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eMatrimony.org Supporting, Encouraging, and Challenging the WWME Community |
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| Resources - Miscellaneous Reflections On Us As A Movement Al & Barbara Regnier and Fr. Des Colleran (Excerpted from 1981 June Worldwide Family Spirit magazine)
Our dream then, as spoken in the Open & Apostolic Presentation of our Marriage Encounter Weekend, is "To Change the World." It's been our Church's dream to "change the world" for nearly 2000 years, so the dream is not just an M.E. Dream. Many couples and priests are touched by hearing this dream spoken on the Weekend. Unfortunately, all too soon most come to see it as the "Impossible Dream" and we begin to dream smaller, to condense our dream, until many of us fail to dream at all. Our ideal is to bring Marriage Encounter to everyone, that every couple should experience their Weekend. But all too soon it becomes obvious that not everyone can or will make the Weekend, and that many who do go eventually drop away from dialogue and trying to live the Weekend concepts. Our value is to renew the Sacrament of Matrimony in and for our Catholic Church. Our mission and primary motivation is for our Catholic family. That's what keeps us involved, striving, and sacrificing. That's where we can see progress that gives us hope. The Weekend is based on and speaks of our Catholic Family values. As such, it calls for change and sacrifice in order to live our vocation as Sacrament in our Church. Without our Church, there is no Sacrament because Sacraments are a gift to us from our Catholic Faith Family. It's difficult, perhaps impossible, for us as persons and as a couple to make all the changes and sacrifices that we must make if we want to strive to live our vocation as Sacrament in our Church. Our Weekend opens us to the possibilities and to our vocation. It brings our Catholic Values into perspective and often is the catalyst for the beginning of significant changes. We look to our family, but often our family is a reflection; of us and where we were before our Weekend. Although they love us, support us, and need us, they will not or cannot call us to grow as Sacrament or in living Catholic Values. We look to our Parish, but often our Parish family also reflects where we were before our Weekend. Unfortunately, they, too, do not call us to be Sacrament and to live Catholic Values. We look to our Church with the realization that the basic principles and values are there; but, they are often distant, diffused, and difficult to grab hold of. The fact is, most of our fellow Catholics are unaware of the strength and beauty of our Catholic Values and of the Sacrament of Matrimony. So we believe we have to help our people create a post-encounter that will help us in living our vocations. So, as a movement we should gather in support groups, to build a community of couples, priests, and religious whose primary focus is to encourage couples to live out their Sacrament of Matrimony. Their hope and their purpose should be two-fold: first, to bring couples to an awareness of their vocation as a Sacrament of the Church; and second, to bring the gift of relationship and the strength of the Sacrament of Matrimony alive in the Church. We believe nearly every couple who makes a Worldwide Marriage Encounter Weekend has a very positive and meaningful experience Most come home with an enriched marriage, new excitement for one another, and great expectations for the future. They come to their Rookie Renewal, perhaps some sharing circles, or an information night, but then we rarely see them again. We ask ourselves, "Why? What has happened to these couples? Why don't they get involved in the Marriage Encounter Community?" Perhaps the answer is in "US." What made our Weekend one of the most significant experiences of our life together was what we learned on the Weekend about ourselves, one another, and our marriage. The process was simple: it involved couples sharing their story, their relationship, and their journey with us; and it involved our rediscovering one another through a technique of communication: writing love letters and dialogue. If these two aspects are the foundation of the Weekend, then they must also be the foundation of the Marriage Encounter Post-Weekend community. Without personal sharing, support, and challenge, the dialogue becomes an empty exercise; and, without dialogue in the couple relationship, sharing and community tends to become social and job-oriented. A Post-Weekend Community built on social activities and jobs is bound to struggle and be less than attractive, because it competes with the modern world in worldly terms and values. In this busy world, who needs one more activity, social function, or job? We hear on our Weekend that "no one dialogues alone!" We also hear, "A couples' dialoguing relationship is the greatest gift we can bring to others." So perhaps the reason that Post-Weekend Marriage Encounter community often struggles is that in many cases we are weak in couple dialogue and relationship sharing. As a Marriage Encounter Post-Weekend Community, is our focus on RELATIONSHIP, or simply friendship? Are we a community "rooted" in our Weekend (dialogue, sharing, discussing, challenging, and supporting one another to LIVE THE WEEKEND CONCEPTS)? Are we calling one another as couples and as a Christian community to live GOD'S PLAN of RELATIONSHIP which is much deeper than the WORLD'S PLAN of friendship? I can be private and self-focused and still be your friend (World's plan), but RELATIONSHIP (God's Plan) calls me to be intimate and to belong to you. Another way to put it is that we are called to be "LOVERS," not just friends, and that's what God's Plan for couples and for a Christian community is all about. INTIMACY: God calls us to be Intimate-to strive for "Oneness"; to become "A" couple, "A" family, "A" Church, "A" People. Ephesians 5: "For these reasons, a man will leave his father and mother, and unite with his wife, and the two will become one." John 17: (Jesus' prayer to His Father) : "I pray that they may be one, Father, just as you and I are one. Eucharistic Prayer of the Mass: "From age to age you gather `A PEOPLE' to yourself." Song: At That First Eucharist: "Thus may we all one Bread, one Body be, Through this blest sacrament of unity." BELONGING: God calls us to belong to one another as members of One Body - we are the living Body of Christ. (St. Paul often writes about our belonging to and being part of the Body of Christ. This is one of the great mysteries of our Church, that special belonging to and another as parts of His Body.) So the question we must ask ourselves isn't, "Who am I?”, but rather, “Who do I belong to and who belongs to me?", and in Community, "Who do we belong to and who Belongs to us?". A COMMUNITY OF LOVE IS BUILT ON: 1. Involvement (relationship, intimacy, belonging) That's the purpose of Marriage Encounter Post-Weekend, then, to form a Christian Community and to strive to become "ONE" in mind, heart, and affection . . . to be lovers! Not just for the sake of those already encountered, but for the sake of the whole world. So we need to ask ourselves, "How is our post-encounter responding to the needs of the Church? How are we responding to the needs of the Church? How are we reaching out to those who have not yet made a Weekend and encouraging them to do so? How are we bringing the gifts of our Weekend to all those who cannot or will not make a Weekend?" The world is looking to WWME to be a model of unity for the world. Click here for a printable version (PDF, 20KB)
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