Homily for the Marriage of my daughter Erin and Ben Bovenzi, Friday Dec.30, St Kateri at St. Margaret Mary

Ben – dude - you saw her before the ceremony.  Bad luck, they say.  Missed out on the big moment, when those doors swing open and there she is.  Bad, bad luck.

And both of you – escorted down the aisle in a liturgical procession.  Instead of bride coming in on daddy’s arm and being given away.  More bad luck, I’m sure someone from the superstition police would tell you.

Well since we’re in the mode of breaking the rules here, or at least superstitions, I’d like to break one of my own.

Congratulations.  To both of you!

Wait! - bad luck!  You say “congratulations” to the groom and “best wishes” to the bride.  Or something like that.

Hogwash.  Congratulations.  To the both of you.

Four congratulations, actually.

First of all, congratulations on your courtship, which has been very different, counter-cultural.  And on your marriage – on getting married.  More and more this world will tell you it’s just a piece of paper, what do we need that for if we love each other.  I will tell you that getting married is counter-cultural, and becoming more so by the day.  So congratulations on trusting in each other’s love enough to commit to loving each other for a lifetime.

Second – congratulations on getting married before God and His people.  If you were paying close attention to the lyrics of the wedding song, which Matt and Julia so beautifully sang at the beginning of our liturgy, the opening stanza was “He is now to be among you at the calling of your hearts. Rest assured this troubadour is acting on his part. The union of your spirits here has caused him to remain for whenever two or more of you are gathered in His name, there is love.”

You could be exchanging vows and rings on a beautiful beach someplace, a destination wedding.  All the vogue these days.  But you have chosen to come here to give your consent, say solemn vows and exchange rings before God and all of us. 

This says something – something powerful.  It says that your faith is important to you.  Like Tobiah and Sarah whose prayer we heard in our first reading, you desire a lifelong covenantal marriage with God at the center.  That you seek God’s blessings and graces as you set out on your married journey together.  That you want Him to accompany you all along that journey.  And He will.  The meaning of the feast we celebrated only five days ago is “God is with us” – Emmanuel.  And God will be with you.  For that – congratulations!

Third, congratulations on your marriage here.  Not only in Church, but in this Church.  For here we recognize that yours is more than a relationship, more than a marriage. It’s a sacrament.  Sacrament – what’s that?

There was a question posed in that song Matt and Julia sang - “Do you believe in something that you’ve never seen before?”  A sacrament is a solemn, visible sign of something unseen, of a spiritual reality.

You see, since the beginning of time, God has been revealing Himself to His creation, to us.  The ultimate way He has revealed Himself to us is in the person of His only begotten Son, Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.  Jesus became the sacrament, if you will, of the Father.  The physical manifestation of our unseen God with us.

Our Lord ascended to heaven, and what did He leave behind? A ragtag group of disciples, inspired by the Holy Spirit, led by twelve apostles – He left behind the Church!  The Church, then, is the sacrament, the physical manifestation, the ongoing presence, of Jesus Himself.  To carry on the mission of Jesus Himself. 

And why?  For the same reason He came to earth – for our salvation!  The Church is His instrument, His sacrament, for the salvation of the world.  And He graciously left the Church seven special ways in which He continues to manifest His presence to us – seven special sacraments – of which holy matrimony is one.

Put in this perspective, your marriage sacrament, which will begin in a few moments and last your entire lives together, is part of Our Lord’s plan for the salvation of the world.  Your vocation, your mission, as a couple, as a family, as a little church, is to make visible, first to each other, and to every person you ever encounter, the loving presence of Jesus Christ.

Your love, the way you speak to each other, look at each other, sacrifice for each other, forgive each other – is to be a physical and very real sign of something – some One - you’ve never seen before – Our Blessed Lord.  So that every single person you meet, but above all each other – will get a glimpse of His amazing love for us, by the way you love each other.

Your sacramental love will then flow out from your relationship to, God willing, your children, and your family, friends, community, our world.  You two together will comfort the mourning.  Be peacemakers.  Show mercy.  Seek justice and righteousness. Most especially with each other, but overflowing to your family and world around you.

That is what we mean by the Sacrament of Marriage.  It’s a mission – a vital mission He’s giving you, you’re accepting.  It’s vital especially in our time, in a world that thirsts for His presence.   Thirsts to know His love.  His tenderness.  His mercy.

For taking on such an important mission, I say “congratulations!”

Finally, congratulations on being married in front of this altar, where soon after we will celebrate His real presence in the ultimate Sacrament, the source and summit of our faith, Holy Eucharist.  You trust in His word when He says “unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood you shall not have life within you” and you want that life always in your marriage.

You will receive the very Body, blood, soul and divinity of our Blessed Lord into your own bodies, and into your marriage, and unite yourselves in communion with each other, with all of us who partake with you, and in a very real sense with all those who have gone before us, those loved ones we wish could be here today, and with all those who will come after us.

You recognize the importance of this sacrament in your own lives and now in your marriage.  Always, always, keep Eucharist at the center of your marriage. 

So to conclude, forget about bad luck.  With Jesus in His Blessed Sacrament at your center, and under the protection and intercession of His Blessed Mother Mary and foster father Joseph, the Holy Family whom we also celebrate this day, you won’t need luck.

For you will have grace – He will shower you with an abundance of grace, and give you the strength and meekness and mercy and every other good gift you will need on your married journey together.

You will have holiness – you will lead each other to ever deeper faith in Jesus Christ.

And you will have joy.  Not necessarily always happiness, but always joy.  Joy in knowing you are exactly where He wants you, fulfilling exactly the mission for which you were created.  Until that day when together you experience the eternal joy He promises to all His beloved.  And make no mistake – you are His beloved.

So I say it again - Erin and Ben – Congratulations!