The Hour Approacheth

The final countdown is on! Guests for Rachel and Steve’s wedding begin arriving today, and the numbers will continue to grow right up through Saturday. While this is definitely their day, I cannot help but remember the excitement of this time for Mary and me thirty-five years ago. One of my best friend’s mother recently sent me an old Polaroid of the “3 Musketeers” in front of his house getting ready to make the drive to Lincoln, Nebraska. Oh, the memories!

Isn’t that what a wedding is really all about? The act, I think, is initially setting the stage for a lifetime of memories together. The photographs (and now videos), the cards and gifts, all combine to stimulate the recall of the most sacred moment we will ever share. This act is that which literally perpetuates the species in its most civilized fashion. I know that it’s incredibly old-fashioned of me, but I truly believe that the increasingly widespread begetting of children out of wedlock explains the unraveling of our society and culture.

I must be quick to say that I do not understand marriage to be solely for the purpose of procreation. I do believe that it is designed to overtly and consciously manifest the genuine love between two people, and that it is from such an environment that humankind moves forward at its highest and most noble level. Obviously, I’m at odds with the wedding chapel culture of Las Vegas, but I find great hope in the future that people like Rachel and Steve are building. “Faith, hope, and love, these three, but the greatest of these is love.”