V.J.E.
This year, as we prepare to celebrate the First Vows of our sisters, we want to share with you a series of reflections on how living our religious life and professing the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience allow us to live in freedom, totality, faithfulness, and fruitfulness each day. This series is inspired by St. Pope John Paul II’s reflections in the Theology of the Body.
This reflection to introduce this series is written by Sr. Yvelyne Marie Bernard, HMSS.
“God wants to marry us!” These five words summarize the entire drama of salvation history as it unfolds in human time. From beginning to end, God is seeking a covenant of love with His people so that we can participate in the union and communion of His Trinitarian life.
A couple who desires to make a successful “wedding cake,” that is, a holy and enduring marriage, needs four essential ingredients: freedom, totality, faithfulness, and fruitfulness. If any one of these ingredients is missing, the cake will not be what it is meant to be. Authentic love must be freely given, totally self-donating, faithful until the end, and fruitful, bringing forth new life and goodness.
When God proposes this divine marriage to us, He Himself supplies these ingredients in perfect measure. He says, “It was not you who chose me, but I who chose you.” His love is free. He says, “No one takes my life from me, but I lay it down of my own accord.” His love is total. He promises, “I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” His love is faithful. And He tells us, “Abide in me… for apart from me you can do nothing… Whoever abides in me bears much fruit.” His love is fruitful.
In Christ, God reveals the perfect Bridegroom. The whole story of salvation—from Eden, through Israel, to the Cross, and finally to the Wedding Feast of the Lamb—is the story of God’s relentless desire to unite Himself to His beloved. The question is not whether God desires this marriage. The question is whether we will say “yes” to His proposal.
Consecrated life is a beautiful way to say yes to Christ with a free heart, ready to give all that she is and all that she has in order, even now, to possess Him who possesses her.