|
Marriage:
What does love have to do with it?
The Oregonian - February
2002
When one speaks of marriage today, it is not always clear in
everyone's mind what is meant. For some, marriage is a life-long
commitment to another person. For others, it is a social
bond meant to make people happy. Once happiness fades, the
relationship is disposable. For still others, marriage is
unnecessary. Why go through all the trouble, they reason,
when you can have many of the benefits without the commitment,
formality and responsibility? A fourth category within the
possible understandings of marriage is that it's a sacrament, a
holy mystery where both the spouses' primary commitment is first
to God and then to one another. This type of marriage is
seen as an eternal commitment. The purposes of marriage
transcend temporal happiness, self-centered agendas and even human
possibilities. The primary concern in a marriage of this nature
is the will of God, the exercise of virtue and the sanctification
of one' spouse. In this type of marriage, human effort is
certainly necessary for success. But only by the grace of
God and His unfathomable mercy are these goals attainable.
The main ingredients of a marriage of this nature are obedience
and humility, but the ultimate means and fruit are pure,
unadulterated, self-sacrificial and unconditional love. Society
spends a fair amount of time and energy on the subject of love,
but unfortunately what is most often meant is a superficial and
emotionally based sentiment, sadly devoid of any real lasting
power. Holy Scripture speaks of love as hoping all things, bearing
all things, enduring all things and outlasting all things.
Love never ends (1 Corinthians 13). The
Scriptural example of this type of love is Jesus Christ
Himself. He illustrates love in the most perfect way through
His own relationship as the bridegroom of the church. Love
according to the teaching of Jesus Christ is a death of one's
selfishness and a purposeful choice to live and serve God and
one's neighbor. Marriage is precisely the sacramental
institution where this kind of love can be discovered, practiced
and perfected in a dynamic sense. For
a marriage to be a means of glorifying God and imitating
Christ-like virtue unto the spiritual healing and sanctification
of one's spouse, the love of self in any self-centered way must be
seen as a roadblock. The Rev. Theodore Dorrance leads
St. John the Baptist Greek Orthodox Church, 10144 SW Park Way in
Beaverton. He can
be reached at 503-292-3737.
|
