Encyclical Deus Caritas Est:

"Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife and they become one flesh” (Gen 2:24).

"Two aspects of this are important. First, eros is somehow rooted in man's very nature; Adam is a seeker, who “abandons his mother and father” in order to find woman; only together do the two represent complete humanity and become “one flesh”. The second aspect is equally important. From the standpoint of creation, eros directs man towards marriage, to a bond which is unique and definitive; thus, and only thus, does it fulfil its deepest purpose. Corresponding to the image of a monotheistic God is monogamous marriage. Marriage based on exclusive and definitive love becomes the icon of the relationship between God and his people and vice versa. God's way of loving becomes the measure of human love. This close connection between eros and marriage in the Bible has practically no equivalent in extra-biblical literature."(Deus Caritas Est, Pope Benedict XVI)

Now all Christians are called to perfection. However, from this it doesn't follow that all Christians who actually seek perfection will find harmony and peace in their family relations. Many will, and many will find their marriage, and family relations, a source of strength assisting them on the road to spiritual perfection. However, a number of lay Christians, some of whom became saints, had an ongoing struggle with their family relations in their efforts to place God first in their lives. Some had an ongoing struggle with their spouses and parents in order to lead a devout life within their married vocation. Some were persecuted by former friends and those with whom they came in contact for trying to act "holy," and for supposedly thinking themselves better than others because they failed to act just like everyone else. Such persecution by family and peers, and others, is one of the main stumbling blocks, called "human respect" that one must meet and overcome if one is to answer God's call to sanctity and perfection. Those who join the priesthood or religious orders have started their spiritual life detached from such human obstacles to spiritual growth, which, along with their religious vows, place them at an initial higher state of perfection. Here's some advice from Christ that those who choose marriage should keep in mind:

"Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not his cross, and followeth after me, is not worthy of me. He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it." (Mat 10:34-39)

Adam was very pleased with the wonderful gift of a wife and helpmate God gave him in the Garden of Paradise. Theirs was a marriage made in heaven, and a source of ongoing strength, joy, and delight. Adam loved Eve, and she loved him, with an unselfish, self-giving love that enhanced their relationship. They both loved God with their whole heart, soul, and mind, and also enjoyed the physical pleasures of the marriage relationship, just as they enjoyed the taste of the foods they found in the garden. They loved their life and the joy and blessings they received in caring for the Garden of Paradise.

Then, Original Sin entered the picture, and the relationship of Adam and Eve turned sour. She blamed him and he blamed her for their predicament. The serpent loved it. It was a great show. Satan was pleased to see this Marriage on the rocks like so many of those we see in the world today.

HIS LITTLE DOVE
by Andrew Richards

I awoke from a dream of love,
Alone in the Garden of Delight,
Eve was asleep like a dove,
Undisturbed in the growing light.

Then I heard again that voice,
Saying, "Is it really Me you love?
If you really had a choice,
Would it be Me or the sleeping dove?"

I said, "You are my soul's very breath,
Does one not love his own life?
Our love is stronger than death,
Much stronger than love of my wife."

"Adam, my friend," said the Voice,
"I'm going to depart for a while.
Remember my Love's a hard choice,
In the face of the dove's lovely smile."

Adam thought of the fruit bringing death,
Remembering the smile of the dove,
Then she ran to him all out of breath,
Eating fruit forbidden to love.

She said, "Darling I've gained inner light,"
Yet in her eye he noticed a tear,
"Why that old serpent was right,
But hold me, it's cold and I fear."

Adam looked at his dear little dove,
Now bereft of her smile of delight.
No longer to share his Great Love,
For her joy had turned into fright.

In his heart he said, "This is not fair,
Where's God with His Justice and Power?
The pain of my wife I can't bear,
So I'll help her this very hour."

And Adam the fruit he did eat,
So good from evil he'd find.
The dove said, "Isn't it sweet?"
He said, "You're out of your mind!"

For the fruit was bitter to taste,
And in anger he looked at his love,
His life now seemed such a waste,
And gone was his love for the dove.

And Adam felt lonely inside,
All joy was gone from his life,
Now with hatred he looked at his bride,
Whose weakness had brought him such strife.

Then Eve to Adam did say,
You're lazy and don't like to toil,
I'm hungry and need food today,
Get busy in planting this soil.

Then Adam cursed the earth,
Which gave bread from the sweat of his brow,
His life seemed all work and no mirth,
And his children so think, even now.

End

"The harmony in which they(man and woman in the Garden) had found themselves, thanks to original justice, is now destroyed(by Original Sin): the control of the soul's spiritual faculties over the body is shattered; the union of man and woman becomes subject to tensions, their relations henceforth marked by lust and domination"( Catholic Catechism Section II, Chapter I Article I Paragraph 7-400)

In spite of the difficulty built into all human relationships due to Original Sin, those who have chosen the lay or married state are called to perfection just like those in other vocations within the Church. St Catherine of Siena was a single, Third Order, Dominican layperson, and in that state she became a great saint and doctor of the Church. St Thomas More was a great married saint who became a martyr. St Clotilde, St Anna Maria Taigi, and St Louis, found sanctity in the married state. However, sanctity is more difficult in the married state, other things being equal, than it is in the priestly or religious state. For married people are occupied with external concerns, and they find their wills and their attention are bound-up in responsibilities, as well as attachment to the people and good things of this world as part of their vocation. This includes spouse, children, friends, home, career, worldly pleasures and concerns. It is very difficult to maintain an "interior life" under such circumstances.

But be clear about one thing. Married persons are all called to become saints within the context of the marriage union, including the practice of married sex within the guidelines approved by the Church. Sexual relations in marriage, including the full enjoyment thereof, can help to strengthen the sacramental relationship and improve the spiritual stance of each partner, when they reflect true love, under obedience to God. Such legitimate sexual relations are no barrier to the fullness of the interior life. On the other hand, regular mortification of sexual desire is prudent on the spiritual journey, just as it is wise to mortify any desire that can be selfish and excessive.

"The effective practice of the evangelical counsels (poverty, chastity, and obedience) is not universally obligatory, but the affective practice or spirit of the counsels obliges everyone who desires to be perfect. The first is usually verified by public vows (as in the consecrated life); the second affects all Christians in a manner compatible with their state in life. (Fr Jordan Aumann, O.P., "Spiritual Theology," Ch. 5, Perfection of the Christian Life)

Since all Christians are called to perfection, all must strive for the spirit of chastity, which obliges everyone who desires to be perfect. This means that married couples must keep their sexual desires and practices under the control of their reason, within the parameters for marriage set down by the Church, which prohibits the use of artificial birth control. The mortification of such desire, with the proper disposition toward chastity, is "built-in" to the marital relationship sanctioned by the Church under the Holy Spirit. A great deal of self-restraint and mortification of sexual desire, in line with the spirit of chastity, is learned during those periods when sexuality cannot be expressed during marriage. This is how it should be so that married couples, called to perfection like everyone else, can regularly curb the runaway passion connected with the normal sexual concupiscense inherited through Original Sin

So don't make the foolish mistake of thinking you "must" remain selfishly aloof from your partner, in a marriage fully taking place within the guidelines approved by the Church, in the name of a higher love of God. God has given us the pleasures that come from food and sex and legitimate recreation as part of the fullness of our life on earth. As long as we follow "all" of the Church's teachings on marital sex, it will, just like the other pleasures God grants to us, when under control of right reason, and the spirit of chastity, help rather than hinder our journey toward union with God.

For a saint's union with God involves supernatural power and takes place primarily within the substance, rather than the sensual part, of the spirit. The natural pleasures of human marriage, even under the influence of grace, do not rise to the level of the torrent of delight connected with the supernatural actuation of the Gifts of the Holy Spirit in divine union. So a married saint can have sexual relations with the spouse, pleasures within the natural order, without finding any negative impact on the substance or the joys enjoyed from the supernatural order through their spiritual marriage with God.

As wonderful as the joys of marriage can be, they are not in the same league as that union, and have no power to hinder it as long as we are faithful to God and all the teachings He has given us through the Holy Spirit inspirations guiding the Pope and the Magisterium. The joys from sex, food, music, and visual beauty that God allows, even to the saints, are part of "the hundredfold" he returns to those who are truly faithful to Him in all things. They remain, however, incidental and, if necessary, with the grace of God, the saint can live without them because he receives "abundant life" from a different dimension. In any case, the real power of the marriage relationship comes not from the joys of the sexual union. It comes from the Divine Love flowing from one partner to the other, and the companionship of a wonderful friend enjoyed in the sacramental relationship. In marriage, as in all human relationships, one must say, "I would not love you half so well, did I not love God more!" So, as part of our spiritual journey to the summit of Mt. Zion, we may participate in the natural joys of sexual love for our spouse, as long as our sexual relations are within the guidelines allowed by the church.

However, we should not be taken-in by the modern lukewarm spiritual outlook that says attachments of the will make no difference in the spiritual life, and that it is just as easy to be spiritual in marriage as it is in the monastery. It's not. God can and will make you a saint in marriage. However, other things being equal, it is easier for Him if your life is already uniformly dedicated to Him, and His Service, Alone. There is greater opportunity for prayer, spiritual reading, and a single-minded dedication of one's life to God in the religious life.

On the other hand, there are many more finite possessions, joys, and worldly concerns to keep one from the spiritual path in the married than in the religious state. One major concern in marriage is the personality and spiritual maturity of the partner. Two people don't always grow spiritually at the same rate, nor at the same time. So, unfortunately, many marriages turn out to be tug-a-wars between two different personalities striving for dominance. It sometimes happens that one partner wants to serve God through the marriage, and the other partner wants to serve mammon. Or, one partner is interested in personal growth and the other one isn't. Needless to say, one would pay a very heavy price for leading a spiritual life within such a difficult relationship. Nonetheless, some of the saints remained true to God in just such a difficult marriage relationship, where the struggle to remain faithful to God became the proof of their overwhelming love and demonstrated to the world their vocation to heroic sanctity.

And then we have the example of Job who lost all his possessions and his children while contracting disease and sores all over his body. At his lowest point, his wife suggested that he "curse God and die." Fortunately, he ignored his wife and decided to wait around to see how everything worked itself out in the sometimes terrible spiritual battle of "faith." And in the end, he was given more children and riches than he started out with, and a long life as well.

"The Christian who lives in the world is often exposed to excessive absorption and preoccupation about a situation to be acquired or maintianed for his family. He is also in danger of forgetting to some extent that he must advance toward another life, another fatherland, and that to reach it, something is needed quite different from the understanding of worldly affairs."(Fr Garrigou-LaGrange, O.P., "Three Ages of the Interior Life, p 207-8)

The point to be made from all of the negative, as opposed to the positive, experiences connected with marriage is that God will not allow you to be tempted beyond that which you are capable of no matter where or how you live. Life gets tough beyond belief at some point in your life, whether you're married, a religious, or single. This is the point where your trust in the natural world falls apart and all you have left is your trust in the Unseen World. If you continue to believe, you'll get through it, but in the way God wants, not necessarily the way you want. Your job is to hang on, come hell or high water, and keep Him first in your life, whether you're married or single. And in this connection, its well to remember that, in all vocations, we most completely fulfill our reason for being when we dwell "within our spirit," with the One for Whom we were created. For God's Holy Spirit is the real "Soul-Mate" for which we were created, and for which we are ever hankering, and the "Nostalgic Lover," Who Marries our soul in a Nuptial Union that never fails, and that is Complete and Supreme Happiness.

And this relationship with our Divine Soul-Mate takes precedence over all human relationships, even a human marriage, as the case of St Thomas More, or many others, clearly demonstrates. For the love of a human husband and wife reaches a higher level of perfection to the extent it flows from the Supernatural Union of each spouse with the Self-Giving Love of the Divine Spouse, and the True Soul-Mate of everyone who comes into the world. Then the partners advance from a natural marriage of two in one flesh to a Supernatural Marriage, in which the two in one flesh become two in One Spirit, as well. So, if your partner to whom you are married in the flesh decides to live for mammon, you must still hang-on to your partner to whom you are married in the Spirit. For you were created for that Partner, the Infinite Love Which will last forever, not for the mirage of worldly bliss and temporal security in a world which is passing away.

"Now there were with us seven brethren: and the first, when he had married a wife, deceased, and, having no issue, left his wife unto his brother: Likewise the second also, and the third, unto the seventh.

"And last of all the woman died also. Therefore in the resurrection whose wife shall she be of the seven? for they all had her.

"Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. For in the resurrection they neither marry, nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels of God in heaven. (Matthew 22|25-30)

And we must always remember there is no Christian vocation sanctioned by the Church in which one is free to live a life of mortal sin, on the basis that the end justifies the means, and to neglect the primary task of all human beings, which is saving one's soul through faithfulness to all the commandments and the transforming love of Jesus Christ. For the vocation of marriage, today, is under major attack from the spirit of the world, lukewarm spirituality, the spirit of easy sexual relationships, adultery, artificial birth-control, abortions, hard-hearted selfishness, runaway ambition, and unlimited greed.

We live in a world where it is no longer fashionable to sacrifice onself for the good of others. We are part of the "Me" generation, where the worship of "Me" is supreme. The sacrifices, economic dislocation, pressures of child-rearing, peer-pressure, requirements for self-giving, and just the basic "struggle to survive" make marriage a "very risky" spiritual choice for anyone with lukewarm spirituality entering that vocation today. Of course, this is obvious to anyone who bothers to look at the statistics, the drug addiction, the suicides, and the shipwreck of broken homes and broken lives in today's society. A single individual, should carefully weigh the real dangers, before committing himself, and the good of his soul, to someone in the state of marriage today.

Shakespeare reminds us what marriage should be:

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no! It is an ever fixed mark
that looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come.
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.