Marriage Assignment

1) The CCC says, “The sacrament of Matrimony signifies the union of Christ and the
Church. It gives spouses the grace to love each other with the love with which Christ has
loved his Church” (CCC 1661). The union a marriage creates between a man and a
woman foreshadows the eternal union between God and His people. Earthy marriage
points us to Heaven and the divine love of Christ.
2) The CCC says, “God himself is the author of marriage. The vocation to marriage is
written in the very nature of man and woman as they came from the hand of the Creator”
(CCC 1603). The trinity made humanity in their image. Just as male and female are
united through matrimony, the trinity wants to be united with us for eternity in Heaven.
3) Jason Evert says the process of preparing our hearts for marriage begins at birth. We
were created for greatness, for love, and for Heaven. In Matrimony, the more we love
that person, the more we desire for them to get to Heaven. In Marriage, both people
strive to make themselves better for each other and they walk with the Lord together.
4) God’s spirituality and desire for a relationship with us is foreshadowed in our bodies as
Male and Female. As Christopher West said, the first Marriage took place in Genesis
between Adam and Eve. This marriage is a symbol of the fulfillment of the eternal
marriage between Humanity and God. Just as Hosea was called to marry a prostitute,
God, out of His love for us, desires to unite Himself with us even in our sinful,
disobedient state.
5) A married couple is called to share in the Priestly office of Jesus Christ. We are called to
offer everything that we have and are as a sacrifice to the Lord.
6) “It is therefore fitting that the spouses should seal their consent to give themselves to
each other through the offering of their own lives by uniting it to the offering of Christ for
his Church made present in the Eucharistic sacrifice, and by receiving the Eucharist so
that, communicating in the same Body and the same Blood of Christ, they may form but
"one body" in Christ” (CCC 1621). Out of love, the couple unites and offers themselves
to Christ in Matrimony. Christ through His paschal Mystery offers His Body and Blood for
us in the Eucharist as well.
7) Obligating Dimension: “Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and
gave himself up for her, that he might sanctify her," adding at once: "'For this reason a
man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall
become one” (CCC 1616). Commemorative Dimension: “It is therefore fitting that the
spouses should seal their consent to give themselves to each other through the offering
of their own lives by uniting it to the offering of Christ for his Church made present in the
Eucharistic sacrifice” (CCC 1621). Demonstrative Dimension: “In the Sacrament of
Matrimony, the couple becomes one flesh before God. “This grace proper to the
sacrament of Matrimony is intended to perfect the couple's love and to strengthen their
indissoluble unity. By this grace they "help one another to attain holiness in their married
life and in welcoming and educating their children” (CCC 1641). Eschatological
Dimension: “Christ dwells with them, gives them the strength to take up their crosses
and so follow him, to rise again after they have fallen, to forgive one another, to bear one
another's burdens, to "be subject to one another out of reverence for Christ” (CCC
 1642). The spouses serve one another out of love for each other and out of obedience
and love for God who will judge us at the end of our lives. We do His Will of love on
Earth knowing we will meet Him in the end.
8)
Outward Sign: “Marriage is Instituted by Christ: “The Graces received: “It gives
based on the consent of marriage covenant, by spouses the grace to love
the contracting parties, that which a man and a woman each other with the love
is, on their will to give form with each other an with which Christ has loved
themselves, each to the intimate communion of life his Church; the grace of
other, mutually and and love, has been the sacrament thus
definitively, in order to live founded and endowed with perfects the human love of
a covenant of faithful and its own special laws by the the spouses, strengthens
fruitful love” (CCC 1662). Creator…Christ the Lord their indissoluble unity, and
raised marriage between sanctifies them on the way
the baptized to the dignity to eternal life” (CCC 1661).
of a sacrament” (CCC
1660). “The Church
attaches great importance
to Jesus' presence at the
wedding at Cana. She
sees in it the confirmation
of the goodness of
marriage and the
proclamation that
thenceforth marriage will
be an efficacious sign of
Christ's presence” (CCC
1613).