The meaning of marriage

Russell Shaw says that the Church needs to educate Catholics on the meaning of sacramental marriage. He comments that President Obama is framing the question around the meaning of the word ‘marriage’ – and that word definitions can change over time. However:

…the debate about same-sex marriage is not an argument about words. It is a debate about the fundamental core meaning of marriage—a meaning that isn’t even touched, much less changed, by playing games with words.

If that is true of civil marriage, though (and it is), it’s infinitely more true in the case of sacramental marriage.

St. Paul in his letter to the Ephesians (5:21-33) likens the relationship of husband and wife in matrimony to the relationship of Christ to the Church. (“This is a great mystery, and I mean in reference to Christ and the church.”) For centuries, the Christian tradition has seen here the foundation of its belief in the sacramentality of Christian marriage. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, reflecting that, speaks of “an efficacious sign, the sacrament of the covenant of Christ and the Church” (CCC 1617).

From this perspective, the very notion of a same-sex union somehow being a “sacrament of the covenant of Christ and the Church” borders on blasphemy.

But for whatever reason or combination of reasons, the deeply moving reality of sacramental marriage isn’t getting through to large numbers of Catholics today.

But He first

Salute the last, and everlasting day,
Joy at the uprising of this Sun, and Son,
Ye whose true tears, or tribulation
Have purely wash’d, or burnt your drossy clay.
Behold, the Highest, parting hence away,
Lightens the dark clouds, which He treads upon;
Nor doth he by ascending show alone,
But first He, and He first enters the way.
O strong Ram, which hast batter’d heaven for me!
Mild lamb, which with Thy Blood hast mark’d the path!
Bright Torch, which shinest, that I the way may see!
O, with Thy own Blood quench Thy own just wrath;
And if Thy Holy Spirit my Muse did raise,
Deign at my hands this crown of prayer and praise.

[Ascension, John Donne]

Government and marriage

Darwin Catholic has posted on why he thinks that government shouldn’t stop legislating marriage. The argument that they should is slightly different to the one I made some time ago, when I suggested that the Church should stop being an agent for the government’s legislation of marriage, but it is an interesting view, and one that is promoting some comment. Here’s one of the comments:

Most of those (myself included) who are interested in getting the government out of the marriage business do not mean that the government should not arbitrate – merely that it is patently obvious that the government is already in the business of acting as arbiter for extra marital households and at this point it would be more rational to create some sort of legal household contract that could simplify this arbitration without the necessity of redefining the historical term and reality of marriage.

Essentially, since we’ve (as a society) disassociated childbearing and -rearing from marriage, and disassociated marriage from communal property ownership (via prenups and states without communal property laws), state validation of marriage no longer adequately serves to protect children or property anyhow – but it does offer just enough in the way of added privileges to make it a bone of contention for households that don’t qualify as married.

Some thoughts on suffering

Bad Catholic claims Christianity has the world’s only coherent response to suffering. Here is just a small taste – but please read the whole post.

Thus love and suffering cannot be divorced. Let any man who claims he can love without suffering be hung as a liar, for to truly desire the Good of another (to love) is to be willing to work to move the other from the bad to the good (to suffer). Whether that Good be their safety, security, happiness, peace or just their full stomach, love sweats bloodfor it. Love suffers.

Suffering then, is the logical nature of a God who is Love itself. If — as we established earlier — love and suffering are inseparable — then Infinite Love willingly experiences infinite suffering. Enter Christ.

I’ve more to say – responding to the ‘suffering is the ultimate evil’ meme that has popped up here a few times – but not right this minute. Next post, I hope.

Grandparenting – the growth industry of the decade

I’ve been quiet over the last few days because I’ve been grandmothering. Eldest Grandchild is convalescing at our place after a nasty dose of streptococci, her brother joined us for the weekend, and two more came for lunch yesterday. Great fun, and certainly far less of a commitment than when the mother of two of them was bedridden while they were babies. It’s a bit of a modern trend. Quite a number of our friends regularly have quasi-, and often more than quasi-, parenting responsibilities for their children’s children.

One child in 10 in the United States now lives with a grandparent or grandparents, with close to 3 million being raised mainly by them — largely by their grandmothers.

To some extent, what’s happening reflects the upbeat fact that older people live longer and stay healthy longer than they used to. But it’s also linked to troubling trends such as marital breakdown, single parenting, family pressures arising when both parents work outside the home, and the impact of a serious recession. Grandparents time and again have stepped up to relieve stressed-out parents and fill the childcare gap.

The quote above is from an article about ‘The Grandmother Exchange’, a programme:

…aimed at three areas of need: 1) relationship issues, particularly how grandmothers can help parents without taking over (“drawing the line between support and meddling”); 2) self-care — protecting themselves against the demands of children who imagine their mothers have nothing else to do except look after their kids (“we need to have a life — friends, work, travel of our own”); 3) teaching grandchildren virtues (“again, without interfering”).

Happy Grandparents’ Decade, all.

Love transforms part 2

Sherry Antonetti has posted about what she has learned from living with her father’s Alzheimers and her son’s Downs Syndrome:

The walk to the cross is one giant lesson on how to love well. We discover how truly fallen we are by discerning how many ways we’ve put limitations on others, for the sake of our hearts. Our bodies change and grow and get sick and tired. This shouldn’t matter, but absent love, it does. This world places much too much value on the condition of the body as proof of the value of the individual; it considers people like my father (now that his condition has worsened) and my son (since before birth) as unnecessary drains on society—as less worthy of attention, medical care, or love. Some even write about mercy-killing and euthanasia with nary a quibble about the reality of what the casual disposal of human beings does to society and the soul. If we can only love when it demands no sacrifice, then we do not love. What a hell on Earth we face if people only matter for what they can do—a society of takers, angry that no one and nothing can fill our voids…

When we try to eliminate suffering by eliminating those who suffer, we thwart our own potential to be surprised by the depths of love and how profoundly well we swim in them.

Love transforms

St Joseph’s church, the first built by St Damian when he arrived at Molokai

Today is the feast day of St Damian of Molokai.

Born Josef De Veuster in Belgium in 1840, he began his novitiate with the Congregation of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary in 1859. In 1863, he took the place of his brother (who had fallen ill) on a trip to Hawaii to serve as a missionary.

At that time, the population of Hawaii were suffering the effects of contact with European diseases, including Hansen’s disease (leprosy). There was no known treatment for leprosy, and it was believed to be highly contagious. The Hawaiian authorities decided to quarantine anyone with leprosy on the island of Molokai, where they would be left to their own devices, except for supplies dropped from time to time. Over 8,000 people were sent to the island between 1865 and 1869, where they coped as best they could without medical care, government, adequate supplies, or hope.

In 1873, the bishop asked for volunteers to serve as priests on the island, knowing that it could be a death sentence. St Damian was one of the first to volunteer.

St Damian began by building a church. Under his spiritual direction, the small colony began to enforce basic laws. Shacks became painted huts; they built a school and planted gardens and organised working farms. St Damian didn’t just give spiritual direction: he dressed ulcers, built homes and beds, built coffins and dug graves. Following his example, others came to nurse, to teach, and to work on construction and maintenance.

St Damian died of leprosy on April 15, 1889, aged 49, and was laid to rest by the community he had transformed through the power of Christ’s love.