July 7, 2026 • 33 mins
In this meditation, Fr. Peter Armenio reflects on God's plan for human love and the vocation of marriage as a reflection of Christ's love for his Church. Drawing from Scripture and the example of the Holy Family, we are reminded that authentic love is rooted in self-giving, sustained by grace, and centered on Jesus Christ.
Fr. Peter invites us to renew our commitment to loving others out of love for Christ, to cultivate friendships and family life rooted in prayer, and to seek the spirit of Nazareth in our daily lives.
Listen and reflect on:
- God's plan for human love
- Marriage as a reflection of Christ's love
- The Holy Family as our model
- Self-giving and sacrificial love
- Keeping Christ at the center of every vocation
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Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_00 (00:10):
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit, amen.
My Lord and my God, I firmlybelieve that you are here, that
you see me, that you hear me.
I adore you with profoundreverence.
I ask your pardon for my sins.
And the grace to make this timeof prayer fruitful.
(00:34):
My Immaculate Mother SaintJoseph, my father, and Lord, my
guardian angel, intercede forme.
In this time of conversationwith Jesus Christ and through
Christ, our conversation isaddressed to God the Father, God
the Son, God the Holy Spirit.
(00:56):
We go through the humanity ofJesus.
And I begin this way, since ourtheme of conversation is
sanctifying human love.
And let's focus on the lovebetween husband and wife, since
(01:26):
the great majority of thepopulation revealed by Genesis.
Genesis narrates the creation ofthe first man and the first
woman.
And immediately after thenarrative of the creation of
woman, God institutes asanctification of human love and
(01:51):
specifying a very special holyhuman love that we call
marriage.
And he reveals, and thatrevelation still holds, that
this love between a husband andwife is the highest form of
(02:19):
human love.
Why is that?
Well, because it's a love thatis meant to reflect the very
love of God.
And for that reason, Godmandated that the husband and
(02:45):
wife leave mother and father andcleave to each other, become one
flesh.
Physically, emotionally, interms of friendship, in terms of
pursuit of Christ, that they beintimately united on many
(03:11):
fronts, united as persons.
God is not telling them that youcan't have your mother-in-law
live with you.
Please let's not interpret leavemother and father and become one
flesh as not having much to dowith our in-laws, but rather it
(03:37):
means that spousal love is yourhighest love.
That nothing surpasses thedevotion, dedication, self-gift
between husband and wife.
And in fact, the normal settingto learn about human love,
(04:01):
whether it's friendship love,whether it's sibling love,
fraternal love, or loving anypotential person because their
images of God, that is learnedfrom this human love between
husband and wife, mother andfather, if that's the case.
(04:24):
I remember a couple of womentelling me that what's key in
forming children, young people,in the sense that God loves them
with heart of father, heart ofmother, as Isaiah reveals.
(04:49):
The most formative example isthe actual bond of love between
their parents, husband and wife.
That gives security, if youwill, that gives them an
experience, a concreteexperience of the love of God,
albeit imperfect and finite, butnevertheless the love of God
(05:12):
that is reflected in fatherlylove and motherly love.
Lord, give us the grace topenetrate this beautiful gift
that you instituted at the dawnof creation of man and woman.
And Heavenly Father, you havesanctified it through your Son
(05:34):
Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ restored theoriginal meaning of marriage,
that this self-gift can never bewithdrawn in what we call
divorce and remarriage, that itis permanent while the spouses
are alive.
(05:56):
And so he restores the originalmeaning of marriage and raises
it to the level of a sacrament,literally makes it holy.
It was holy to begin with, butnow he gives it the stamp of
Christ-like holiness.
(06:17):
And that's what we mean bysanctification in the fullest
sense of the word.
To give us some perspective,sacraments bring holiness to the
human person in different ways,according to different needs.
(06:39):
But there are three sacramentsthat are intimately linked with
the Christian vocation.
Baptism initiates a calling todiscipleship, a union with
Christ, an intimate union withChrist.
(07:02):
And how is that understood?
Well, we look at the sign.
What's the sign?
It's water.
What does water do?
Water washes, washes awayoriginal sin and personal sin.
Water gives birth.
You plant a seed, but you've gotto water that soil for that seed
(07:22):
to sprout up into a plant or atree.
Even mammals and the humanperson is born out of water.
It's refreshing, it renews, etc.
And so that symbol of water,that sign of water, is
(07:43):
effectively spiritually.
The sign is effectively in aspiritual manner.
It does give rebirth in Christ.
It does wash away sin.
The sign tells you itssupernatural or spiritual role.
Confirmation completes thatdiscipleship so that we receive
(08:09):
grace to actually proclaim thetruth of the gospel and have the
strength to defend it andprofess it even at the cost of
our lives.
But there's two other sacramentsthat specify this kind of human
love.
One is holy orders, that is avocation to act in the person of
(08:36):
Christ.
Holy orders is a power menreceive to act in Christ's
place, to renew his sacrifice ofthe cross, that we call the
sacrifice or liturgy of theEucharist, the Holy Mass.
And the other one is matrimony,where the couple receive the
(09:07):
supernatural grace to love withthe heart of Christ.
Now, in this time of prayer, weneed to cross our T's and dot
our I's and not to be afraid tomake sure that our contemplation
(09:28):
of this sanctification of humanlove through the sacrament of
matrimony squares with reason.
Every truth of the faith does,but we want to meditate on how
it squares with reason.
(09:48):
And I say that because thetangible data contradict, at
least ostensibly, the beautifuldoctrine on sanctification of
human love, which we callmatrimony.
(10:13):
Jesus works his first miracle ata wedding.
That's a powerful message.
And there's so many ways youcould look at the conversion of
water and wine.
You could make it into anallegory in the spirit of the
fathers of the church, on theEucharist, on the Passion, on
(10:36):
evangelization, because it's awork of conversion.
But I want to focus a little biton marriage.
He worked this miracle inmarriage, and the end result was
a conversion of water into wine.
(10:56):
And that, among many meanings,for our purposes right now, that
is an allegory of thesanctification of human love.
The Mosaic law states that weare expected to love neighbor as
(11:17):
ourself, a tall order.
Sanctified human love is, and itapplies to everybody, but let's
focus a little bit on husbandand wife, signifies loving each
other according to the newcommandment, with the very heart
(11:38):
of Christ.
Impossible but approachable.
We can always approach it andget closer to that.
Impossible standard to actuallyduplicate the heart of Christ,
who is perfect God and perfectman.
I don't think I'm too far off.
(11:59):
I say it's impossible, butpossible to get close to it.
Otherwise, he would not haveissued that commandment.
And Paul calls this sacrament agreat sacrament, and it
symbolizes Christ's love for hischurch.
(12:24):
And we, many Christian homes, ifyou're praying in church, you
will see a crucifix, you seethat beat-up naked dead man.
That is the culminating sign ofChrist's love for his church.
(12:46):
He communicates his love forevery person by laying down his
very life in a merciless andmost painful sacrifice.
The gift of self, self-giving,does not surpass that.
(13:08):
It's the ultimate self-gift.
And marriage is meant, ormatrimony is meant to reflect
that very love for Christ.
That's what's revealed by theHoly Spirit through Saint Paul.
And hence the church mandatesthat Catholic baptized faithful
(13:34):
must receive the mess be marriedin church, and if they're in the
conditions that they're bothChristian, or one, at least
one's Catholic, one's Christian,that they receive the sacrament
of matrimony because the churchis a mother and wants her
children to receive all thegraces possible to persevere in
(14:00):
this human love called marriage.
Now, the elephant in the room isthat something's not working.
I need to admit that there'sbeen a good number of marriages.
I mean, not countless, butenough, where the couple, and
(14:27):
myself included, have decidedwe're going to have Catholic
celebration of the sacrament ofmatrimony outside of Mass.
We'll do the readings, we'llhave a homily, we'll do the
marriage ceremony or thematrimonial ceremony, but we
will not do it within theEucharistic celebration of the
(14:49):
Mass.
For the simple reason that insome cases most people were not
Catholic.
One couple were converts.
(15:21):
But somehow the marriagefizzled.
Many were many are divorced andremarried.
And so we, the couple and Imyself made a judgment call.
Well, if the majority are notgoing to go to communion, or
they're not in condition to goto communion, it's too awkward.
(15:45):
And so let's just have amatrimonial celebration of and
do without the Eucharisticcelebration, have the liturgy of
the word.
Well, we need to answer thequestion, and we know the
(16:06):
answer, but we need to answerthe question anyway,
prayerfully, with the light offaith and light of human
knowledge.
Something's not working.
I mean, is this actually truethat you receive the grace to
(16:28):
love each other with that actualheart of Christ when you see so
many failed marriages?
Does the sacrament work ordoesn't it?
I mean, if we're going to judgeby the date, it doesn't.
But we know it does.
(16:51):
Perhaps I could give an example.
And this could be a goodillustration.
I remember now, many decadesago, when I was in high school.
And one of the students at myparticular high school was a
(17:15):
phenomenal sprinter.
In those days we ran yards.
And as a freshman in highschool, this kid was so fast
that he ran under ten seconds.
(17:44):
But he personally was notinterested in track and field.
Maybe it was not maybe it wasten seconds, but maybe I think
it was under ten.
My memory doesn't fail me.
And that's that was phenomenal.
(18:05):
I think still it is veryimpressive, especially in your
freshman high school.
But he had very little interestin track and field.
He played football and heconcentrated his efforts there.
And he never got better.
He reached his peak freshmanyear because he never was on the
(18:32):
track team.
He never worked out.
Or maybe he'd run track beatsbut without working out.
And so, given the keencompetition, he never was the
best.
He wasn't all-state.
Maybe I don't even think he wasall county.
(18:56):
Why do I mention that?
Or maybe even a better examplecould be I had the uh fun
privilege of seeing an NFLfootball practice.
And my first reaction was theseyoung men, in the positive
(19:18):
sense, in terms of their agilityand their strength and their
speed, were freaks.
Freaks of nature.
You know, the ordinary mortaldid not have those gifts.
And uh it was a time of the yearwhen there was probably
eighty-five young menpracticing, who was the final
(19:41):
cuts were not made, or even thesemifinal cuts were not made.
And you had two or threepotential superstars, and the
rest were average greatathletes.
I mean, your your average NFLplayer.
(20:03):
And basically the ones who willmake the team, yes, there's
luck, but there's a lot of hardwork.
And what was crystal clear,because yeah, great majority
were, you know, all conference,all East, all West, all, you
(20:24):
know, all America, all American.
The ones who worked very hard,with some luck, would make the
team.
If you did not work, no matterhow much talent you had, unless
you were, you know, a knownsuperstar already, you wouldn't
make the team.
(20:46):
We need to work at our humanlove, whether we're married or
not.
Baptism gives us the DNA to besaints.
That doesn't mean we're going tobe saints unless we work at it.
Yes, that man and woman, in anunqualified way, have received a
DNA to actually be able toapproach that love Jesus has for
(21:14):
every person.
And because I have virtually notseen a severely dysfunctional
marriage when both are workingat it.
Yes, they have that DNA, theyhave the matrimony, but they
(21:35):
need to work at it.
And our models for human love,period, but now we're talking
about this specific form ofhuman love, is the holy family
in Nazareth.
Again, let's prayerfully use ourlight of reason.
(22:01):
Maybe our first reaction, it'sunderstandable, is yeah, I
agree, my model is.
The Holy Family, Jesus, Mary,and Joseph.
But in terms of realisticexpectations or realistic
application, I cannot identifywith the Holy Family.
(22:25):
I admire the Holy Family, Ivenerate the Holy Family, I love
the Holy Family, I pray to theHoly Family, but I cannot
identify with the Holy Family.
Why?
Well, the woman of the househappens to be immaculately
conceived.
She's never experienced atemptation.
There's no weaknesses connectedto sin.
(22:46):
Sorry, I'm not there.
Not even close.
Okay.
St.
Joseph, though the churchdoesn't teach that he was
immaculate conceived, it doesn'ttake a brilliant theologian to
(23:07):
figure out that if he's going toactually educate and form Jesus,
and if the male frame ofreference for Jesus and his
humanity is Saint Joseph, noone, barring the Blessed Mother,
has received the amount of graceand the special graces that
Saint Joseph received.
(23:29):
No one had a more importantmission than to get Jesus ready
as a man to go public.
I mean, get Jesus ready for themost important three years in
the history of the universe.
So can't relate to him either.
(23:55):
When your son has literally isyour creator, according to his
divinity.
So I can't relate.
Well, why are we told to imitatethe Holy Family?
Can we massage this in such away that it's crystal clear that
(24:16):
they're my paradigm, they're mymodel.
Yes.
Very simple.
Though we're not immaticallyconceived, though we have not
received the extraordinarygraces of Saint Joseph, but
their focus was Christ.
(24:40):
And both have similar stories.
One said yes to the angelGabriel to serve or cooperate in
the conception of the Son of Godand to mother the Son of God
(25:03):
throughout his sojourn here onearth.
So she gave a colossal yes of atotal act of self-giving,
communicated in a dream.
Saint Joseph also gave his totalyes, accepting Mary as his wife,
(25:27):
though conceiving a son that hedid not cooperate in that
conception.
He would have no human father,and he would have to bring him
up, educate him, be responsiblefor him.
And he gave his colossal yes.
(25:48):
So that's number one, I think wewant to have very clear in our
minds that this sanctificationof human love requires that I
give myself totally to thisperson, especially when it comes
to matrimony.
And number two, that it'sintimately related, that my
(26:12):
fulfillment is not in myultimate fulfillment, is not my
spouse, but my ultimatefulfillment is Christ.
I need to be centered on Christ.
I need to live my matrimonialcalling, if that's my calling,
(26:33):
or my celibate calling, whetherit's a celibacy that I formerly
embraced because I've receivedthe gift to be celibate for the
kingdom of God, or celibacybecause I'm not called to
marriage.
(26:58):
He has to be the center of mylife.
And if not, given my pastoralexperience, it's hard to vouch
for the success of a marriagewhen Christ is not a key player
in that marriage, to use an ideaof Fulton Sheen takes three to
(27:23):
get married.
And so what our Lord isencouraging us here to consider
that yes, this sanctification ofhuman love through marriage and
outside of marriage is possiblewith the sacrament, but my
(27:49):
cooperation, the sacrament isnot magic.
My struggle would becomefruitful, but I've got my
freedom is key here.
I do this because I was it wassuggested to me after a wedding,
I wedding mass that I celebrateda few years ago, not that long
(28:11):
ago, that a couple burst intothe sacristy when I was finished
mass and divesting, hanging upmy vestments, and they'd been
married probably at least 40years when they came in,
(28:33):
elderly, in comparison to anewlywed, anyway, and told me,
do not be afraid to speak aboutmatrimony to young people.
Young people are nervous becausethey they've come, many have
come from dysfunctional familiesand and they see marriages that
(28:56):
don't last too long.
She said, We're allincompatible.
My husband and I areincompatible, but we have made
Christ important to us.
We pray with each other.
(29:19):
Uh we pray together.
They were taking St.
John Paul's advice that therosary draws the couple
together, helps them love eachother more.
It's part of living out the DNAof matrimony.
She said we go to confession,which forces us to confess our
(29:40):
sins, not our spouses' sins.
And um we know that ourspiritual lives, because we're
married, is to love each other,not exclusively, but primary.
But we have to really work onour communication and our
(30:01):
friendship, and we are.
And we've been we're morefulfilled now than when we were
very young.
And so that's one dimension ofthis sanctification of human
love, and we go back to the HolyFamily, and what do we see?
(30:24):
Well, the greatest saints were ahusband and a wife, a mom and a
dad.
They were the greatest saintsbecause of the grace of God.
They were great saints becauseChrist was the center.
(30:45):
They lived their matrimony ormarriage on account of Christ.
Christ was the glue that keptthem together.
No husband and wife loved eachother as much as the Blessed
Mother and Saint Joseph.
And so we go to that holy familyfor their prayer of
(31:09):
intercession, that whether I'mpaying for toothpaste in a local
store, whether I'm onlinewaiting to board a plane,
whether I'm with a friend orfamily member, that I try to
(31:30):
duplicate that ambiance of theHoly Family, which especially
applies to a husband and wife,that we live for Christ, that we
do everything for Christ, toquote Saint Jose Maria, that
(31:51):
it's okay to love each other forone another's own sake, but if
that's as far as it goes, hesays that's not good.
He said we have to love peopleout of love for Christ.
That ensures that our love willgrow and that our love will
(32:11):
become even more human, if youwill.
Anyway, we close our meditation,perhaps going to the first
aspiration that was taught us aschildren, Jesus and Mary and
Joseph.
Pray for us.
Pray that we duplicate theenvironment of Nazareth, which
(32:32):
is also translated in Love OneAnother as I have loved you.
I thank you, my God, for thegood resolutions, affections,
and inspirations you'vecommunicated to me in this
meditation.
I ask your help putting theminto effect.
My Immaculate Mother SaintJoseph, my father and Lord, my
(32:54):
guardian angel, intercede forme.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the
Holy Spirit, amen.
My Lord and my God, I firmlybelieve that you are here, that
you see me, that you hear me.
I adore you with profoundreverence.
I ask your pardon for my sins.
And the grace to make this timeof prayer fruitful.
(00:34):
My Immaculate Mother SaintJoseph, my father, and Lord, my
guardian angel, intercede forme.
In this time of conversationwith Jesus Christ and through
Christ, our conversation isaddressed to God the Father, God
the Son, God the Holy Spirit.
(00:56):
We go through the humanity ofJesus.
And I begin this way, since ourtheme of conversation is
sanctifying human love.
And let's focus on the lovebetween husband and wife, since
(01:26):
the great majority of thepopulation revealed by Genesis.
Genesis narrates the creation ofthe first man and the first
woman.
And immediately after thenarrative of the creation of
woman, God institutes asanctification of human love and
(01:51):
specifying a very special holyhuman love that we call
marriage.
And he reveals, and thatrevelation still holds, that
this love between a husband andwife is the highest form of
(02:19):
human love.
Why is that?
Well, because it's a love thatis meant to reflect the very
love of God.
And for that reason, Godmandated that the husband and
(02:45):
wife leave mother and father andcleave to each other, become one
flesh.
Physically, emotionally, interms of friendship, in terms of
pursuit of Christ, that they beintimately united on many
(03:11):
fronts, united as persons.
God is not telling them that youcan't have your mother-in-law
live with you.
Please let's not interpret leavemother and father and become one
flesh as not having much to dowith our in-laws, but rather it
(03:37):
means that spousal love is yourhighest love.
That nothing surpasses thedevotion, dedication, self-gift
between husband and wife.
And in fact, the normal settingto learn about human love,
(04:01):
whether it's friendship love,whether it's sibling love,
fraternal love, or loving anypotential person because their
images of God, that is learnedfrom this human love between
husband and wife, mother andfather, if that's the case.
(04:24):
I remember a couple of womentelling me that what's key in
forming children, young people,in the sense that God loves them
with heart of father, heart ofmother, as Isaiah reveals.
(04:49):
The most formative example isthe actual bond of love between
their parents, husband and wife.
That gives security, if youwill, that gives them an
experience, a concreteexperience of the love of God,
albeit imperfect and finite, butnevertheless the love of God
(05:12):
that is reflected in fatherlylove and motherly love.
Lord, give us the grace topenetrate this beautiful gift
that you instituted at the dawnof creation of man and woman.
And Heavenly Father, you havesanctified it through your Son
(05:34):
Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ restored theoriginal meaning of marriage,
that this self-gift can never bewithdrawn in what we call
divorce and remarriage, that itis permanent while the spouses
are alive.
(05:56):
And so he restores the originalmeaning of marriage and raises
it to the level of a sacrament,literally makes it holy.
It was holy to begin with, butnow he gives it the stamp of
Christ-like holiness.
(06:17):
And that's what we mean bysanctification in the fullest
sense of the word.
To give us some perspective,sacraments bring holiness to the
human person in different ways,according to different needs.
(06:39):
But there are three sacramentsthat are intimately linked with
the Christian vocation.
Baptism initiates a calling todiscipleship, a union with
Christ, an intimate union withChrist.
(07:02):
And how is that understood?
Well, we look at the sign.
What's the sign?
It's water.
What does water do?
Water washes, washes awayoriginal sin and personal sin.
Water gives birth.
You plant a seed, but you've gotto water that soil for that seed
(07:22):
to sprout up into a plant or atree.
Even mammals and the humanperson is born out of water.
It's refreshing, it renews, etc.
And so that symbol of water,that sign of water, is
(07:43):
effectively spiritually.
The sign is effectively in aspiritual manner.
It does give rebirth in Christ.
It does wash away sin.
The sign tells you itssupernatural or spiritual role.
Confirmation completes thatdiscipleship so that we receive
(08:09):
grace to actually proclaim thetruth of the gospel and have the
strength to defend it andprofess it even at the cost of
our lives.
But there's two other sacramentsthat specify this kind of human
love.
One is holy orders, that is avocation to act in the person of
(08:36):
Christ.
Holy orders is a power menreceive to act in Christ's
place, to renew his sacrifice ofthe cross, that we call the
sacrifice or liturgy of theEucharist, the Holy Mass.
And the other one is matrimony,where the couple receive the
(09:07):
supernatural grace to love withthe heart of Christ.
Now, in this time of prayer, weneed to cross our T's and dot
our I's and not to be afraid tomake sure that our contemplation
(09:28):
of this sanctification of humanlove through the sacrament of
matrimony squares with reason.
Every truth of the faith does,but we want to meditate on how
it squares with reason.
(09:48):
And I say that because thetangible data contradict, at
least ostensibly, the beautifuldoctrine on sanctification of
human love, which we callmatrimony.
(10:13):
Jesus works his first miracle ata wedding.
That's a powerful message.
And there's so many ways youcould look at the conversion of
water and wine.
You could make it into anallegory in the spirit of the
fathers of the church, on theEucharist, on the Passion, on
(10:36):
evangelization, because it's awork of conversion.
But I want to focus a little biton marriage.
He worked this miracle inmarriage, and the end result was
a conversion of water into wine.
(10:56):
And that, among many meanings,for our purposes right now, that
is an allegory of thesanctification of human love.
The Mosaic law states that weare expected to love neighbor as
(11:17):
ourself, a tall order.
Sanctified human love is, and itapplies to everybody, but let's
focus a little bit on husbandand wife, signifies loving each
other according to the newcommandment, with the very heart
(11:38):
of Christ.
Impossible but approachable.
We can always approach it andget closer to that.
Impossible standard to actuallyduplicate the heart of Christ,
who is perfect God and perfectman.
I don't think I'm too far off.
(11:59):
I say it's impossible, butpossible to get close to it.
Otherwise, he would not haveissued that commandment.
And Paul calls this sacrament agreat sacrament, and it
symbolizes Christ's love for hischurch.
(12:24):
And we, many Christian homes, ifyou're praying in church, you
will see a crucifix, you seethat beat-up naked dead man.
That is the culminating sign ofChrist's love for his church.
(12:46):
He communicates his love forevery person by laying down his
very life in a merciless andmost painful sacrifice.
The gift of self, self-giving,does not surpass that.
(13:08):
It's the ultimate self-gift.
And marriage is meant, ormatrimony is meant to reflect
that very love for Christ.
That's what's revealed by theHoly Spirit through Saint Paul.
And hence the church mandatesthat Catholic baptized faithful
(13:34):
must receive the mess be marriedin church, and if they're in the
conditions that they're bothChristian, or one, at least
one's Catholic, one's Christian,that they receive the sacrament
of matrimony because the churchis a mother and wants her
children to receive all thegraces possible to persevere in
(14:00):
this human love called marriage.
Now, the elephant in the room isthat something's not working.
I need to admit that there'sbeen a good number of marriages.
I mean, not countless, butenough, where the couple, and
(14:27):
myself included, have decidedwe're going to have Catholic
celebration of the sacrament ofmatrimony outside of Mass.
We'll do the readings, we'llhave a homily, we'll do the
marriage ceremony or thematrimonial ceremony, but we
will not do it within theEucharistic celebration of the
(14:49):
Mass.
For the simple reason that insome cases most people were not
Catholic.
One couple were converts.
(15:21):
But somehow the marriagefizzled.
Many were many are divorced andremarried.
And so we, the couple and Imyself made a judgment call.
Well, if the majority are notgoing to go to communion, or
they're not in condition to goto communion, it's too awkward.
(15:45):
And so let's just have amatrimonial celebration of and
do without the Eucharisticcelebration, have the liturgy of
the word.
Well, we need to answer thequestion, and we know the
(16:06):
answer, but we need to answerthe question anyway,
prayerfully, with the light offaith and light of human
knowledge.
Something's not working.
I mean, is this actually truethat you receive the grace to
(16:28):
love each other with that actualheart of Christ when you see so
many failed marriages?
Does the sacrament work ordoesn't it?
I mean, if we're going to judgeby the date, it doesn't.
But we know it does.
(16:51):
Perhaps I could give an example.
And this could be a goodillustration.
I remember now, many decadesago, when I was in high school.
And one of the students at myparticular high school was a
(17:15):
phenomenal sprinter.
In those days we ran yards.
And as a freshman in highschool, this kid was so fast
that he ran under ten seconds.
(17:44):
But he personally was notinterested in track and field.
Maybe it was not maybe it wasten seconds, but maybe I think
it was under ten.
My memory doesn't fail me.
And that's that was phenomenal.
(18:05):
I think still it is veryimpressive, especially in your
freshman high school.
But he had very little interestin track and field.
He played football and heconcentrated his efforts there.
And he never got better.
He reached his peak freshmanyear because he never was on the
(18:32):
track team.
He never worked out.
Or maybe he'd run track beatsbut without working out.
And so, given the keencompetition, he never was the
best.
He wasn't all-state.
Maybe I don't even think he wasall county.
(18:56):
Why do I mention that?
Or maybe even a better examplecould be I had the uh fun
privilege of seeing an NFLfootball practice.
And my first reaction was theseyoung men, in the positive
(19:18):
sense, in terms of their agilityand their strength and their
speed, were freaks.
Freaks of nature.
You know, the ordinary mortaldid not have those gifts.
And uh it was a time of the yearwhen there was probably
eighty-five young menpracticing, who was the final
(19:41):
cuts were not made, or even thesemifinal cuts were not made.
And you had two or threepotential superstars, and the
rest were average greatathletes.
I mean, your your average NFLplayer.
(20:03):
And basically the ones who willmake the team, yes, there's
luck, but there's a lot of hardwork.
And what was crystal clear,because yeah, great majority
were, you know, all conference,all East, all West, all, you
(20:24):
know, all America, all American.
The ones who worked very hard,with some luck, would make the
team.
If you did not work, no matterhow much talent you had, unless
you were, you know, a knownsuperstar already, you wouldn't
make the team.
(20:46):
We need to work at our humanlove, whether we're married or
not.
Baptism gives us the DNA to besaints.
That doesn't mean we're going tobe saints unless we work at it.
Yes, that man and woman, in anunqualified way, have received a
DNA to actually be able toapproach that love Jesus has for
(21:14):
every person.
And because I have virtually notseen a severely dysfunctional
marriage when both are workingat it.
Yes, they have that DNA, theyhave the matrimony, but they
(21:35):
need to work at it.
And our models for human love,period, but now we're talking
about this specific form ofhuman love, is the holy family
in Nazareth.
Again, let's prayerfully use ourlight of reason.
(22:01):
Maybe our first reaction, it'sunderstandable, is yeah, I
agree, my model is.
The Holy Family, Jesus, Mary,and Joseph.
But in terms of realisticexpectations or realistic
application, I cannot identifywith the Holy Family.
(22:25):
I admire the Holy Family, Ivenerate the Holy Family, I love
the Holy Family, I pray to theHoly Family, but I cannot
identify with the Holy Family.
Why?
Well, the woman of the househappens to be immaculately
conceived.
She's never experienced atemptation.
There's no weaknesses connectedto sin.
(22:46):
Sorry, I'm not there.
Not even close.
Okay.
St.
Joseph, though the churchdoesn't teach that he was
immaculate conceived, it doesn'ttake a brilliant theologian to
(23:07):
figure out that if he's going toactually educate and form Jesus,
and if the male frame ofreference for Jesus and his
humanity is Saint Joseph, noone, barring the Blessed Mother,
has received the amount of graceand the special graces that
Saint Joseph received.
(23:29):
No one had a more importantmission than to get Jesus ready
as a man to go public.
I mean, get Jesus ready for themost important three years in
the history of the universe.
So can't relate to him either.
(23:55):
When your son has literally isyour creator, according to his
divinity.
So I can't relate.
Well, why are we told to imitatethe Holy Family?
Can we massage this in such away that it's crystal clear that
(24:16):
they're my paradigm, they're mymodel.
Yes.
Very simple.
Though we're not immaticallyconceived, though we have not
received the extraordinarygraces of Saint Joseph, but
their focus was Christ.
(24:40):
And both have similar stories.
One said yes to the angelGabriel to serve or cooperate in
the conception of the Son of Godand to mother the Son of God
(25:03):
throughout his sojourn here onearth.
So she gave a colossal yes of atotal act of self-giving,
communicated in a dream.
Saint Joseph also gave his totalyes, accepting Mary as his wife,
(25:27):
though conceiving a son that hedid not cooperate in that
conception.
He would have no human father,and he would have to bring him
up, educate him, be responsiblefor him.
And he gave his colossal yes.
(25:48):
So that's number one, I think wewant to have very clear in our
minds that this sanctificationof human love requires that I
give myself totally to thisperson, especially when it comes
to matrimony.
And number two, that it'sintimately related, that my
(26:12):
fulfillment is not in myultimate fulfillment, is not my
spouse, but my ultimatefulfillment is Christ.
I need to be centered on Christ.
I need to live my matrimonialcalling, if that's my calling,
(26:33):
or my celibate calling, whetherit's a celibacy that I formerly
embraced because I've receivedthe gift to be celibate for the
kingdom of God, or celibacybecause I'm not called to
marriage.
(26:58):
He has to be the center of mylife.
And if not, given my pastoralexperience, it's hard to vouch
for the success of a marriagewhen Christ is not a key player
in that marriage, to use an ideaof Fulton Sheen takes three to
(27:23):
get married.
And so what our Lord isencouraging us here to consider
that yes, this sanctification ofhuman love through marriage and
outside of marriage is possiblewith the sacrament, but my
(27:49):
cooperation, the sacrament isnot magic.
My struggle would becomefruitful, but I've got my
freedom is key here.
I do this because I was it wassuggested to me after a wedding,
I wedding mass that I celebrateda few years ago, not that long
(28:11):
ago, that a couple burst intothe sacristy when I was finished
mass and divesting, hanging upmy vestments, and they'd been
married probably at least 40years when they came in,
(28:33):
elderly, in comparison to anewlywed, anyway, and told me,
do not be afraid to speak aboutmatrimony to young people.
Young people are nervous becausethey they've come, many have
come from dysfunctional familiesand and they see marriages that
(28:56):
don't last too long.
She said, We're allincompatible.
My husband and I areincompatible, but we have made
Christ important to us.
We pray with each other.
(29:19):
Uh we pray together.
They were taking St.
John Paul's advice that therosary draws the couple
together, helps them love eachother more.
It's part of living out the DNAof matrimony.
She said we go to confession,which forces us to confess our
(29:40):
sins, not our spouses' sins.
And um we know that ourspiritual lives, because we're
married, is to love each other,not exclusively, but primary.
But we have to really work onour communication and our
(30:01):
friendship, and we are.
And we've been we're morefulfilled now than when we were
very young.
And so that's one dimension ofthis sanctification of human
love, and we go back to the HolyFamily, and what do we see?
(30:24):
Well, the greatest saints were ahusband and a wife, a mom and a
dad.
They were the greatest saintsbecause of the grace of God.
They were great saints becauseChrist was the center.
(30:45):
They lived their matrimony ormarriage on account of Christ.
Christ was the glue that keptthem together.
No husband and wife loved eachother as much as the Blessed
Mother and Saint Joseph.
And so we go to that holy familyfor their prayer of
(31:09):
intercession, that whether I'mpaying for toothpaste in a local
store, whether I'm onlinewaiting to board a plane,
whether I'm with a friend orfamily member, that I try to
(31:30):
duplicate that ambiance of theHoly Family, which especially
applies to a husband and wife,that we live for Christ, that we
do everything for Christ, toquote Saint Jose Maria, that
(31:51):
it's okay to love each other forone another's own sake, but if
that's as far as it goes, hesays that's not good.
He said we have to love peopleout of love for Christ.
That ensures that our love willgrow and that our love will
(32:11):
become even more human, if youwill.
Anyway, we close our meditation,perhaps going to the first
aspiration that was taught us aschildren, Jesus and Mary and
Joseph.
Pray for us.
Pray that we duplicate theenvironment of Nazareth, which
(32:32):
is also translated in Love OneAnother as I have loved you.
I thank you, my God, for thegood resolutions, affections,
and inspirations you'vecommunicated to me in this
meditation.
I ask your help putting theminto effect.
My Immaculate Mother SaintJoseph, my father and Lord, my
(32:54):
guardian angel, intercede forme.
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