Yes, I did get up early to watch the Royal Wedding. I love weddings and the British excel at pomp and circumstance and the beauty of tradition. I've posted a lot about broken Britain and its scuttling of all that made it great so I watched with great pleasure at the Englishness and tradition of the royal wedding. So did all the crowds and hundreds of millions around the globe.
The beauty of Westminster Abbey
The native English flowers decorating the church and the trees along the aisle.
The two princes in red and blue with spurs!
The beautiful bride and Kate's gorgeous dress
The charming flower girls and pages, led by the maid of honor.
The best wedding sermon I ever heard by The Bishop of London
Be who God meant you to be and you will set the world on fire.” So said St Catherine of Siena whose festival day it is today. Marriage is intended to be a way in which man and woman help each other to become what God meant each one to be, their deepest and truest selves.
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In a sense every wedding is a royal wedding with the bride and the groom as king and queen of creation, making a new life together so that life can flow through them into the future.
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And in the Spirit of this generous God, husband and wife are to give themselves to each another.
A spiritual life grows as love finds its centre beyond ourselves. Faithful and committed relationships offer a door into the mystery of spiritual life in which we discover this; the more we give of self, the richer we become in soul; the more we go beyond ourselves in love, the more we become our true selves and our spiritual beauty is more fully revealed. In marriage we are seeking to bring one another into fuller life.
The music, especially Ubi Caritas et Amor as arranged by Paul Mealor
The young crowds.
The kiss and the little bridesmaid who found the roar of the crowd and the flyover much too loud.
All the wonderful clothes and hats! But the cartwheeling verger captures best the joy of the day.
Posted by Jill Fallon at April 29, 2011 9:10 PM | Permalink