This morning, I listened to one of the best straight forward wedding
sermons I have ever heard. The bishop of London, Richard Chartres did the
sermon splendidly for the 2011 most celebrated royal couple, the Duke and
Duchess of Cambridge: William Arthur Philip Louis and Catherine Elizabeth. The
wedding is truly a sharing of the Gospel to the whole world with presumably the largest audience ever.
‘Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.’ So said St Catherine of Siena whose festival
day it is today. Marriage is intended to be a way in which man and woman help
each other to become what God meant each one to be, their deepest and truest
selves.
Many are
full of fear for the future of the prospects of our world but the message of
the celebrations in this country and far beyond its shores is the right one –
this is a joyful day! It is good that people in every continent are able to
share in these celebrations because this is, as every wedding day should be, a
day of hope.
In a sense
every wedding is a royal wedding with the bride and the groom as king and queen
of creation, making a new life together so that life can flow through them into
the future.
William and
Catherine, you have chosen to be married in the sight of a generous God who so
loved the world that he gave himself to us in the person of Jesus Christ.
And in the
Spirit of this generous God, husband and wife are to give themselves to each
another.
A spiritual
life grows as love finds its centre beyond ourselves. Faithful and committed
relationships offer a door into the mystery of spiritual life in which we
discover this; the more we give of self, the richer we become in soul; the more
we go beyond ourselves in love, the more we become our true selves and our
spiritual beauty is more fully revealed. In marriage we are seeking to bring
one another into fuller life.
It is of
course very hard to wean ourselves away from self-centredness. And people can
dream of doing such a thing but the hope should be fulfilled it is necessary a
solemn decision that, whatever the difficulties, we are committed to the way of
generous love.
You have both
made your decision today – ‘I will’ – and by making this new relationship, you
have aligned yourselves with what we believe is the way in which life is
spiritually evolving, and which will lead to a creative future for the human
race.
We stand
looking forward to a century which is full of promise and full of peril. Human
beings are confronting the question of how to use wisely a power that has been
given to us through the discoveries of the last century. We shall not be
converted to the promise of the future by more knowledge, but rather by an
increase of loving wisdom and reverence, for life, for the earth and for one
another.
Marriage
should transform, as husband and wife make one another their work of art. It is
possible to transform as long as we do not harbour ambitions to reform our
partner. There must be no coercion if the Spirit is to flow; each must give the
other space and freedom. Chaucer, the London poet, sums it up in a pithy
phrase:
‘Whan maistrie [mastery] comth, the God of Love anon, Beteth his
wynges, and farewell, he is gon.’
As the
reality of God has faded from so many lives in the West, there has been a
corresponding inflation of expectations that personal relations alone will
supply meaning and happiness in life. This is to load our partner with too
great a burden. We are all incomplete: we all need the love which is secure,
rather than oppressive, we need mutual forgiveness, to thrive.
As we move
towards our partner in love, following the example of Jesus Christ, the Holy
Spirit is quickened within us and can increasingly fill our lives with light.
This leads to a family life which offers the best conditions in which the next
generation can practise and exchange those gifts which can overcome fear and
division and incubate the coming world of the Spirit, whose fruits are love and
joy and peace.
I pray that
all of us present and the many millions watching this ceremony and sharing in
your joy today, will do everything in our power to support and uphold you in
your new life. And I pray that God will bless you in the way of life that you
have chosen, that way which is expressed in the prayer that you have composed
together in preparation for this day:
God our
Father, we thank you for our families; for the love that we share and for the
joy of our marriage.
In the
busyness of each day keep our eyes fixed on what is real and important in life
and help us to be generous with our time and love and energy.
Strengthened
by our union help us to serve and comfort those who suffer. We ask this in the
Spirit of Jesus Christ. Amen.
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