will I be faithful?

Homily

Wedding of Paul Feighner and Laila Carter

26 February 2022

Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Kansas City, MO

AMDG

Will I be faithful?

The fate of the world depends on this question.  So history will turn on your answer today, Paul and Laila.  It's not my aim to scare you, nor to drench your wedding in hyperbole.  Yet woe to me if I hide the truth that your answer means everything.

Weddings mean everything.  You don't have to take just my word for it.  Mary told Jesus to get involved at Cana.  Did he ever, making 180 gallons of the best wine!  Why?  Cause this moment matters!

It's your turn, Paul and Laila, to bet it all and to answer the question on which the world turns - will I be faithful?

In the cross of Jesus Christ God has answered for his part.  It's there that Jesus reveals fully what marriage really is.  I give you everything I am, no matter what, even unto death.  Jesus plays for keeps, holding nothing back.  It's here for all to see and to truth.  You get married before this sign, Paul and Laila.  By coming here, you confess you are playing for keeps.  Nothing could matter more.

Praise God for you two, that you have the capacity mediated through the faith of your family and friends, to receive this question from God in the call to marriage, and even more, to answer it!  I can't wait to receive your answer.  I need it to believe.  So does everyone here, to a person.  What is more, the world desperately needs your answer now, more than ever.

Again, I'm not trying to frighten you.  Yet neither should we hide from the grace gifted to you in marriage, which is about to transform you through your vows into a new reality, no longer two but one flesh.  Let's not run from this moment, for your yes is nothing less than a participation in the answer of Jesus that makes all things new from the inside out.  There couldn't possibly be anything more intimate, or more powerful, than your answer to the question which you join to His answer - will I be faithful?

The horrific evil in the streets of Kiyv today is born from unfaithfulness.  Evil appears when people are scared, not knowing who will be faithful to them.  It turns us into monsters, capable of the worse divorces, of taking life rather than giving it.

In promising faithfulness to each other, Paul and Laila, you create new life!  Your answer allows God to renew and heal this world through you.  I praise God for you, that you have the call and capacity to dare an answer that is so needed.

What I know is that nothing could matter more.

Now is your time to answer - will I be faithful?