A Note From the Pastor: August 17, 2025

As you likely know, I am presenting a seven-part series on marriage (Beloved). So far, we’ve discussed how the salvation story of God and His people can be properly understood as a love story.

We’ve been reminded of how the Bible begins talking about marriage (Gen 2:24), it ends speaking of marriage (Rev 21:2), and marital and wedding imagery is woven throughout in between. Marriage is clearly something God and the biblical authors considered important, and so it should come as little surprise that the Catholic Church therefore considers it important.

Further, when we consider that Jesus’ first miracle occurred at a wedding (John 2:1-12), and even more importantly, that Jesus’ sacrifice on Calvary is understood to be the moment in which he (the bridegroom) offered his life for humanity (his bride), we come to see the Mass as our participation in the Wedding Feast: “Let us rejoice and be glad and give him glory. For the wedding day of the Lamb has come, his bride has made herself ready” (Rev 19:7).

With all this in mind, as you know, the Church regards marriage as a sacrament, meaning that a wedding is more than just a beautiful ritual, a tradition, a gathering of family and friends with their good wishes and hopes. As a sacrament, it is a moment in which God decisively acts and does something. As I like to say: as different as the bread and wine are from the Body and Blood that we receive from the altar, equally different is the couple who entered the church at the start of the wedding, from what they are when they leave at the end.

In conferring the sacrament to one another, they unite themselves to one another and to God. Their offering themselves to one another opens a flood of grace that is intended to fill their hearts. I think of it as something like the amber that naturally emerges from a tree, and which envelopes, protects and preserves the delicate organisms that are held within. That’s the grace God intends for the couple.

This all sounds beautiful and perhaps idyllic, but our experience of it is anything but easy or simple. Living marriage comes with great complexities, but also there is a lot of confusion about it. In upcoming letters, I intend to attempt to address (and hopefully, clarify) some of the teachings on marriage, such as divorce, cohabitation, same-sex marriage, remarriage, etc.

Again, in speaking with people, I often find that that there is misunderstanding about what the Church teaches, why it holds that belief, but also misunderstanding about ways forward for those who experience the difficulties associated with marriage. More to come. In the meantime, let us pray for this God-given gift: the institution of marriage.

Yours in Christ,

Father Todd O. Strange