{"id":8896,"date":"2014-10-02T14:24:22","date_gmt":"2014-10-02T18:24:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/evetushnet\/?p=8896"},"modified":"2014-10-02T14:24:22","modified_gmt":"2014-10-02T18:24:22","slug":"wedding-crowns-and-solidarity-in-struggle-a-gay-and-catholic-book-extra","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/evetushnet\/2014\/10\/wedding-crowns-and-solidarity-in-struggle-a-gay-and-catholic-book-extra.html","title":{"rendered":"Wedding Crowns and Solidarity in Struggle: A “Gay and Catholic” Book Extra"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

I\u2019ve been to two Orthodox Christian weddings so far, and my favorite part of them is the crowns. Both bride and groom are crowned during the ceremony. As with the breaking of the glass in a Jewish wedding (probably also my favorite part, though the chair-bouncing which terrified my father at my sister\u2019s wedding may take first place there) I\u2019m guessing there are multiple meanings to this symbol, but the one I\u2019ve heard most often is that these are the crowns of martyrdom. They\u2019re meant to remind the couple (and the witnesses, their friends and families) that their marriage is being forged not for their own personal satisfaction but for sacrificial love. And the sacrifices you want<\/em> to make in your marriage may not be the sacrifices God wants from you<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Love Is Our Mission<\/em>, the new \u201cpreparatory catechesis\u201d on the family from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia which I reviewed here<\/a>, does an excellent job of highlighting this sacrificial character of marriage. I\u2019ve talked with people who say, \u201cBut straight people get to fulfill their desires, and you have to suppress yours,\u201d or, \u201cSo in the Eastern churches priests get to fulfill their desires but bishops don\u2019t?\u201d This is a misunderstanding of marriage, as my friend Matt Jones points out toward the end of this piece<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Good (good-enough!) marriages as I\u2019ve observed them are a means for the spouses\u2019 sanctification in large part because they require sacrificing one\u2019s own desires. They require not only forgiveness and repentance, constantly renewed, but accepting one\u2019s spouse completely, \u201cfor better and for worse, in sickness and in health.\u201d People change after marriage, and while sometimes you do need to leave for your own safety, the well-being of your children, and\/or the well-being or at least correction of your spouse\u2013I\u2019ve counseled and supported women leaving abusive marriages\u2013in less-drastic cases you pretty much do need to accept painful changes. And at one point or another I think many if not most spouses<\/a> are in this \u201cless-drastic case\u201d where you fantasize about divorce, or don\u2019t know how you\u2019ll put up with this if it keeps going. That\u2019s true of some of the best, most loving couples I know.<\/p>\n

I met privately with some people from an East Coast archdiocese and talked with them about many of the themes of my book. One thing they asked was basically, What are some things we\u2019re not talking about enough, which might help people see where the Church is coming from on gay issues? And I surprised myself by saying it would help immensely to talk more about the sacrifices the Church expects straight people to make, the difficulty of the sexual discipline required of them. The vocations in which they\u2019re called to pour out their love are also really, really tough. One reason I\u2019m grateful for my work at the pregnancy center is that it makes it impossible to forget just how hard Christian sexual discipline is for women who have sex with men\u2013and, you know, men who have sex with women. I see so many people making excruciating and humiliating choices to give their children life or to support the kids they fathered: choices which will lower their economic prospects, damage their reputation, create conflict with their own parents, etc. But they do it because they want to follow God.<\/p>\n

Being more honest about the sexual and vocational discipline required of straight people shouldn\u2019t become a pity party, or an excuse to tell gay people to shut up about our struggles. My point is not at all, \u201cWe need to suck it up and deal, straight people suffer too!\u201d What we need is solidarity without condescension. And solidarity without envy\u2013without, \u201cYou get everything and I get nothing!\u201d<\/p>\n

Instead we can seek to acknowledge one another\u2019s suffering and honor one another\u2019s sacrifice. The vocational paths are different but none of them lead around<\/em>\u00a0 what Spenser called the Gracious Valley of Humiliation; all of them are, sometimes, the Way of the Cross.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve been to two Orthodox Christian weddings so far, and my favorite part of them is the crowns. Both bride and groom are crowned during the ceremony. As with the breaking of the glass in a Jewish wedding (probably also my favorite part, though the chair-bouncing which terrified my father at my sister\u2019s wedding may […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1071,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,7],"tags":[1264,11,29,90,26,27],"class_list":["post-8896","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gay-catholic-whatnot","category-mackerel-snapping","tag-gay-catholic-whatnot","tag-his-banner-over-me-was-love","tag-marriage-2","tag-pregnancy-center","tag-suffering","tag-vocation"],"yoast_head":"\nWedding Crowns and Solidarity in Struggle: A "Gay and Catholic" Book Extra<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"I've been to two Orthodox Christian weddings so far, and my favorite part of them is the crowns. Both bride and groom are crowned during the ceremony. 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