Those who have wives should act as not having them and other Pauline paradoxes

A phrase from Mass today really struck me: St. Paul's counsel that those "using the world" do so as "not using it fully." Maybe it's having seriously considered clerical celibacy and the detached, itinerant lifestyle of a diocesan priest that has always given me a degree of discomfort with this balancing act. The question is: How much is too much? Obviously I've settled in comfortably despite my discomfort: I have 40 acres in God's country to call my own, a wife who loves me, and children who love me and depend on me for everything. So, for all my discomfiture, I'm a man of the world, with daily labor that I thoroughly enjoy. I have practical concerns that occupy my time and energy, and interests in agriculture and animal husbandry, in political ideals, in practical entertainment and all the little enjoyments of life.

In short, there is as little of the ethereal to my everyday life as there is to that of the next person. And so, St. Paul's words rightly make me uncomfortable whenever I hear them, and they have me asking yet again today: How much is too much?

There is a great deal of truth to the argument that things are inherently good, and that we come to know God through our proper, measured embrace of them. Food, drink, and a comfortable chair all, in the pleasure they give after a hard day's work, provide a foretaste of the enjoyments of heaven and an opportunity to give thanks to the God who is the source of all good things. More seriously, I've made a real investment of myself in terms of my daily labor and my commitment to the ideals of organic farming and the noble cause of small-scale, sustainable agriculture. So we also come closer to God through our commitment to justice, to truth, and to the common good. In each example, there is a balance: There is such a thing as too much food and drink detracting from one's health, too much labor detracting from one's family life, etc.

But let me also broach the most radical example St. Paul brings up: that "those having wives act as not having them." Is St. Paul saying that there is also such a thing as too much commitment to one's family, to one's wife and children? A cynic might say that this is just Paul being Paul, the life-long celibate who just a little earlier had advised that a man only resort to marriage if he can't control his passions (cf. 1 Cor 7:9). Easy for Paul-the-bachelor to say, but what of a married man such as myself? And what of St. Paul himself elsewhere, who inspires me with his challenging words that husbands ought to love their wives as Christ loves the Church (Eph 5:25)? After all, Christ turned the water into wine at Cana, blessing marriage and making it holy, a sacrament. Through the unshakable embrace of one's spouse, for better or for worse, in the indissoluble bond of holy matrimony, one is supposed to be drawn closer to Christ. One is united to God, in other words, by a determined, single-minded embrace of  the worldly, very human, very real bond of marriage. So, what of those who have wives acting as if they don't? How can these matters be squared? Can there really be too much?

I was led to consider Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac. I imagine that there was little in the world that Abraham was more invested in or loved more dearly than his son. Actually, that's how God refers to Isaac when he commands Abraham to sacrifice him: "Take your son Isaac, your only one, whom you love..." (Gen 22:2). It was through caring for Isaac, providing for his basic needs, giving him an example to follow, and raising him into a God-fearing man that Abraham himself came to know God better. Fatherhood was his vocation, and yet, when God asked him to sacrifice his own son, Abraham willingly and unhesitatingly raised hand to perform the deed.

Obviously there are New Testament ramifications in this Genesis passage to God the Father, who so loved the world that he sent his beloved, only-begotten Son into the world to die on the cross. But I found myself asking what I would do if I were Abraham, if I had to choose between God and the gifts he has given me. Ultimately that's what this is all about: Are you so invested in the world that you would be unwilling to give it all up if circumstances demanded? I'm reminded of the single-mindedness St. Louis de Montfort's motto, Deiu seul, God alone. How much is too much? How much can one love the things of this world before giving it all up would cause us to hesitate or to experience pangs of regret?

It's not that radical a question if you look back at history. It's interesting, for example, to look at the history of England under Oliver Cromwell, where most Catholics were broken through the exorbitant taxes levied against them for non-attendance at the official Protestant parishes. What if I was threatened with the loss of my own farm unless I rejected my faith? My stolid answer, of course, is that I'd accept the loss of all my material possessions rather than reject my faith. Some days I think I'd even be strong enough to die a martyr, like the early Christians who were torn apart by lions in the arena rather than carry out sacrifice to the pagan gods. That said, I can identify with the annoying child-protagonist of Flannery O'Connor's short story, "The Temple of the Holy Ghost," who "thought she could be a martyr if they killed her quick."

But the real examples are cleverer than that. What if my wife or one of my children were to be shot and killed unless I trampled on Consecrated Hosts spilled from the tabernacle? What if all I had to do was spit on the Bible, or proclaim aloud just once that I don't believe in God, in order to save them? The problem is that we don't want to put the people we love in the same category as other worldly things. This, I think, is why St. Paul counsels against marriage. It's not that one can't love Christ through marriage and family; rather, it's that, despite the travails, suffering, and imperfections of our human relationships, there is nothing else in the world that more closely resembles the loving embrace of God. Therefore, there is also nothing that would be harder to give up.

So, I remain as discomfited by St. Paul and his very true, very relevant counsel as ever. There is something of a paradox here. Because God is transcendent, totally other, the imperfect love we experience in our human relationships is the only way we can come to understand and experience his love for us. So we need to embrace and love fully, not in part. We need to believe, and to love, and to sacrifice without reserve, for those who are ours in order to understand and come to know the unreserved, unconditional love of the God whose we are. Yet somehow we must also come to recognize that the things we love here on earth, even the ones we love most here are earth, are but fleeting shadows, foretastes of the love that is to come.