You can find the readings here

Brief synopsis of the readings: The first reading is probably familiar to most Christians and Jews. God created the whole world and as his crowning achievement created Adam. But God recognizes that “it is not good that the man should be alone. I will make him a helpmate.” God then creates Eve and determines that “a man leaves his father and mother and joins himself to his wife, and they become one body.” Mark’s Gospel recounts a passage that troubles many modern Christians. Some Pharisees ask Jesus if it is permissible for a man to divorce his wife. Jesus criticizes them and tells them that once a couple marries under God, they may not be divided. Jesus tells his disciples that any man who divorces his wife (and remarries) is guilty of adultery; any woman who divorces her husband and marries another is also guilty of adultery. Later, people brought their children to Jesus for a blessing. Jesus encouraged this because “it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs. I tell you solemnly, anyone who does not welcome the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”

Can I be the one who says this? All over the Catholic world this weekend millions of married couples will hear a celibate, male, (often elderly) priest extoll the joys of marriage. That’s ironic enough but a certain percentage of these priests will claim the moral authority to determine who can be married and who cannot.

I’ll encourage you to sit with this irony for a few minutes before we continue.

I have to confess a certain unfair advantage here and I do it with appropriate humility. For those of you who don’t know, I was a Catholic priest from 1994 to 1997. I met someone who fulfilled me, and after an exhausting year of prayer, discernment, and gratitude I left the priesthood and got married. When I’m on my deathbed I will still look on this decision as the smartest thing I’ve ever done.

That said I must confess a wry amusement when I see these readings. I well remember all the free advice I gave to engaged and married couples about marriage. The universe is still laughing about the fact that when I got married I had to suddenly follow all the advice I slung around for free.

I learned that my advice was good, but I had no idea what I was talking about. I don’t know if I stumbled into this wisdom by accident or through the hasty guidance of the Holy Spirit but I’m grateful for it.

Both readings speak to the partnership between couples who have found each other and choose to bond themselves. This has become a political issue for our nation. Most of us read the passage from Genesis with an eye toward the fact that as humans we aren’t complete when we’re alone. Earlier passages speak of God creating all sorts of things and saying “and it was good.” The first thing he states is not good is loneliness: It is not good that man should be alone.

This is important. If we read this passage as its written, it shows that God came to an understanding that we need each other only after creating Adam. We can make an argument that Adam realized that he was incomplete only after he was created and put on this earth. His loneliness surprised God.

However it happened, God and Adam recognized that Adam needed companionship, and Adam needed Eve. The creation of Eve has been both the best and the worst thing that we read in the Bible.

It’s the best thing in terms that it recognized that we are paired and partnered by design. It’s the best thing that it recognized we aren’t solitary creations who come together only for procreation.

But it’s the worst thing in the way we have interpreted the Gospel reading. Here Jesus appears to say that marriage is permanent, no matter what. Because of this the church does not recognize divorce (no matter the circumstances) and anyone who divorces and remarries must do so outside of the church, which excludes them from receiving Communion. Is this what Jesus had in mind when he spoke these words?

I don’t think so. Catholics of the last century were often told to stay together even if their marriages devolved into facades or battlefields. They were erroneously told that the mere act of divorce (even without remarriage) caused them to be excommunicated. Annulments were possible, though out of the reach of most of the faithful.

Catholics of my generation often made the painful, if necessary, decision to leave theses marriages and went on with their lives. Some felt it was their lot to live the rest of their lives alone (in clear opposition to the passage from Genesis), trading happiness and joy for Communion. Others continued to receive Communion and lived in fear that their soul was in peril.

And so I’ll ask it again: is this what Jesus had in mind?

What if it’s not? There was raging debate among Pharisees of the time about whether or not a man could divorce his wife. Some felt that divorce was reasonable only if a man’s wife was unfaithful. Others believed a man could divorce his wife for any reason. The Pharisees were attempting to trap Jesus, making him choose one side or the other, and hoping he would get sucked into the controversy.

Whenever the pharisees try this, Jesus refuses to take the bait. Given this, Jesus changed the discussion from “which side are you on” to a discussion of justice and righteousness. In the time of Jesus, women had a hard time being on their own. For most of their lives they were dependent, first on their fathers, then their husband, and if they were widowed, their sons.

Jesus was making the point that if a man divorces his wife (for whatever reason) he was leaving her with few options. The imagination does not stretch to believe that a woman who has been abandoned marries someone else not for love or companionship but for survival. I think Jesus was saying to the pharisees that if the man has the power he has the responsibility to fulfill his obligations.

I think Jesus was angry that the pharisees were politicizing a relationship that went back to the very heart of who we are as children of God. If we are called to be with each other in intimate, permanent, and exclusive relationships, the pharisees are cheapening it by attempting to back Jesus into a corner.

And so how do we, over 2,000 years after Jesus, find the sacred in marriage? I think we do that by continuing to value marriage. The idea of being “happily married” is universally seen as a good thing. I know it is for Nancy and me.

But we do nothing to value marriage by coercing or bullying people to stay in violent, abusive, or destructive marriages. We need to recognize that a marriage isn’t sacramental because it was in a church. A marriage is sacramental when it leads both partners (whatever their faith, race, or orientation) to be better persons, to reflect in each other the love God has for us.

We honor the readings from Genesis and Mark when we honor the fact that marriage gives us our best opportunity to find the infinite love that God has for all of us.