THE EUCHARIST: GIFT OF THE BRIDEGROOM

BY LINDA JI, DIRECTOR OF THE OFFICE FOR FAMILY LIFE AT THE DIOCESE OF ORANGE

DO YOU BELIEVE in the real presence of Christ in marriage?

To remind us of the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, the US Bishops launched a multi-year Eucharistic Revival effort. I propose that such a movement needs alongside it a revival also for the Sacrament of Marriage.

St. John Paul II called marriage the “primordial sacrament” in his Theology of the Body Wednesday audiences. Marriage is the original, “most ancient” sacrament belonging to creation itself, designed by God for all humanity from the beginning. As written in Genesis, humans are created in God’s image as male and female, with masculinity and femininity in our very bodies. Marriage of a man and woman is a fundamental human relationship that reflects our Creator: God who is a relationship of three loving persons in one God. In this male-female complementarity and union as a family, we reveal God who is love.

Sin and error have marred our behaving so, even our believing that this is who we are. Jesus Christ, the Son of God through whom all things are created, elevates marriage to a sacrament, redeems it and gifts it back to us with grace. Thus, through sacramental marriage, couples are called to be visible signs of that invisible grace of Christ’s love in the world through the whole of their union — their lives, minds, souls and bodies.

It feels challenging to live up to this call. I imagine that a sacrament of Christ’s love should look beautiful and elegant. My husband and my married life looks messy and fraught, and our parenting probably

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FEBRUARY 26, 2023

First Sunday Of Lent

Who We Are And Whose We Are

THE LENTEN SEASON IS a fresh invitation to explore again who God is, who we are, and what it means to be human. We begin by hearing the tragic story of the first humans in the book of Genesis. As Paul describes in Romans, our struggles started when our ancestors broke the bond of unity with God, sought self-sufficiency, and grew apart from their true purpose and identity. In Matthew’s Gospel, we see how Jesus resists the lure of living outside of unity with God. Jesus rejects false promises of possessions, power, and status. Instead, he puts his life in his Father’s hands. As our model for living as a fully human person, Jesus demonstrates that we are created to live in relationship with and trust in God, and in harmony with and for all of creation.

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Saint Profile

SAINT PORPHYRIUS

347-420

PORPHYRIUS WAS APPOINTED Bishop of the city of Gaza during a time when the region was hostile to Christianity and churches were only allowed to be built outside the city’s walls. The city had been the site of a number of martyrings in previous decades. Following several appeals to the emperor in Constantinople, soldiers were sent to enact the destruction of the pagan temples. On the site of the largest of these was constructed the Eudoxiana, a large church funded by the empress.

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