A Sketch on the Hope of Marriage

“Marriage is not something you do. Marriage is something you enter in to.”

I wonder at the hope of marriage. It is large as the world. Villages the world over, cities, town, and hovel bear witness. There are, of course, marriages barely worthy of the name: hope a joke, intention wrong, a scary sight if all were laid bare. And there is naivete' enough for all mankind, shocking dimness of wit while longing for the promise that is life. Yet we follow the primal call that would lead us upward. Marriage is this, and more.

I remember the first wedding I attended, somewhere in Western Kansas. The wind was blowing, as always, and there were peanuts and those pastel-colored sweets, a treat for my five-year old palate. I think of it now for the feigned sanctity. Or was it real? I did not know, being such a young boy. But now I know all such occasions participate in a mystery beyond us, though few have the wisdom to know the true goodness that beckons.

Marriage touches all the world, earthy and divine at once. It calls forth everything – everything. No wonder the ancient vow includes, “with my body I thee worship.” It is sensual to be sure, and not wrong for that. But it is more. It requires a man to declare the ultimate earthly value of his life, dare to receive her into his care, and begin to learn that they are, together, the greatest possible clue to something beyond.

Marriage proclaims there is something real in the world, something worth all the dance and food and reveling. It makes possible and sensible the jubilant toast to life, and echoes a parable claimed of secondary things: “Every time someone gets married we know God wants the world to go on.” Or better, “Getting married declares life is worth living, and we are going to make it so.”

Sadly the marriage I witnessed on the Kansas prairie did not last. Who knows why. They found reason to leave, to break the vow, the trust, the hope. Every time that happens we all die in part, for a declared union of supreme value falls away and we became lesser than we know we can be. And we may even toy with the devilish idea that says marriage is bad.

Nay. Marriage is an eternal good. Full stop.

Someone said it this way: “Marriage is not something you do. Marriage is something you enter in to.” Marriage is bigger than you. It is the making of you, the making of a home, of a life: a jubilant hope declaring, “Life is worth living and we will prove it!” 

That's the hope marriage makes possible in this wonderful life, and it will save us if we let it.

 

But if we continue to disparage it, we will be undone.