Twenty-Seventh Sunday in Ordinary Time

Dear Friends,

Today’s readings that the Church gives us to contemplate reveal some of the fundamental needs of our humanness: the need for union with another and God's desire to be united with us.

In the first reading, God proclaims the need for complementarity. It is not good for the human person to be alone. After all, the human person is created in the image and likeness of God, who is three persons that are so complimentary and so in love with each other that they are one. Therefore, the human person needs another person before him that is complementary to him. Complementary means one that is “other”-enough or different enough so that I and the other can become one together. The “you” and “I” become a “we”. This is why God creates man and woman. So that in their differences and otherness, they may give themselves to each other and receive each other. In other words, so that they can love each other and become one together. This union between man and woman is so beautiful and so powerful!

Yet, in Jesus, the union of man and woman gains another decisive significance! In the sacrament of marriage, the union between a husband and wife points to the union between Jesus and his spouse, the Church. When Jesus became man, he united himself forever to mankind, especially to the Church. He committed himself to her, and assures that He would make her holy forever and that she, filled with the Holy Spirit, would continue His work of salvation, redemption, and reconciliation.

This is why Jesus, is so adamant in treasuring and protecting the union of a husband and a wife. Because when a man leaves his home and becomes one with his wife, they reveal to us our need for union with each other, and they reveal to us Jesus union with us.

Let us pray today for all those who are married and for those preparing for marriage that the Lord’s love for his church may shine through their marriages.

Thibault Vincent, SCV - CLM Coordinator