Since the month of June is the most popular month for weddings, I decided to post some helpful quotes to encourage those who are married, engaged, or are discerning a vocation to marriage.
"Purity is the fruit of prayer" Blessed Mother Teresa.
"Purity prepares the soul for love, and love confirms the soul in purity" Cardinal John Henry Newman.
"The person who does not decide to love forever will find it very difficult to really love for even one day" Pope John Paul II.
"No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends" Christ in John 15:13.
"Now, Lord, you know that I take this wife of mine not because of lust, but for a noble purpose. Call down your mercy on me and on her, and allow us to live together to a happy old age" prayer said by Tobiah with Sarah at his side on their wedding night in Tobit 8:7.
"Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, [love] is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails" St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.
"Intense love does not measure... it just gives" Blessed Mother Teresa.
"There is no place for selfishness- and no place for fear! Do not be afraid, then, when love makes demands. Do not be afraid when love requires sacrifice" Pope John Paul II.
"If the one falls, the other will lift up his companion... So also, if two sleep together, they keep each other warm. How can one keep warm? Where a lone man may be overcome, two together can resist" Ecclesiates 4:10-12.
"The LORD God said: 'It is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a suitable partner for him.' ...
So the LORD God cast a deep sleep on the man, and while he was asleep he took out one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. The LORD God then built up into a woman the rib that he had taken from the man. When he brought her to the man, the man said:
'This one, at last, is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called 'woman,' for out of 'her man' this one has been taken." That is why a man leaves, his father and mother and clings to his wife and the two of them became one body" Genesis 2:18, 21-25.
"Be subordinate to one another out of reverence for Christ. Wives should be subordinate to their husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is head of his wife just as Christ is head of the church, he himself the savior of the body. As the church is subordinate to Christ, so wives should be subordinate to their husbands in everything.
Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the church and handed himself over for her to sanctify her, cleansing her by the bath of water with the word, that he might present to himself the church in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.
So [also] husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one hates his own flesh but rather nourishes and cherishes it, even as Christ does the church, because we are members of his body" Ephesians 5:21-30.
"Love to be real, it must cost- it must hurt- it must empty of self" Blessed Mother Teresa.
