Love and marriage

Just yesterday, I chatted with two friends in the course of my day and one asked me whether I wanted to get married while the other asked if I had met that special someone yet?

I have to admit that the concept of marriage has popped up in my consciousness a fair bit recently and I have been reflecting on what it means in my current state of singlehood.

Coincidentally, I had spent the morning watching Christopher West’s Created and Redeemed on Living the “Great Mystery” of Marriage.

Watching the DVD helped me understand the longings of my heart for each of us is created for marriage, to be in union with "Christ the Bridegroom", who out of deep love wants to "‘impregnate’ us with divine life.”

Can I, as a single, live out marriage vows and experience Christ’s love as “free, total, faithful and fruitful”?

Having received the complete gift of Christ’s love, who laid down His life for me of His own volition so that I can live life to the fullest, I am learning to reciprocate that love and in turn, love Him in a manner that is “free, total, faithful and fruitful”, which, incidentally, is what couples pledge each other in the sacramental vows of marriage on their wedding day.

While I lack the physical presence of a husband, and at times wish that I had someone to cuddle just before I fall asleep, I can honestly say that I do not want for much at this point in my life. Even the occasional jagged edge of loneliness is smoothed over by spending time with Jesus.

Abraham Maslow found that humans have an instinctual need to make the most of their unique abilities, to self-actualize and be the best they can be once they had satisfied all their physiological needs.

Viktor Frankl took the concept of self-actualization one step further and posited that self-actualization is merely a side effect of self-transcendence, for our search for meaning in life takes us outside ourselves and our psyches into the world.

Falling in love (when self-transcendence becomes an actuality) with Jesus has led me to seek beyond my own needs and wants. And being faithful to Him means being faithful to His vision of life here on earth: to love others as He has loved and continues to love me -with a love that is unconditional, tender, compassionate and boundless.

Secure in His embrace, I am content, at peace with myself and brimming with inner joy. For what matters most in my life is His happiness and in seeking to please Him as a bride pleases her bridegroom, and vice versa.

Ain't love grand?