Marriage: Nurturing spirituality in everyday life

By Beverly Hartberg
ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, FAMILY MINISTRY, DIOCESE OF MADISON

	This article is part of a series of articles exploring various aspects of marriage. The series is intended to provide information for Catholic citizens as they vote November 7 on a state Marriage Referendum. The referendum would amend the state constitution to provide that only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized in Wisconsin.

The book, A Daring Promise: A Spirituality of Christian Marriage, describes the wonder, beauty, and possible depth of marital spirituality.

The author, Richard Gaillardetz, speaks of a marital spirituality that couples may not discover until a time when their marriage no longer flows smoothly, but becomes work - work that is exhausting and sometimes feels fruitless.

This may occur when couples grasp for something to hold onto, while they feel they are slipping away from the relationship they envisioned during their courtship or engagement. It may occur when life sends an unexpected challenge or obstacle the couple must face together.

Or, a need or sense of married spirituality may come to a couple when they feel they are only drifting in their life together and wonder, "Is this all there is to happily ever after?" - the life they had hoped to enter.

In ordinary events

Gaillardetz says a married spirituality should help couples discover their truest identity before God as they are being true to the spiritual discipline of faithful marital living. By living out their marriage vows, while being present to the call that God has for them as marriage partners, as parents, or as contributors to the work force and society, married couples recognize their spirituality in the ordinary events of their marriage.

Gaillardetz believes that an authentic marital spirituality flourishes best when it is drawn from a larger religious tradition, for the following reasons - a religious or faith tradition offers couples a language by which they can name the experience of God in their lives and explain to each other how they respond to that call, and a religious tradition gives couples a foundation of stories, rituals, and beliefs that give substance and shape to their spiritual life, as well as serves as a corrective influence to the human tendency to follow their own superficial wants and desires.

Alongside a strong faith tradition, it is in the "ordinary," everyday events of life that married couples discover and recognize their spirituality.

Developing spirituality

How does a married couple develop a married spirituality? How does a couple know if or when they have spirituality in their marriage?

The best measurement of marital spirituality is whether God is present in "between" in their relationship as husband and wife. A married couple's most telling experience of God occurs, not when they are focused on God in prayer or worship, but in their loving embrace of each other in their daily life.

Developing a marital spirituality leads to fostering a marital communion of mutuality, intimacy, and companionship.

Mutuality

Married couples may recognize and develop a sense of mutuality in which both spouses recognize and acknowledge the giftedness of the other. An exercise of mutuality suggests that couples share with each other all the ways in which they experience their partner as a true gift.

An ongoing expression of mutuality invites and encourages partners to affirm or compliment the giftedness of their spouse when their gifts are evident. The gift that each partner brings to the marriage or to the family can be celebrated and honored daily.

Intimacy

Guillardartz says marital intimacy is nurtured as a couple strives to go beyond a desire for closeness to a genuine vulnerability before each other. Such vulnerability of complete and open sharing requires that each partner have a sufficiently developed self-identity, so as not to become lost in the other.

When two unique selves freely and fully give themselves over in communion with the other, intimacy can become a powerful reality. Such a reality also calls partners to be open to the call to growth extended by their partner or due to life experiences.

Companionship

In loose translation, a companion is "one who shares bread." In marriage, companionship means couples are called to nourish one another. The "bread" of marriage may take the form of a caring listener or patient support when a spouse is dealing with a difficulty. Nourishment may be the invitation from a spouse to spend time as a couple or the arrangement to "feed" the marriage with special attention by going on a date.

Married partners are also called to be companions in reaching their eternal goal. The purpose of marriage is for each spouse to bring the other to God. In this way, marriage, surrounded by everyday responsibilities, challenges, and opportunities, is the spiritual playing field where partners work out their salvation as a team.

Spiritual qualities

Marriage magazine, which dedicated an entire issue to marriage spirituality, cited as the elements of married spirituality: spiritual bonding, spiritual intimacy, and spiritual closeness, expressed through acts or expressions of forgiveness, listening, gratitude, rituals for couples, compassion, silence, and prayer. One article noted the qualities of deeply spiritual partners and their effect on marriage, which included:*

being humble,
being compassionate,
experiencing the joy of being alive,
being hopeful,
knowing how to forgive,
not being totally dependent on one's partner,
developing discernment and being trusting,
being self-disciplined and accountable,
realizing life is a journey and seeing oneself in process,
knowing how to love,
not needing things to be happy, and
knowing how to celebrate.

Glue in marriage

Author Walt Wangerin directs married couples to image married spirituality as "this thing between us." Marriage spirituality has also been described as the glue that holds a marriage together, as the energy that gives a marriage life and being, as the umbrella under which a couple finds the meaning of their union, and as the spirit that carries the relationship.

Spirituality does not just occur in a marriage - but it can be found, it can be recognized, it can be developed, it can be nourished, it can be opened by married couples who recognize God in their midst, who see the beauty and face of God in their spouse, and who work to preserve their marriage by giving it intentional time and attention.

Married couples may well benefit from often and regularly recognizing and realizing just what "this thing between us" is, or might be, for them and their marriage.

Beverly Hartberg is the associate director of the Office of Family Ministry. Another resource she recommends is Marriage and the Spirituality of Intimacy by Leif Kehrwald.

*Reprinted from Marriage magazine, 955 Lake Drive, St. Paul, MN 55120.

Labor Day reflection:
Offering our work each day as prayer

	Guest commentary  Fr. Don Lange

In late 15th Century Germany, young Albert Durer agreed to work in the dangerous mines so that he could earn enough money to send his talented brother through art school. When Albrecht, his brother, finished art school, he would reciprocate by sending Albert through art school.

However, the four years that he worked in the mines were cruel to Albert. He broke every finger in his hands at least once. As a result his hands became so crippled by arthritis that his dream of becoming an artist died. Now he could not even hold a paintbrush.

Sacrificial love

In a Christ-like way Albert had given his life so that his brother could live his dream. To express his thanks for his brother's sacrificial love, in 1508 Albrecht sketched Albert's abused hands with palms together and fingers extended skyward.

Albrecht named his painting of love simply "Hands." The entire world almost immediately opened their hearts to this great masterpiece. But perhaps urged by the Holy Spirit, the people of the world re-baptized it with the name "Praying Hands."

The name is appropriate because especially through his hands, Albert offered his work as a daily prayer of love for his brother. Perhaps this is why a picture of "Praying Hands" is on our diocesan Web site under "Prayers."

Work as prayer

Since we are close to Labor Day, if we have not already done so, perhaps we can consider making our work a prayer. We can make our work a prayer by offering our best to Jesus at our job, at volunteer positions, at home, or wherever we work.

The book called The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence is kind of a classic on making our work a prayer. Brother Lawrence joined the Carmelite order and became a full member in 1642.

He fully expected to spend his days in prayer and meditation. Instead his superior assigned him to do the cooking and cleanup.

For 10 years he hated this work. But one day while working, he experienced an intense awareness of the presence of God. This grace enabled him to make his work a prayer.

In her book, Having a Mary heart in a Martha world, Joanna Weaver writes that after his conversion, Brother Lawrence decided to do everything well for the love of God. When he did this, he found his own kitchen service a joy and an avenue to a closer walk with God.

Brother Lawrence described work as prayer, "The time of business does not with me differ from the time of prayer. And in the noise and clatter of my kitchen, while several persons are calling for different things at the same time, I possess God in as great a tranquility as if I were on my knees at the Blessed Sacrament."

After his deeper conversion Brother Lawrence's working love made his washing dishes an act of worship. Joanna Weaver writes that when we joyfully offer our work as prayer, something wonderful happens. Sinks turn into sanctuaries, mops swab holy ground, and daily chores become opportunities to express our gratitude.

Add a little chocolate

In the book Love Adds a Little Chocolate, Linda Andersen writes, "Duty can pack an adequate sack lunch, but love may decide to enclose a little love note inside . . . Obligation sends the children to bed on time, but love tucks the corners in around their necks and passes out kisses and hugs (even to teenagers) . . . duty gets offended quickly if it is not appreciated but love learns to laugh a lot and to work for the sheer joy of doing it. Obligation can pour a glass of milk, but love quite often adds a little chocolate!"

I suggest that the above examples of love are ways that Jesus lived his life. Again and again he went beyond the call of duty and acted out of love. His work became his prayer of love not only in the carpenter shop, but also in his work of healing, preaching, and proclaiming the kingdom.

Let us pray for the grace to imitate him.

Fr. Don Lange is a pastor emeritus in the Diocese of Madison.

God's plan:
Truth that sets us free is true freedom

		A Culture  of Life  Christopher West

Imagine Adam's state of mind when he awoke to the sight of the first woman. The deepest desire of his heart is to give himself away in love to another person "like himself," and he has just finished naming billions of animals and found no one. So what does he say?

"At last, you are the one! You are bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh" (see Gn 2:23). That is, "At last, a person like myself that I can love."

'Capacity of expressing love'

How does Adam know that she's the one he can love? Remember that they were naked. It was their bodies that revealed the spiritual truth of their persons. In their nakedness they discovered what John Paul II calls the "nuptial meaning of the body," that is, "the [body's] capacity of expressing love: that love precisely in which the person becomes a gift and - by means of this gift fulfills the very meaning of his being and existence."

Adam looked at himself; he looked at Eve. He realized this profound reality: "We go together. God made us for each other. I can give myself to you, and you can give yourself to me, and we can live in a life-giving communion of love" - the image of God, marriage.

That was the sentiment of sexual desire as God created it and as they experienced it: to make a gift of themselves to each other in the image of God. This is why they were naked and felt no shame (see Gn 2:25). There's no shame in loving as God loves, only the experience of joy, peace, and a deep knowledge of human goodness.

Trust in God

God had told Adam that he was free to eat from any tree in the garden except the "tree of the knowledge of good and evil." If he did, he would die (see Gn 2:17). In the symbolism of biblical language, here we see God drawing a line that humanity is not free to cross. God alone knows what is best for us. As creatures, we must trust in God's providence and not seek to determine good and evil for ourselves. If we do, we will die.

Here's an analogy. Suppose you just purchased a new car and are pulling into the gas station to fill it up for the first time. The sticker by the gas tank reads "unleaded gas only."

Now, the person that designed the car knows it inside and out. He knows what's best for it. It would be foolish to say, "I don't care what the manufacturer says. I'm stickin' diesel in here." If you did so, you would have some major car troubles.

True freedom

Just as it is with the car, the only way our lives will "run" the way they're meant to run is if we live according to the Designer's plan. The sticker on the car isn't meant to limit our freedom but to facilitate our freedom in making good choices. It's the same with God's commands. They serve our freedom.

True freedom is not to do whatever I want. True freedom is to do whatever's good, whatever's in keeping with the truth of our humanity. As Jesus said, it's the truth that sets us free (see Jn 8:32).

Christopher West is a research fellow and faculty member of the Theology of the Body Institute in West Chester, Pa. His column is syndicated by www.OneMoreSoul.com and reprinted from his book Good News About Sex and Marriage: Honest Questions and Answers About Catholic Teaching (St. Anthony Messenger Press).