to the Eucharist where the new and eternal covenant of Christ’s love and the Church’s responding adoration
come together in the Body and Blood of the Lord. The fruitfulness of that covenant, made known to us at the baptismal font,
where God’s children are born to the life of grace, is the purpose of their own fruitful, conjugal love. Openness to
Christ’s will is therefore not an added extra to married life: it is fundamental to its authenticity. Marriage is a
vehicle for Christ to save the married, to bring to birth the children His Father calls to existence, and to direct them towards
the mystery of salvation taught and administered to us in the Church.
Of course, married discipleship will be marked by the Cross of the Savior. But the route to living that Cross is certainly
not to opt out of Christ. Married beatitude follows the pattern of the Beatitudes Jesus proclaimed for all His disciples,
and that pattern foresees sufferings in this present time and perfect beatitude only hereafter. Poverty, persecution, tears,
injustice and all the rest will form part of the tissue of marriage. If lived in Christ, they will strengthen marriage. If
lived in the spirit of the world, they will destroy it. Here stands the great challenge and mission of the married Catholic:
to live together not only with your spouse but with Christ at the heart of your relationship. You can witness neither to each
other, to the children God gives you, nor to the wider community, if Christ is not the central focus, first priority, decisive
criterion and exclusive framework of your relationship. Your commitment to sacramental life as individuals and as a couple,
your willingness to spend time in prayer alone and together, your earnestness in assuring that He is the Heart of your home,
the arranging of your time and decisions in relation to His will: all of this will flow from your married commitment and strengthen
it daily. Indeed, you will welcome trials not as unwanted intrusions but as opportunities to seek mutual understanding more
deeply in the unfailing grace and strength of Christ, which is precisely the grace of your marriage.
I have had no fear in preaching such a challenging and up-front homily today, for I know that both Madelyn, the Bride,
and Ron, the Groom, resonate 1,000% with every word I have said. The courage of their faith is both edifying and refreshing,
both admirable and enviable. They are neither naïve nor misguided about what lies before them, and their intrepid spirit knows
nothing of arrogance or presumption. Rather, the strength of character, faith and love which characterizes each of them has
become exponential because of their deep love for Christ and His Church. That is why the marriage they receive from heaven
today will be a light upon the earth around them until, when death doth them part, and the sacrament which is their marriage
gives way to the reality of the eternal covenant of heaven itself, the heavenly Bridegroom will receive both the one and the
other into the banquet of eternity and reward them with the blessings that await the faithful and the just.
Msgr. Peter Magee
Saturday, December
6th, 2003: St. Matthew’s Cathedral, DC
Nuptial Mass,
10.00 am for Mr. and Mrs. Ronald Marchessault
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