June 7, 2005
On May 30th, my parents celebrated 35 years of marriage – 35 years of a committed, sacramental union of love and sacrifice. When they met, my mom was a 20-year-old art student at Ohio University and a member of “the Church of the Brethren”. My father was a 30-year-old German airman in Officer Training School and a devout Catholic. Even though my father spoke very little English and my mother no German; he was Catholic and she was Protestant; and they were 10 years apart in age – they couldn’t find any reason why they shouldn’t get married! So, married they were, and before long, my Protestant mother became Catholic and my German father became an American citizen. The two truly became one!
My parents didn’t seem to have a whole lot in common in the beginning; but in fact, they had some very fundamental common ground. They both took marriage seriously; they both took God seriously. They knew that marriage was a sacrament and a lifelong covenant which they didn’t enter into with an escape hatch in view. They were setting out on an adventure of a lifetime, not on a trial experiment.
I grew up without the slightest seed of fear that my parents would separate or divorce. Being abducted by aliens seemed a more likely possibility! People often wonder where a religious vocation comes from. The call comes from God, but our ability to respond to that call and our capacity for living in a radical relationship of love with Christ is largely dependent on the formation we receive in our families – the “domestic church”. Pope John Paul II considered his home life in the little apartment with his hard-working and devout father to be his “domestic seminary” which prepared him to respond to God’s call to the priesthood.
A husband and wife reflect the communion of love within the Holy Trinity, each one pouring himself out for the other and receiving the love of the other totally. By loving one another constantly, cheerfully, and sacrificially, parents give their children a most valuable gift, a formation in love.
If a child has confidence in his parents’ committed love for one another and knows that he himself is a fruit of that love, he is that much closer to understanding who he is as a beloved child of God with a mission to live-out the sacrificial love he has already seen and experienced in his home.
To be a holy spouse and parent according to the plan of God is a challenge and daily struggle – as is every vocation seriously undertaken. You can be sure that if love of God and obedience to His will fuels your renewed and committed love for your spouse, you build your house on rock and not on sand.
May Almighty God bless and strengthen all husbands and wives, all mothers and fathers.
Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!
Sr. Clare Matthiass, CFR
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comments: father benedict @ franciscanfriars.com
