Take me out.
Out of my skin;
Out of my body;
Out of my mind.
Let me beg,
Beg for you,
Beg for more,
Make me beg.
What you want,
That I want.
What I need,
That you know;
And that you give.
To hold and to love,
That I do not know;
That you do not promise.
Not just at the moment.
If the goal of your relationship is to culminate at the altar, before a priest in a suit or wedding gown, then at the altar it will end, because when it goes beyond the altar, the result will be 2 divergent individuals who are unequally yoked by virtue of an institution.
An ideal relationship should array you for a life ahead, not a day's ceremony at the altar or before a magistrate.
A wedding ceremony is the formal declaration of a union between a man and woman, to the public.
Marriage is the life that follows after the ceremony.
Young couples ought to understand that the ceremony is for the public and everybody else, but marriage is the exclusive reserve for the couple.
You should not get burned out, or expend all your physical, mental or financial resources, planning for just a day, while the life that follows, is left in abeyance to chance or "hope in God".
The Marriage is greater than the wedding and we know that the lesser is included in the greater.
Marriage occurs when 2 willing & able individuals pledge allegiance/commitment, one to another, and saddle themselves with the responsibilities therein.
This is not that pledge made before the priest or magistrate, no! This one is made of one's will & accord, adjudged by his conscience.
What the majority of people fail to comprehend is; a person might seem meet to walk down the aisle with, but do they measure up to walk the crossroads of life with you, would they still be standing by your side when the unprecedented storms of life surges and burgeons against you? It's nice for one to carry you down the aisle to the altar due to the euphoria of the ceremony, but beyond that day, would they still be a shoulder to lean when you're weak or weary
If in all sincerity, you cannot answer these questions in the affirmative, then you ought to recede and redefine your priorities as it pertains to that relationship which you know is leading somewhere.
It's more profitable to plan for a life ahead than to plan for a day's ceremony
Awesome, MD
Obasi Enyinna Samuel
I attended a workshop at Catholic Church of the Presentation about a month ago on FORGIVENESS AND RECONCILIATION IN MARRIAGE. The target participants were married couples but singles were also invited. It was precisely on the 3rd of December 2016. Being an aspiring husband, I went out of curiosity. I wanted to hear from married couples what the experience is like. I already learnt a lot about forgiveness and reconciliation from the classes at the Opus Dei centre.
The first speaker was a priest who was also religious. He rolled out well prepared sermons on forgiveness and he got a well deserved round of appluase. Then came the part of the workshop I was interested in, the troubleshooting session. Some elderly daddys and mummys and other members of the MARRIAGE AND FAMILY LIFE UNIT of the parish were called up to special seats facing the congregation. They were going to answer the questions that would be asked. I will eventually talk about this session. After the troubleshooting, a lady was called up to lead us through an exercise on forgiveness. We were all to become more forgiving after going through a workbook called The Path to REACH Forgiveness in about 2 hours.
Surely there were testimonies and lots of lessons were learnt but what struck me markedly were the nature of the majority of the questions that were asked during the troubleshooting session. What I realised was that humanity had not changed even after 2000 years of Christ being around with us. People still asked the same questions that Peter asked Jesus albeit in different ways: "Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" I noticed that we all just want to know when to say ENOUGH IS ENOUGH. We want to know when to call it QUITS. Deep down, we feel there MUST be a point it will get to and we would then be justified in denying the other party the forgiveness we owe them.
Take a look at some of the questions:
(1) How do you keep forgiving a husband who cheats on you with every slightest opportunity he gets, who brings women into your matrimonial bed when you're not around?
(2) Is it right to continue in a relationship where your partner has this bad habit that you can't cope with, but he keeps begging me to give him another chance, yet the same thing keeps happening?
(3) How do you put up with a woman who keeps challenging your authority as a man?
(4) What do you do when you actually get tired of forgiving?
My reaction to this problem is to put forward two suggestions which are actually two successive rungs of the same ladder. The ladder I'm talking about here is called Christian Charity. Charity demands that we love as Christ loves, that we consider first the needs of our neighbour over and above our own. This is precisely how our Lord answered Peter, He told him the parable of the Unforgiving Servant. So the first rung of this ladder is FORGIVE AS LONG AS YOUR NEIGHBOUR NEEDS IT. Just keep forgiving. God readily forgives even when our sorrow is imperfect, so we who are Christians should readily forgives those who wrong us.
Yes we are humans, nearly everything about us is finite. Our capacity to forgive repeatedly ought to get exhausted if not for God's grace that makes it infinite. For the non Christian, it does get to a point where enough is enough, but for the Christian something different ought to happen at that point. The Christian should realise that perhaps my serial offender can no longer help himself. My offender has become a slave, has become addicted, has developed bad habits which have greatly compromised his self control and his willpower. My serial offender needs my help, may need some form of rehabilitation, definitely needs MORE THAN JUST FORGIVENESS.
Many of us know persons who are slaves of Bacchus, slaves of Venus, whose lives have been ruined by substance abuse. These conditions have been studied medically to great extents. We know that it's not enough to pardon such a person for getting drunk and misbehaving, for cheating on us, for getting high on 'pot' and missing a million dollar job interview. We know we have to help them seek THERAPY if we really LOVE them. Regarding a brother who sings against you, this is what Jesus said, "...go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother..." then you can also offer to help him out of the bad habit.
Another issue usually arises when, "yes I have gone beyond just forgiving my serial offender, I have started helping him out of his sinful habits and I have done this for donkey years (God will bear me witness). Haven't I done ENOUGH?" I don't have an answer to this, but St. Josemaria Escriva does. When he talked about Fortitude to his daughters and sons, he told them never to give up on those friends of theirs "because we realize that we can go as far as the gates of hell (in our efforts to help them), but no further, since beyond them it is impossible to love God. This is the way to fulfil Jesus' words, "By your patience you shall gain possession of your souls."". A word of advice from St. Augustine also comes handy "if you say enough, you're finished".
MORE THAN JUST FORGIVENESS...
Asogwa K.C.