Apr 27, 2009
"I am the way the truth and the life" – John 14:6
Have you ever experienced something and thought to yourself: "This is the way things were meant to be?" Last weekend my triplet sister got married. The weekend came and went very quickly, but when I look back and hear others talk about their experience of the day I can’t help but rejoice at what happened: The expression of love, the commitment to Jesus and the Church, the celebration and support of friends and family, and the promise of a new life together. It was the way things were meant to be. During the dinner at the reception I had a friend come up to me and say that this was his third wedding that he had been to this month. You can imagine how he felt about that! But he said this wedding was different. He exclaimed, "they did it right…and you can just tell by the witness they are to all of us." He was so right. I think my sister and her new husband Brian have a lot to teach us. And not only them, as there are many couples today who love one another and prepare for marriage in the right way. It shows us that there is a way that things were meant to be.
Yesterday a friend asked me what I thought chastity was. I remember during my college years when I heard chastity described as, "living rightly." What a thought! I am one who tends to think that we talk about chastity and sexuality sometimes in complicated ways and so to make the concept simple makes sense to me. Living rightly. If we think about life in this way, the whole notion of chastity goes so much further than just being in a relationship with a person of the opposite sex. Living the virtue of chastity is choosing to live rightly in all areas of our life, with our whole body and whole soul working together to be who God calls us to be.
There is a lot we can learn by understanding that we are called to live in right relation to one another and thinking about those examples in our life where we see this lived out. Jesus came to show us how to live rightly and how make choices in our lives according to the way He wanted things to be. How do we live rightly in our families? How do we live rightly among our relationships and friendships? How to we live right within our communities of school, work places, and society? Most importantly, how do we live rightly with Jesus and His Church?