ARCHDIOCESE OF PHILADELPHIA

Dear brother Priests,
Dear Deacons,
Dear Friends in Christ, especially you, dear Jubilarians of fifty years of Christian married life,

We celebrate this beautiful liturgy today at a very important moment of the Church’s year.

It was just last Thursday that we celebrated the feast of the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ into heaven. Jesus, after the completion of His mission on earth, returned to His Father in heaven. And next Sunday we will celebrate the feast of Pentecost and, therefore, we are preparing for the coming of the Holy Spirit.

Both of these events we celebrate within what we call the “Easter season.” We continue to celebrate the victory and triumph of the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Within this beautiful context of Easter, the Ascension and the coming feast of Pentecost, we celebrate another victory, another triumph—your wedding anniversaries, dear friends. Twenty-five, fifty and more years of Christian married life are a wonderful gift to celebrate with joy and thanksgiving.

Actually all the graces and blessings you received during these years, the victory of your love for each other and for your family are all part of the victory of Christ over sin and death. In other words, from Christ’s Death and Resurrection you have drawn grace and strength for your married life, for your love, your family, your mission.

The power of Jesus’ Resurrection has been infused into your hearts and lives—to enable you to love and support each other and to live according to Christ’s commandment of love.

This celebration of your anniversary is a very special time in your lives. But it is also special for the whole Archdiocese of Philadelphia and for the whole Church, because you are an important part of Christ’s Church.

This occasion is one of remembrance and thanksgiving. You look back to the beginning of your marriage to praise God, to thank Him for each other and—all of you who were blessed with children—to thank Him for your family.

In this context of looking back, I would like to share with you words that were often used in the marriage ceremony. You will remember some of the phrases and all of the sentiments expressed.
May I ask you to listen prayerfully, to savor those words of the Church that sealed your love and prepared you for the reality of Christian marriage in everyday ordinary life. On your wedding day the priest began with these or similar words:

“Dear friends in Christ: As you know, you are about to enter into a union which is most sacred and most serious. It is most sacred because it was established by God Himself. By it, He gave to man and woman a share in the greatest work of creation, the work of the continuation of the human race. And in this way He sanctified human love and enabled man and woman to help each other live as children of God, by sharing a common life under His fatherly care.

“Because God Himself is thus its author, marriage is of its very nature a holy institution, requiring of those who enter into it a complete and unreserved giving of self. But Christ our Lord added to the holiness of marriage an even deeper meaning and a higher beauty. He referred to the love of marriage to describe His own love for His Church, that is, for the people of God whom He redeemed by His own blood. And so He gave to Christians a new vision of what married life ought to be, a life of self-sacrificing love like His own. It is for this reason that His Apostle, St. Paul, clearly states that marriage is now and for all time to be considered a great mystery, intimately bound up with the supernatural union of Christ and the Church, which union is also to be its pattern.

“Your marriage is also then most serious, because it will bind you together for life in a relationship so close and so intimate, that it will profoundly influence your whole future. That future, with its hopes and disappointments, its successes and its failures, its pleasures and its pains, its joys and its sorrows, is hidden from your eyes. You know that these elements are mingled in every life, and are to be expected in your own. And so, not knowing what is before you, you take each other for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death.

“Truly, then, these words are most serious. It is a beautiful tribute to your undoubted faith in each other, that, recognizing their full import, you are nevertheless so willing and ready to pronounce them. And because these words involve such solemn obligations, it is most fitting that you rest the security of your wedded life upon the great principle of self-sacrifice. And so you begin your married life by the voluntary and complete surrender of your individual lives, in the interest of that deeper and wider life which you are to have in common. Henceforth you belong entirely to each other; you will be one in mind, one in heart, and one if affections. And whatever sacrifices you may hereafter be required to make to preserve this common life, always make them generously. Sacrifice is usually difficult and irksome. Only love can make it easy; and perfect love can make it a joy. We are willing to give in proportion as we love. And when love is perfect, the sacrifice is complete. God so loved the world that He gave His Only begotten Son; and the Son so loved us that He gave Himself for our salvation. ‘Greater love than this no man has, that a man lay down his life for his friends.’

“No greater blessing can come to your married life than pure conjugal love, loyal and true to the end. May, then, this love with which you join your hands and hearts today, never fail, but grow deeper and stronger as the years go on. And if true love and the unselfish spirit of perfect sacrifice guide your every action, you can expect the greatest measure of earthly happiness that may be allotted to man in this vale of tears. The rest is in the hands of God. Nor will God we wanting to your needs; He will pledge you the life-long support of His graces in the Holy Sacrament which you are now going to receive.”

With these words, dear friends, you joined your hands and hearts, with trust in God and each other. And the years have passed.

But this anniversary, this remembrance, is the occasion for great thanksgiving to God. And this you do by participating in the Sacrifice of the Mass which makes present in your lives the victory of Jesus Christ. It brings into your hearts the grace and power of Christ’s Resurrection.

Even as you thank God for the great gift of each other and for the wonderful blessing of your love, you realize that you have lived this reality of love in the context of human limitations and challenges. And so, today, in your great act of thanksgiving to God, your celebration invites you to personal renewal and ever greater generosity and self-giving.

Those of you who have children are joined by them as you renew your joy and your love!

And those of you who may not have children still possess the great gift of each other and your lifelong love.

Today, in your anniversary celebration, the Church assures all of you once again that through the Sacrament of Marriage your love has been elevated even beyond its natural goodness, to be a sign of Christ’s love for His Church. And, once again, the generosity of Christ, His sacrifice, His self-giving is held out to all of you, dear friends, as the ever relevant pattern of your love for each other and for your families.

May, then, this day of remembrance, thanksgiving and renewal fill your hearts and lives with the peace of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Amen.