Strong, practical love

When ET and I were on our honeymoon in Vancouver, we went to daily mass at a wonderful little Catholic church down the road. Over the course of the week, we got to know a wonderful older married couple, and we are still in touch via “snail mail” to this day. As we said good-bye on our last day in Vancouver, they gave us a wonderful gift: a plaque that’s meant to hang in a window, with the following prayer on it:

A Marriage Prayer

Lord, help us
to remember when
we first met and the strong
love that grew between us.
To work that love into practical
things so nothing can divide us.
We ask for words both
kind and loving, and for hearts
always ready to ask forgiveness
as well as to forgive.
Dear Lord, we put our marriage
in your hands.
Amen.

When I came downstairs this morning, bleary-eyed and wishing that baby Maria had decided to sleep just a little bit longer :), I saw that ET had stayed up late last night to tackle two enormous baskets of laundry. Now that’s what I call “working love into practical things” – thank you, ET! How nice it is to know that the dreaded task of folding that laundry has now been lifted from my shoulders!

I love this prayer because it gets right to the heart of what I think marriage is all about – finding ways to work our love into the practical realities of daily life so that they unite rather than divide us, asking for the grace to forgive and be forgiven, to speak words that are kind and loving, to place our marriage into Our Lord’s hands every day. I hope that this prayer will be a blessing to you today, too!