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2006 ARCHIVE
December
Big Words, Cybergeeks, and Singlehood
November
St. Joseph, Unofficial Patron of the Dream Date
Part 2 of 2 parts
October
St. Joseph, Unofficial Patron of the Dream Date
Part 1 of 2 parts
September
Semper Fi, "Always Faithful" - Mary, the Marines, and Dating - Part 2 of 2 parts
August
Semper Fi, "Always Faithful" - Mary, the Marines, and Dating - Part 1 of 2 parts
July
What Is The Church's Moral Teaching on Chastity?
(Excerpted from Chapter III. A Major Challenge: A Chaste, Christian Courtship)
(Part 3)
June
Love and Affection
(Excerpted from Chapter IV, "Understanding Love")
(Part 2)
May
Excerpted from Christian Courtship in
An Oversexed World.
(Part 1)
April
Confessions of an Undercover Virgin
March
Renewing Singles Ministry
February
Body Language: Commentary on the Intersection of Faith, Sex & Culture
January
SINGLES MINISTRY IS VOCATION FORMATION
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| AUGUST 2006: |
Semper Fi, "Always Faithful" - Mary, the Marines, and Dating - Part 1 of 2 parts
Written by Thomas P. Schmierer
July 13, 2006 |
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 Overview of Reflection
With the recent passing of our great nation's Independence Day holiday, it is important for single Catholics in America to reflect on the major identifying groups that they share: Catholic, American, and Single. Arguably, one of the major distinguishing features of Catholicism is our veneration of Mary, thus Mary will serve as the Catholic portion of our meditation. On Independence Day, we attempt to focus on the great sacrifices that our armed forces have made for our freedom, thus military service members has been selected to represent the American portion of our reflection. By being single, we are interested in creating better dating opportunities, thus dating will represent the Single portion of our reflection. It is, of course, very American to seek opportunities to efficiently multi-task, so we may as well connect reflections on Mary, our military service members, and dating all into a singular firework bang!
Singlehood, for a woman, is a time for her to prepare for motherhood. By reflecting on the virtues of Mary, our model mother, a Catholic single woman will see that Mary's obedience caused her to be in situations that required graceful perseverance. In addition, a Catholic single man must learn to seek Mary-inspired virtue in his significant other in order to eventually make a wise choice of spouse. It is in studying these virtues that we realize that Our Blessed Mother has some of the main primary characteristics of a US Marine. That's right, Mary is hardcore!(1)
US Marine Corps Virtues of Obedience and Perseverance
The motto of the US Marine Corps is "Semper Fidelis," or "Always Faithful," which is an accurate name, considering a mutiny has never even been considered in their long history. The Marine Corps motto not only displays faithful obedience to superiors, but also a strong sense of duty for one's country. The Marine Corps prides itself on being able to adapt and modify to any given situation in order to overcome it. Like the Marine Corps, Mary has also displayed the ability to adapt and modify to any given situation and has done so out of a strong sense of duty to the government in power.
Marian Virtue of Obedience
As Tradition tells us, Mary is without sin. Because Mary is sinless, we often forget that Mary has free will, just like any other fully-functioning human being. At the time when she was pregnant with Jesus, she could have chosen to disobey the "world" leader, Caesar Augustus, and to send Joseph alone to be counted in the census. She could have invented some very legitimate rationalizations to stay behind with one possible excuse being that she was pregnant with the new Messiah and did not want to risk losing Him. It is relatively safe to assume that Mary understood that Caesar Augustus had been placed in a position of power over her by God and that by obeying her government, she was obeying God.(2) Regardless of the reason, Mary fulfilled her civil obligation to register at the census and one could project that Mary would also fulfill her other civil obligations, such as voting if she was on this earth with us today, even if that meant walking to the polls (or riding on a donkey).(3)
Marian Virtue of Perseverance
It is Mary's willingness to persevere under extreme situations of duress that proves she is as hardcore as any modern day member of the American military. As referred to above, Mary knew that there was no desirable method of transportation and that she was within days of giving birth, yet still made the choice to travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Additionally, like any human being, Mary would have preferred the comforts of an inn as opposed to sleeping with animals, but she adapted and overcame the difficult situation. Even after giving birth to her son, she modified a manger into a crib in order to overcome that situation. Upon reflection on the details, one must wonder if she first removed the fodder from it or placed the swaddling clothes on top of the fodder. Regardless of how the manger was adapted into a crib, the larger point is that the situation was not even close to being desirable, yet all of the infancy narratives in the New Testament collectively lead us to believe that Mary never reacted in a manner that was less than graceful.
Footnotes
- No irreverence intended. The definition of hardcore used here is synonymous with "committed," as in "the primary quality found in one who perseveres."
- This is not to suggest that it is Marian or Christian to support a government in control who obviously has not been placed in a position of power by God, i.e. Adolf Hitler and Nazism.
- I realize this is a large projection, though it would seem inconsistent of Mary to fulfill one civil obligation and not another. For those who disagree with the assumption that Mary would vote, it is at least a commonly held opinion that under normal circumstances it is our Christian obligation to vote, while there may be some specific cases where the opposite is true.
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