Saint Valentine’s Day is two days away.
However, if you want to really romance your beloved, decide today that this year and each going forward, will be the most loving ever. Marriage often begins with the couple surrounded by loved ones, flowers, gifts, reminders of all up the joys of both the present and future. Sustaining a marriage means leaning on each other when the other part of those vows, (for poorer, in sickness, in bad times) show up and last.
Just as “God walks amongst the pots and pans,” so also the tenderness of a sacramental relationship rests in the thousand details of every day.
How we greet each other, how we care for each other’s things, what we ask, what we refrain from asking, what we do and what we do not do, all reveal to both the other and the world, how much we love, how little, we count the cost or measure the time.
It’s easy to lose this understanding in the rush of the day, the hard press of tasks, and the need to always deal with all that we have to address. Being deliberate in our courtship of our spouse’s soul requires thought, effort and a willingness to surrender efficiency and time. We must spend time with each other, on each other, to the exclusion of the world.
Saint Valentine’s day seems like a perfect time to remind ourselves that this is the better vintage. We cannot grow closer to God if we are busy growing apart from the one we promised to love before God.
Sacramental marriage is a journey of two yoked souls, knit together by their own assent to accept the graces that only come from a sacrament. We must grow together, to grow closer to God, we must grow closer to God, to grow closer to each other. It is an ongoing both and journey, of learning to decrease, as our love for each other and for God increases.
So how do we do this in practical terms, when there are things like shoveling the ice from the driveway, fixing dinner, dropping off kids to and from practices, forms, emails, paperwork, work work, and anything extra like oil changes and prescriptions and required meetings along the way?
1) Decide as a couple, to set a day of the week, and set date night. Take turns planning it, but make it part of the schedule -just like attending mass, an obligation that is a joy, and that through habit, becomes more of a joy.
2) Write love letters or post cards to each other, once a week –just a little note, or post-it in the lunch box, something to let the other know, you’re thinking of them. It’s the little things that give a lift to life, resolve to be deliberate about choosing to give that lift.
3) Play with your family. Whatever it is that your family loves, make it a family thing –watching sports, playing games, a movie genre, video games, what not, playing with the whole family, knits the family together and again, makes the vocation of being a mom or a dad, not all business, not all tasks, not all drudgery. Love requires self sacrifice, but it should not be joy-free, it should not be merely a to do list.
4) Say “I love you often.” Because who doesn’t love being told they are loved –try to begin and end the day with a prayer and an embrace, to remind yourselves that this time, this place, and this person is special, singular, and this time, a gift to be treasured.
5) When you mess up, (and you will), be deliberately restorative with your words and your actions. Pray to the Holy Spirit for guidance, and reconciliation.
This Valentine’s Day, make it the start of what will always be, “The most romantic year ever,” and begin building memories that tell the story to your children and grandchildren, “They loved each other well.” Happy Valentine’s Day!
