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 become one flesh.
This union is joined by God. It cannot be separated by man. In this way the union of husband and wife mirrors the deeper and even more profound unity of the Trinity itself. That's is what St. Paul says about this passage. He tells us, "This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church" (cf. Eph. 5:32). In other words, the love between spouses is meant to reflect that love Jesus has for his Church. And that union itself is based on his own union with the Father and with the Spirit.
We all need to experience this union in some form, whether or not that be marriage. It is not good for man to be alone. The union joined by God is something more than we can get from any other relationship to any of the good things of the created world. Only those beings who are rational like us, who are both matter and Spirit, can help us to experience this unity. Even among them, only in complimentary do we experience something of the mysterious depths of the profound union we can have with God. In these depths the other always remains in all of his or her uniqueness but the gap between is so marvelously bridged. It is not a union which blurs the boundaries and merges into an amorphous blob of love. It is like the Trinity. The three persons always remain distinct and are nevertheless always united in the love that is their essence.
God wants to give us the unity of the Spirit by the bond of peace (cf. Eph. 4:3). There are various degrees of this unity, but all are valuable. They are made possible because we are consecrated by Jesus and made to be his brothers. The suffering of the cross is the common origin of our family. It is the bridge which reunites a wandering humanity to God. It is quite truly the bridge between heaven and earth. Because it is so it is also the bridge that unites all human relationships, whether between Christian brothers, or husband and wife. It is God's own unity which is the source of all of this.
Jesus answered him, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him (cf. Joh. 14:23).
God himself joins himself to us. And by that union we can now experience ever deeper union with all others to whom he is joined. In this way we become fruitful in his household, even as our households in turn bear fruit in due season.
Your wife shall be like a fruitful vine
in the recesses of your home;
your children like olive plants
around your table.
Let us embrace this common origin we share with our eldest brother. Let us welcome the unity of the Spirit. May he transform all of our earthly relationships into those which are, more and more, unbreakable, joined by God himself. To do so we must embrace others based on who they are rather than what they can do for us. We must move from a mercenary love to an altruistic. This is the love which can welcome even children from whom we have nothing to gain. Then when we discover that we ourselves have nothing to give we needn't fear. Jesus is ready to embrace us as well.
Amen, I say to you,
whoever does not accept the kingdom of God like a child
will not enter it."
Then he embraced them and blessed them,
placing his hands on them.
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