MARRIAGE A DAILY DISCOVERING OF GOD WHO IS LOVE

Today is a very special day for Oluwatomi (God is enough for me to rely on) David and Desayo (I was born into joy), it is a special day for the two families and friends of the couples. And also today is a special day for the Church, why? Because today two special children of the Holy Mother Church have come to express before her the love they have discovered in God who is love. 

But I have two questions for two of you today, and my first question is what is love? The second question is have you truly discovered love?

I know you will tell me that love is a strong feeling, a strong passion or a strong attraction for someone or something.  In fact, the dictionary defines love as a strong positive emotion of regard and affection. A deep feeling of sexual desire and attraction.

But this definition does not give us the true meaning of love, because love is beyond feelings, affections, emotion, attraction or sexual desire. You want to know what love is? I will let you know what love really means. Love I will tell you is that very nature of God that we share. That is why when someone is in love or when someone discovers love, is something deep and deeper than the human nature because it is the nature of God that we share. And St John tells us that God is love, and he who abides in love, abides God and God in him. 

And he said in 1 cor. 13:4-8 that Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres, Love never fails. So, back to my second question, Oluwatomi and Desayo have you discovered love or I will say have you discovered God in each other? Because Marriage simple mean discovering God in your spouse. 

Little wonder, Pope Francis while addressing couples present in St. Peter's Square for his May 27 general audience in 2015 said that: Marriage is a vocation from God, is not just a relationship based on attraction and feelings, of a moment, of something short. It requires a journey which establishes a very strong and lasting partnership, which makes two lives one, a true miracle of human freedom and the grace of God. At the end of his address he said something very important. He said that, Love requires work not just attraction or feelings that comes and goes.

Hence, can. 1055, defines marriage as a covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of their whole life, and which of it’s own nature is ordered to the well-being of the spouses and to the procreation and upbringing of children, has, between the baptised , been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament.

My dear brother and sister, marriage is like building a house, you must ensure that you erect the structure of your marriage in a solid foundation of love well rooted in God. It is a daily struggle towards discovering God. In this struggles you need to know that both of you have a special role to play. Oluwatomi, you are the man of the house, men affirms and protect their home just like St Joseph. 

Desayo, you are a woman, women stirs the whole family with joy just like our Mother Mary and that is why there is a special prayer said for the woman in the nuptials blessings which  says: May the grace of love and peace abide in your daughter and let her always follow the example of those holy women whose praises are sung in the Scriptures. May her husband entrust his heart to her, so that, acknowledging her as his equal and his joint heir to the life of grace, he may show her due honor and cherish her always with the love that Christ has for his Church.

Oluwatomi, Desayo, God loves you, the church loves you, your families love you, all of us present at this holy Celebrating of the Mass love you. Abide in God’s love.