With our readings this weekend we drift into a new meditation on human marriage. Those of you who hear me regularly know that I talk a great deal about marriage in passing, because one of the grand themes of Holy Scripture is the marriage of God to His chosen people. The Jews dwelt a great deal upon this, for it made them a very special possession of God, in the same way that a husband is the very special possession of his wife, and she a very special possession of his. It is this mutual self-giving that is the inner strength of every strong marriage.
The Church was established by a very Jewish Christ and governed at first by His very Jewish Apostles, so inevitably when they welcomed non-Jews (like ourselves) into the Church, they extended to us this belonging to God. So – and this is very clear in the New Testament – the Church considers herself the Bride of Christ, and the Church very carefully guards sacramental marriage as unbreakable, insoluble. God calls us to love each other in this respect with a love akin to His own for us. And so, with that as an introduction, let’s have a look at these readings.
“But the Lord God said, ‘It is not well that man should be without companionship; I will give him a mate of his own kind.’ And now, from the clay of the ground, all the beasts that roam the earth and all that flies through the air were ready fashioned, and the Lord God brought them to Adam, to see what he would call them; the name Adam gave to each living creature is its name still. Thus Adam gave names to all the cattle, and all that flies in the air, and all the wild beasts; and still Adam had no mate of his own kind. So the Lord God made Adam fall into a deep sleep, and, while he slept, took away one of his ribs, and filled its place with flesh. This rib, which he had taken out of Adam, the Lord God formed into a woman; and when He brought her to Adam, Adam said, ‘Here, at last, is bone that comes from mine, flesh that comes from mine; it shall be called Woman, this thing that was taken out of Man.’ That is why a man is destined to leave father and mother, and cling to his wife instead, so that the two become one flesh. Both went naked, Adam and his wife, and thought it no shame.”
Book of Genesis, 2: 18-25 [link]
This Genesis reading is quite obvious and needs no elaboration. God sees that the man He has built needs assistance in his lonely task of governing and shaping the garden of Creation and, when this gardener Adam cannot find the companionship he needs in the beasts and the fowl brought before him, the Holy One gives him the greatest blessing yet: woman. Woman who can complete him, not only assisting in the work of creation and in providing companionship, but also in uniting intimately with him in a symphony of love that finds its source in the love of God Himself. A love which then bears fruit in the birth of children and therefore the further blessing of this race of men.
But the heart of man can corrupt anything, of course, and over the course of time we know of the historical degradation of woman, that continues today despite the advances we have made over the last two hundred years in the west. Woman became and remains in many ways a possession to facilitate the lusts of man, and even among the sanctified people of God – the Jews – we hear of how easy it had become for a husband to divorce his wife, and put her away in perpetual disgrace. And these pharisees of the Gospel story dared to parade their divorce (as permitted by Moses, they said) before the Holy One, Who had given woman to man in the beginning.
“Then the Pharisees came and put Him to the test by asking Him, whether it is right for a man to put away his wife. He answered them, ‘What command did Moses give you?’ And they said, ‘Moses left a man free to put his wife away, if he gave her a writ of separation.’ Jesus answered them, ‘It was to suit your hard hearts that Moses wrote such a command as that; God, from the first days of creation, made them man and woman. A man, therefore, will leave his father and mother and will cling to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. Why then, since they are no longer two, but one flesh, what God has joined, let not man put asunder.’ And when they were in the house, His disciples asked Him further about the same question. Whereupon He told them, ‘If a man puts away his wife and marries another, he behaves adulterously towards her, and if a woman puts away her husband and marries another, she is an adulteress.’ Then they brought children to Him, asking Him to touch them; and His disciples rebuked those who brought them. But Jesus was indignant at seeing this; ‘Let the children come to Me,’ He said, ‘do not keep them back; the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you truthfully, the man who does not welcome the kingdom of God like a child, will never enter into it.’ And so He embraced them, laid His hands upon them, and blessed them.”
Gospel of S. Mark, 10: 2-16 [link]
Our Lord is obviously not amused with the question about divorce and immediately instructs them about what marriage was when Eve had been created. The Church has continued this instruction ever since, notoriously in our own country, when the English church was divided off from the Successor of S. Peter primarily over the new controversies over marriage created by the protestant rebels. Why would it occur to King Henry that he could be divorced from his first wife, if such ideas were not placed before him by his protestant advisors?
It is interesting indeed that what remains central – the rejection of Sacraments like marriage – in the feud between the Apostolic churches and the protestant communities has to deal with unity in general. Part of what fractured the Western church (and continues to fracture the separated communities) and has divided her ever since is a Sacrament that was intended to unite husband and wife forever. Today, marriage and family life is the battleground in which we may perceive the armies of light and the armies of darkness fighting for human souls. Those of us who are old enough to have watched this train crash actually progress in our own lifetimes know best what has been lost – how stability and strength in our families declined within a hundred years as a result of persistent attacks on marriage and family life.
So, these readings are perennial, and the Holy One continues to invite spouses to commitments to each other and blesses their little children. Our second reading from the letter to the Hebrews demonstrates to us that He Himself made His commitment to His bride the Church, bowing His eternal head before her in humility, making perfect His devotion to her in sacrifice and suffering. She has always replied with tears, blessing Him to Whom she owes everything, her holy Spouse, her Lord and God.
“But we can see this; we can see one who was made a little lower than the angels, I mean Jesus, crowned, now, with glory and honour because of the death He underwent; in God’s gracious design He was to taste death, and taste it on behalf of all. God is the last end of all things, the first beginning of all things; and it befitted His majesty that, in summoning all those sons of His to glory, He should crown with suffering the life of that Prince who was to lead them into salvation. The Son Who sanctifies and the sons who are sanctified have a common origin, all of them; He is not ashamed, then, to own them as His brethren.”
Letter to the Hebrews, 2: 9-11 [link]
Catholic Louth and Mablethorpe 