“…marriage is an icon of the mystery between Christ and the Church…Christ’s teaching had little to do with keeping a set of marriage rules. Rather, we were meant to learn the purpose of the divine mystery of marriage.” (Dynamis, Father Barnabas Powell)
“The union of man and woman as husband and wife is sanctified and blessed with the gift of the Holy Spirit creating a new entity - "the Church in the home."...With love and harmony in the house, married couples become mini-Churches. It is a two-way street however, if the two are to become one person.” (Father Stanley Harakas, Fr. Joseph Irvin)
“It is of great significance if there is a person who truly prays in a family. Prayer attracts God’s Grace and all the members of the family feel it, even those whose hearts have grown cold. Pray always…God wants married people to be of one mind. By disobeying God’s commandment they create an atmosphere of hades in their homes.” (Elder Thaddeus of Vitovnica)
“If the glue is good, two pieces of wood glued together will cleave so fast to each other that they can be more easily broken in any other place than where they were joined. God glues the husband to the wife with His own blood...every marriage needs the miracle of God’s presence. It needs to invite him in so that He can introduce His reconciling grace into the material of two lives. That grace is not a buttress thrown up from the outside to hold up the walls of marriage when they are unable to stand by themselves. It is the “glue” which provides the conditions of personal responsibility, patience and understanding by which two persons adhere to each other in willing faithfulness…The practice of staying faithful to our partner is a profoundly spiritual one. The practice consists in remembering every day to treat the other as what we knew him or her to be right from the start, an unfathomable gift of love.” (Francis de Sales, G.R. Slater, Rev. Christopher H. Martin)
"Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last; but feelings come and go... But, of course, ceasing to be in love need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense love as distinct from being in love is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriage) the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God... Being in love first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise. It is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it." (C. S. Lewis)
“None of us is capable of loving our spouse with the perfect love of our Bridegroom. However, by God’s grace and faithfully looking to Jesus as the model spouse, we can intentionally enter into the process of holy, healthy self care through prayer, solitude, worship, learning, healthful eating, physical activity, appropriate rest and leisure, fellowship with others, and attending to any unhealthy habits or addictions we may have. Thus, we will become healthy, holy persons, who, by God’s grace and our cooperation, grow to love our spouses from a place of fullness.” (Presvytera Kerry Pappas, LMFT)
“There is something divine in true marriage. It is like a triangle: it takes three to get married—a man, a woman and God…It takes three to make love, not two: you, your spouse, and God. Without God people only succeed in bringing out the worst in one another. Lovers who have nothing else to do but love each other soon find there is nothing else. Without a central loyalty life is unfinished.” (G.R. Slater, Fulton J. Sheen)
“This love [eros] is deeply implanted within our inmost being. Unnoticed by us, it attracts the bodies of men and women to each other, because in the beginning woman came forth from man, and from man and woman other men and women proceed. Can you see now how close this union is, and how God providentially created it from a single nature?” (St. John Chrysostom)
“The presence of Christ gives a grace to marriage. By that I mean a plus, a blessing and a power beyond the ordinary. It is significant that the marriage of man and woman is the favorite image which the Bible uses for God’s relationship to His people.” (G.R. Slater)
“In marriage, then, we are transfigured. Loneliness and egocentricity are overcome and personality is completed and perfected.” (Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev)
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