WEDDING HOMILY

LOVE AS HIGHEST VALUE   -  WEDDING HOMILY

In a sense every wedding is a royal wedding with the bride and groom as king and queen of Creation, making a new life together so that life can flow through them into the future.

William and Catherine, you have chosen to be married in the sight of a generous God who so loved the world that he gave himself to us in the person of Jesus Christ. In the Spirit of this generous God, husband and wife are to give themselves to each another.

The spiritual life grows as love finds its centre beyond ourselves. Faithful and committed relationships offer a door into the mystery of spiritual life in which we discover this: the more we give of self, the richer we become in soul; the more we go beyond ourselves in love, the more we become our true selves and our spiritual beauty is more fully revealed.

 You have both made your decision today – “I will” – and by making this new relationship, you have aligned yourselves with what we believe is the way in which life is spiritually evolving, and which will lead to a creative future for the human race.

We stand looking forward to a century which is full of promise and full of peril. Human beings are confronting the question of how to use wisely a power that has been given to us through the discoveries of the last century. We shall not be converted to the promise of the future by more knowledge, but rather by an increase of loving wisdom and reverence, for life, for the earth and for one another.

The more we discover about the mystery of life, the richer our theology, the more profound our worship. And as with the heart of the cosmos, so too with the cosmos of the heart. When Kate Middleton and Prince William married some months ago, how many viewers saw the magnificent moment transcending their individualities? Bishop Richard Chartres quoted St. Cath-erine of Siena when he encouraged the couple to “set the world on fire” with the intensity of their love. Something stirred in a million hearts at that moment of the famous “kiss” on the balcony of Buckingham Palace. Maybe something happened to all of creation too! Love is personal but also universal. We are finite beings with infinite capacities.

Moreover, the mystery holds whether that true love is expressed between two people in a lofty cathedral or the local cafe. Whether we believe it or not, Christian faith insists we have all been chosen and kissed by the God of all kings and queens; we have all been signed and sealed as princes and princesses from the beginning; someone fell in love with all of us before the stars were born.