News Item: : Marriage as an Apostolate
(Category: Torch of The Faith News)
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Wednesday 01 February 2017 - 11:05:25

The Witness of a Generation Formed in the True Faith

When I first became a Catholic in 1993, there were a number of strongly Catholic couples, of retirement age or thereabouts, that were very active in the parish qua married couples.

Having already brought up their families, these couples were very involved together in the spirituality of the parish: expressed through shared attendance at daily Mass and Rosary, weekly Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, Novena to Our Lady of Perpetual Help and Stations of the Cross; and also in the practical outreach that was going out from the parish, through traditional groups like the SVP society and the Legion of Mary.

I particularly remember these couples as ones that, whilst being very rooted in the necessities of everyday life, nevertheless clearly exuded love, commitment and even a certain sense of holiness. Indeed, it was through the very ordinariness of their daily lives that the gleams of sanctity showed.

Even in the case of one couple where the husband had sadly walked out and gone absent years earlier, his good wife faithfully kept up her side of the covenant; even going to an extra Mass every single Sunday, as well as the one she already went to with her grown-up children, in a self-sacrificial attempt to fulfill the missing husband's Sunday obligation for him. I'll never forget that lived testimony to real love and the indissolubility of true marriage.

It is worth reflecting that the majority of these couples had their formation in the faith as youngsters in the decades of the 1930's - 1940's. 

Many of these good folks died and went to their reward in the first decade of the new millennium. I sometimes shudder to think of what they would make of the present papacy and its impacts. They never would have believed it possible that things could ever sink to the level of the current attempted subversion of the True Faith.

Over the years, we have still encountered couples of the kind being described above, mainly in Traditionalist circles or in places like Steubenville or Pantasaph, but there do seem to be a lot less of them than there ever were before; and there are certainly less of them coming up ''through the ranks'' of the following generations.

Indeed, with even marriage itself becoming rare, we now know some priests whose parishes have not been blessed with the celebration of a single Nuptial Mass or wedding ceremony for several years. 

When one reflects on the present crisis in the Church, it becomes clear that far too many people, alas even among the ranks of the Sacred Hierarchy, have an understanding of marriage that is heavily influenced by post-modernity and pop-psychology. This leads them to view love and marriage primarily, if not solely, as some kind of guaranteed vehicle for easy-happiness and self-actualization.

Just taking a look at the approach taken by the Modernists in the whole divisive battle over Amoris Laetitia reveals an understanding of spousal love that has much more in common with consumerism, where one is encouraged to update to the ''latest model'' every few years, than with anything one finds in the natural and divine law.

When one contrasts their approach with the qualities of actual self-sacrificial love, especially those established and enabled by the grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ, it becomes clear that theirs is an immature, selfish and overly romanticised conception indeed. Worse than that, it is extremely sinful.

During these crazy times for the Church, it can often be refreshing to dip into the writings of some of the best Catholics like that great Irishman Frank Duff, the Servant of God and Founder of the Legion of Mary.

The Servant of God, and Founder of the Legion of Mary, Frank Duff (1889 - 1980).

What follows is an excerpt from his book The Spirit of the Legion of Mary. It has been chosen because I think it well highlights the genuine spirituality that so obviously set those above-mentioned Catholic couples apart: they truly lived their marriages as a shared apostolate.

Even the lady who had been cruelly abandoned continued to live in the midst of her sufferings in this apostolic manner. Indeed, she had perhaps the deepest grasp of the redemptive power of suffering, when it is borne in love with Christ, that I have yet encountered.

If we are all to overcome the present crisis, which we should more accurately call a heresy, then the spirituality of those couples is one we would all do well to recover and emulate.

Marrying for God by Frank Duff

Do people ever think of getting married for God? Is there any reality in the phrase ''Vocation of marriage'' so frequently heard? Or is that expression no more than lip-service? I fear so. For examine and you will find that quite a different set of ideas from true vocational ideals governs the general approach to marriage.

I do not suggest that people do not try to lead holy lives in matrimony. Of course they do. But so do the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker - and the Civil servant.

But that does not by itself constitute those trades vocations except in the conventional sense of the word.

Marriage is different.

It is a true vocation in every sense of the word, because it is a sacramental state - as is the priesthood itself.

Therefore, marriage is an immense thing, elevated as far above merely occupational states as Mount Everest is reared above ground level.

But vocations and sacraments for full efficacy require cooperation; and I fear that in regard to the great Sacrament of Matrimony this condition is not being sufficiently satisfied.

Its big moment is esteemed to be the wedding; after which there is little or no advertence to the fact of a sacramental condition.

If graces flow, it is rather because God freely gives them, than because of any effort to earn them. For in the everyday marriage the main factors are not faith, hope and charity, but pounds, shillings and pence; not holiness, but worldly pursuits; not God, but sheer self.

Doesn't this neatly encapsulate and express the whole crisis now facing the Church?

May the Holy Family - Pray for us!

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This news item is from Torch of The Faith
( http://www.torchofthefaith.com/news.php?extend.1540 )