Epistle: 1 Corinthians 7:35-8:7
Gospel: St. Matthew 15:29-31
Marriage and Monasticism: 1 Corinthians 7:35-8:7,especially vs. 38:
"So then he who gives her in marriage does well, but he who does not give her in marriage does better." We ended yesterday's meditation with the observation that only by recovering an Apostolic desire to please the Lord above all else can Christian men and women, as sexual beings, hope to overcome the destructive forces of secularism within themselves and to serve Him faithfully Who is true Life. Let each of us consider within his heart how best to fulfill the Apostle's admonition to "serve the Lord without distraction" (vs. 35), which was the ending point of yesterday's reading and is also the starting point of the passage which is before us today.
In today's reading, St. Paul reviews two decisions concerning sexuality, which Christians may encounter - betrothal and remarriage. In doing so, he invites all disciples to look more deeply than many of us ever have done at celibacy and marriage as vocations.
Foremost, note that the Apostle is careful not to put a "leash" on any Christian, except in terms of what is "proper" (vs. 35). He allows Gospel imperatives to restrain Christians against improper behavior, thoughts, and attitudes. Significantly, St. Paul does not promote one state in this life above another except pragmatically, responding to the "present distress" (vs. 26), which arises because "the form of this world is passing away" (vs. 31). Love of Christ binds us to live well in this world until we die or until the Lord returns. Nonetheless, let each of us remember that this present world tends, because of its fallen state, to pull us away from the Lord Jesus.
How then shall we live? In what state? Does ‘being married' pose an insuperable barrier for living as a Christian? Should Christians embrace the monastic life as the ultimate solution? St. Paul reassures fathers and their eligible daughters that they do not sin by marrying and giving in marriage (vs.36). Similarly, the father who chooses to continue the support of his daughter when she has aged beyond the years of marriage "does well" (vs. 37). The issue for us is not which state of life to embrace, but whether one is "steadfast in his heart" toward the Lord (vs. 37).
What then might be some reasons for preferring either the monastic life or the married life? Certainly it would not be because one state in life is of greater "purity" than the other. St. John Chrysostom states plainly the wisdom of our Orthodox Christian Tradition against any such view: "And if any persons have been hindered by the marriage state, let them know that marriage is not the hindrance, but their purpose which made an ill use of marriage." The contemporary theologian Paul Evdokimov echos St. John in very plain language: "Yet, the future of the world depends on a solution tailored to man. It is not ‘in spite of marriage,' but in its fulfillment that spouses live the supernatural and holiness of their union....the nuptial ‘kenosis' unveils its secret only to the eyes of God and to no others."
The key to our primary life-shaping decisions, Evdokimov reminds us, isneither to accept the banalities which the modern world promotes, settling for the "licentiousness of legalized mating," nor is it to flee into the vocation of monasticism out of frustration with the whole corrupt culture which pledges allegiance to the "kingdom of intercourse." Rather, he affirms in a classic Orthodox manner that "a balanced asceticism helps one understand that the life of the body and the soul, in celibacy or in married life, is an art of the spirit; chastity stands at the beginning of these two expressions of an integral Christian humanism, turned toward the End," which is Christ.
What St. Paul and the Tradition after him uphold are decisions of persons free to marry or not, because of being "in the Lord" (vs. 39). In God, marriage and monasticism are one.
May all of us, Thy servants, shine like the stars of heaven in Thee, O Lord our God.
