Weekly HOMILY for April 29, 2007: Marriage: Created and Creating As God

Marriage of Greg and Emily Herwig
College of Notre Dame
(B-1, D-4, and F-5)
April 28, 2007

Marriage: Created and Creating As God
By (Rev. Msgr.) Nicholas P. Amato



Note: Since this was Deacon Preaching Sunday, Father Nick did not preach at his Masses. The following is a wedding homily he gave on Saturday at the wedding of Greg and Emily Herwig at the chapel of the College of Notre Dame in Baltimore City.


The Gilgamesh Epic

Biblical scholars tell us that at a certain time in history the Jewish People began to ask themselves, “How did we come to be? How were we created?”

In trying to find an answer to that question, two things were foremost in their minds: (1) How good God had been to them in creating them and (2) How God had chosen them from among all other people to be his very own.

God’s goodness and God’s choosing them – those two ideas filled their minds and hearts.

In trying to answer how it was that God created them, they looked around at the pagan religions of their neighbors and found an old Sumerian story called the Gilgamesh Epic.

The Gilgamesh Epic spoke of a cool and luxurious garden in which God had created a man and a woman from the earth.

Using this story as a base, they embellished it and it became the wonderful story of the creation of Adam and Eve that we find in the Book of Genesis.


God’s Creating

This scriptural background helps us understand better the first reading from Genesis that Greg and Emily have chosen for their marriage.

How beautifully it expresses God’s goodness – their sense of being blessed.

The passage tells us that God was primarily interested in creating something like himself and then empowering that creation with similar attributes.

We read that after God accomplishes this act of creation, he sits back and the writer of Genesis says, “God saw all he had made and indeed it was very good.”

Good, indeed! What a wonderful place to come from as you begin your lives together – the place of knowing that in creating each of you, God was very pleased with what he had done.


Created in God’s Image

The author of Genesis isn’t content simply to have God express his satisfaction over creating us. The writer goes into how God actually accomplished it.

There are three things that this “accomplishment” teaches us about marriage.

The FIRST is that we’re created in God’s image. Just as a hand in the mirror is an image of the real hand, so you both are God’s image.

And just how do husband and wife image God? As Christians, we believe, in God’s unity and diversity. We profess one God, yet three divine persons.

In the marriage bond, two separate individuals – complete with their very different personalities – can achieve a unity and oneness that is unparalleled in nature, a unity found only in the Godhead.

Husband and wife become one entity, a oneness that is expressed in a unity of shared feelings, a unity of life’s fulfillments, a unity of life’s disappointments.


Given Dominion

A SECOND thing that God’s creating man and woman teaches us about marriage has to do with being given dominion over all creation.

In being given dominion, God has not called you to dominate or violate nature, but to live in harmony with it.

Greg and Emily, you have the power to create jointly and to name the works of your hands, whether that creation is a home, a holiday dinner, love letters, relationships with friends, a child.

Know that you have been created partners and helpmates to one another and a woman is not a man’s shadow, nor his servant, but his other self.

In fact, the word “helpmate,” translated from the Hebrew, actually means “one who stands at the side of the other.”

God then, has created each of you as a partner and helpmate for the other, to lovingly rule over the works of your hands.

Remain at each other’s side; remain true companions and like any good companion, bring to your creating your very own unique gifts and talents.


Be Fruitful and Multiply

FINALLY, you’ve been called to be fruitful and multiply.

The children to be borne of your union will be proof itself that the Lord knows that it is not good for either man or woman to be alone.

Your very union then as husband and wife is of divine origin. It is a holy state in which you both can live a completeness not otherwise attainable alone.

That is important to remember Greg and Emily, when friends, possessions, careers, even your families or your children, seek to be first in our lives.

God saying, “Be fruitful and multiply” is divine testimony that no one or no thing, must ever come between your love for each other.


Conclusion

Greg and Emily, what we wish for you today on your wedding day is this sense of God’s goodness that has been bestowed upon you and has brought you to his altar today.

Let the reading from the Book of Genesis that you have chosen guide you on your common journey.

It is good that you have found each other.

Always remember that you have been (1) Created in God’s image, that you have been (2) Given dominion over creation and that your call is to (3) Be fruitful and multiply.