Christ's Wedding Day

Good Friday.  The day we set aside once a year to commemorate the death of Our Lord for our sins and the opening of the gates of Heaven for our salvation. We remember God, who took on human nature and all of it's messiness in order to spend eternity with us, His beloved children, and His beloved bride, The Church.

What if we thought of Good Friday as a a wedding feast in conjunction with Christ's sacrificial love?  In his book, Jesus the Bridegroom: The Greatest Love Story Ever Told, Brant Pitre examines the actual event of the crucifixion in the light of historical Jewish wedding.  He places Christ as the Heavenly bridegroom and the Church as His eternal bride.

In an earlier post, I wrote about how Christ yearns to be intimate with us, emptying Himself into something so simple as bread and wine so that He can physically be within our very bodies.  In Mass tonight, the Homily focused on Christ's desire for us to know God - to be intimate with Him.  Not just to know about Him, but to really know Him as the most important thing in our lives. 

In Biblical terms, the phrase "to know" indicates a physical relationship, or an absolute knowledge of the other. The Hebrew word is "Yada."  John  W. Ritenbaugh in his study of the old testament Hebrew language wrote, 

"At times, the Bible uses "to know" as a euphemism for sexual intimacy. Paul is not saying here [in Philippians 3:8-10] that he desires sexual intimacy with Christ, but that he greatly desires spiritual intimacy with Him. He wants to be so close to Him that he experiences the same level of life as Jesus did—even to the point of suffering or dying as He died, if that is necessary to be made like Him in every possible way. He desires to glorify God in every aspect of his life just as Jesus did."

 In Joshua 23:14, Joshua gathers the people to tell them about their relationship with the Lord.  "Behold this day I am going into the way of all the earth, and you shall know with all your mind that of all the words which the Lord promised to perform for you, not one hath failed. " 

In Luke 1:34, Mary's eternal virginity is emphasized with her lack of previous intimacy and full knowledge with any man. "And Mary said to the angel: How shall this be done, because I know not man?"

Christ desires to be intimate with us.  To have absolute knowledge of us.  In John 17:3-4, He prays to the Father before His passion. "Now this is eternal life: that they know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom you have sent.  I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do."  

And what is more physical than Christ's passion and death for our salvation?  He is betrayed with a kiss from a close follower, and then goes through the most physically excruciating death imaginable for a person in the fist century.  He is covered in His own blood, the physical life of His body (and the spiritual life of ours), and drags a wooden beam through streets crowded with the jeering of the souls He is on His way to die to save.  His body is fastened and hoisted in the sky, where He physically must thrust Himself up to fill His lungs. 

All the while, He thinks of you.

And when the crowds yell at Him to come down from the cross and prove that He is God, He thinks of you.  "I can't come down from the cross.  I have to stay up here for (insert your name) because one day, even if it's over two thousand years in the future, they are going to need me.  And how can I teach them of the beauty of suffering if I give up now?"  

And then, "It is finished."  There is a spear thrust into His heart that is so full of overflowing love for our soul despite how much pain we have caused Him that blood and water flow from His side.

Brant Pitre points out the significance of this final physical aspect of Christ's death. "So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept he took out one of his side (Greek pleura) and closed up its place with the flesh; and the rib which the Lord had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to man....so too Jesus falls into the sleep of death, and blood and water flow from his side (Greek pleura) And just as the miraculous creation of the first bride from the side of Adam is the foundation of marriage of man and woman, so the miraculous flow of blood and water from the side of Jesus is the origin and foundation of the marriage of Christ and the Church."

So Christ pours out His very life on the altar of the Cross on Good Friday, that supposedly dark day that ushered in the redemption of our souls from a debt that we could never pay off.  And the Catholic Mass taps into the eternal sacrifice at Calvary.

 In The Faith of Millions, John A. O’Brien said, "The Mass is the renewal and perpetuation of the sacrifice of the cross in the sense that it offers [Jesus] anew to God . . . and thus commemorates the sacrifice of the cross, reenacts it symbolically and mystically, and applies the fruits of Christ’s death upon the cross to individual human souls. All the efficacy of the Mass is derived, therefore, from the sacrifice of Calvary."

What will your wedding gift to Christ be?  A Sunday morning hour when convenient for you? He sacrificed His entire life for you...are you willing to do the same for him? 

You're His "The One"

Tonight I was listening to a talk by Father Mike Schmitz about the beauty found in the sacrament of the Eucharist.  This post includes some of Father Mike's thoughts with a little bit of Chloe-isms sprinkled in. 

We're physical beings.  We have bodies that reside here on a physical earth, surronded by things that we interact with through taste, touch, smell and sound.  We connect with the tangible.  Although we have an eternal soul, we are able to experience the goodness God has provided for here on this earth with our bodies.

Including love.  And other people.  As someone whose love language is physical touch, I can so attest to this.  Body language speaks volumes.  There have been times that I have felt loved simply by someone taking the time to put their arms around me and give me a genuine hug.

Physical touch and contact with friends and family is easy to find.  It's there in a romantic relationship too.  But what about my relationship with God?  How does my love language translate into my relationship with the Divine? There have been countless times that I have turned to my girlfriends and said "If only Christ could wrap me in His arms and I could feel his warmth in a hug.  And if He wore cologne." That would be what they call the dream. 

Luckily, Christ knows the aching of my heart and has the answer (does He ever not?).  He yearns to pull us closer to His heart.  He doesn't want to just be acquainted with us.  Or be there when we need Him.  Or even be really close friends.  He wants to be intimate with us.


Father Mike tackled this subject of the physical desire, and said, "We shake hands with everyone.  There are a smaller number of people who we would hug.  Even a smaller number of people who we'd kiss.  A smaller number still who we'd kiss like that. And only in the sacrament of marriage are we called to give ourselves totally to another physically."

Christ doesn't just want to shake our hands, or give us a friendly nod as we pass Him in the hallways.  He doesn't just want to give us a hug when we feel bad, or a kiss when we need some lovin'.  No - Christ wants to give His entire self to us.  All of Him.  His whole body, and even His very blood.

But to those of us who have been walking around the Catholic block for quite a while, that amazing mystery seems common place.  Going to Church this Sunday to receive the very body of the creator of the universe? Sure, we'll take some of that.  We may or not be more excited for the doughnuts after Church though.

Yet day after day, we spend our lives yearning, aching for the one.  Not just someone, or a one, or anyone, but The One. We love love, and want someone to return the feeling.

Yet when we receive communion, every Mass becomes a wedding between you and the best lover in the history of forever.

A lover who knows me better than I know myself.  Who not only recognizes my hopes and dreams, but has plans to amplify them and sweep me off of my feet...and off the path defined by my will.  I think it's time I got to know that lover better.  He knows the count of hairs on my head...and sometimes I can count the number of times I've prayed this week on one hand.

In the Song of Songs, the story of a lover who desires the good of his beloved is woven throughout the language of a fantastic romance.  But at the core of this is the story of a God who is enamored with His beloved.  You're God's "The One."

Song of Songs 7:10 "I am my beloved’s, and his desire is for me."

He desires us...are we willing to make Him our one?