My Sister's Wedding Ceremony¶
I was incredibly honored and thrilled to perform the wedding of my sister Hannah today. Here's a rough transcript of what I said during the ceremony.
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We're gathered here today to celebrate the marriage of Hannah Marie Redding, and Juan Daniel Garza. We're gathered here as family and friends and loved ones to express our love for them, and our dreams and wishes and hopes for their future. I want to thank them for inviting us to be a part of this moment in their lives, and I want to thank you all for joining us in it.
When I was trying to prepare for this moment, I wanted to look back across history to see what other people felt was important to say, to express, to affirm, in moments like this.
And I was struck by a single idea: that over countless generations, people have come together in these kinds of ceremonies, in order to connect what they were feeling and sharing at that specific moment in time, with something bigger than they were.
And so, I want to try to connect what we're celebrating and sharing and experiencing here today, with something that is bigger than us all.
The Catholic writer GK Chesterton said that we like to say "God is love", because that sounds like a nice sentiment, but we don't like to say "God is trinity", because that sounds like religious dogma. The irony, as he expressed it, is that these are two different ways of saying exactly the same thing. And the reason we don't recognize this is because we've forgotten what love actually looks like.
For Chesterton, the trinity isn't simply an abstract statement about the nature of God—it's a model of the purest, and fullest, and most complete kind of love there is. And it's a model we're invited to embody in ourselves and in our relationships.
I think the nature of this relationship can be expressed in one simple phrase:
"All that I have is yours."
This phrase is found twice in the Gospels. The first time is in the story of the Prodigal Son, where the God character says it to his children. The moral of the story isn't simply that we may be forgiven and accepted, but that the one who forgives and accepts us is the one who says to us:
"You are always with me, and All that I have is yours."
The second time we see this phrase, it's in the mouth of Jesus himself. This may be the most audacious claim Jesus makes in all of scripture—when he turns to God, and says in essence:
"You are always with me, and All that I have is yours."
This is the picture of a relationship where each person is devoted to lifting up the other, without end, without limit. In this kind of relationship, one can say to the other:
"I want to see you reach all that you are, all that you may be, all that you can become. I want to see the full expression of your beauty, glory, strength, and power. I want to see you rise without limit, without end. And I want to dedicate myself to helping make that happen."
And the other can say in turn:
"I want to see you reach all that you are, all that you may be, all that you can become. I want to see the full expression of your beauty, glory, strength, and power. I want to see you rise without limit, without end. And I want to dedicate myself to helping make that happen."
In this kind of relationship, there is no subjugation, no subordination. In this kind of relationship, no identity is erased, no desire is dissolved, no will is broken. In this kind of relationship, each one is only ever lifting, and being lifted.
In this kind of relationship, there is no room for enabling or codependency. In this kind of relationship, there is no self-sacrifice that is not also a self-glorification. In this kind of relationship, there is only light, and no darkness at all.
We're told that in this kind of relationship—where each is seeking to help the other reach their unending and limitless potential—that the relationship itself becomes its own substance, its own dynamic, its own power. And this is the kind of power that can give life to the world, call new things into existence, create and cultivate life, and bind the world together.
This is the kind of relationship that constitutes the divine being, and it's the kind of relationship we're invited to model and embody in our own lives. And when we do so—when we participate in this kind of relationship, and this kind of love, then scripture boldly declares that we become participants in the divine nature, partakers of the divine life.
Of course, all of us only approximate this kind of love.
Because this kind of love is difficult. You can never fully devote yourself to lifting up another person, until you trust that they are devoted to lifting up you as well.
And so it's a process. A process of learning to trust the other person, to trust yourself, to become strong, as you become vulnerable. And so, step by step, a bit at a time, in growth, and discovery, and challenge, and change—we move ever closer to the vision of divine life.
And I think this is why generation after generation have held these kinds of ceremonies. To remind ourselves to step forward into this kind of relationship, this kind of reality, this kind of love.
And to invite the couple to connect their relationship with this vision, this aim, this goal—
The kind of relationship, and the kind of love, that makes up the substance of divinity itself.
Source: Facebook