2023.11.26 Tears of Grace, Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

This is the day on the church calendar when we are invited to remember Christ the King ( the one heart able to be benevolent no matter what or who). 

I can’t say too much for royalty, except I do love movie heroes like King Kong, simply for their bold chutzpah. Imagine hanging onto a screaming damsel, blonde of course, and thumping your chest with vainglory when you’re a kidnapper of malicious intent! Well, yes, I can imagine that kind of triumphalism. But I’m a brunette and always have been, so not for me. 

*  *  *  *

Christ the King Sunday was, in 1986,  the Sunday of my second marriage, this one to the parish rector at my home parish in the midst of a Sunday Eucharist. Our guest list was easy: the congregation and invited family. An unimaginably perfect setting with one objection I’d already voiced, my aversion to the KING image for Jesus: “Kings don’t work for me!”  “Calm down,”said Dick. It’s Matthew’s agenda. 

I could live with the King idea but still can’t imagine why I unexpectedly wept at my own wedding, right in the middle of saying my vows. My poor, as yet unvowed, fiancé looked stunned, rigid and trembling, so frightened that his mustache quivered. He thought, “This crazy woman!” 

My therapist was my witness. She stood behind me and rubbed my back. Dick’s witness stood behind him and put his hand on Dick’s shoulder. 

As for me, I still have no idea exactly why I lost control at this moment, except that I was vulnerable to floods of tears without provocation. My lines were simple and my heart was secure. Yes, we’d been through tough times, divorces. He was the priest of a small parish in a small town. I was awaiting the bishop’s approval of my own ordination.

All I can say is this: My idea of marriage had been shot through with holes; failure was still in my catalogue of fears. I was absolutely awed that we were vowing all this once again, and equally sure that no one would ever be my “king.” I guess the truth was that we loved each other, admired each other, and dared to try the impossible together, and that we were gathered around the mysterious sacramental grace of the Eucharist. 

I wept—not from feelings of failure or regret, but from the sorrow that accompanies a truth too deep to define: The human heart is a spacious vessel, capable of holding many loves and many pains, an infinity of feelings. The divine heart is even more spacious.  

2015.11.29 What Moms Are For—Sometimes

Mom, how in hell do you do this?

Do what?  (A million anxious possibilities flooded my mind)

This wedding stuff. They don't want anything about God, or any of that stuff.

Well, you can pray without mentioning God. (A loosey goosey Anglican response if I ever heard one!) 
Check in with your Higher Power.

I’m calling you, Mom!  I looked at the profile of the two of us he'd put on my cell phone and laughed.

My son, Rob, had obtained his short-term, priest-for-a-day license to officiate at his wife’s brother’s wedding in California. He was legally all set, and suddenly that didn’t seem enough. I have to admit I grinned. What Mom "does" is not disrespected, though not easily grasped, by her four children, who are all smart enough to tell me that they only like church the way “you and Sim (their stepfather, my second husband and brother priest) do it.” But now Rob was faced with doing something churchy himself.

I listened, decided that, bidden or not, God would be there, gave him a few ideas he didn’t need, and invoked the contemporary credo: you can be spiritual and not religious.

Within a few days he sent me a text with his proposed service.  “Mom, Please review and pray for your son that he doesn’t flub this or fall off the cliff.”

(So now I could envision the romantic cliff-hanger wedding setting and my son on a windy bluff feeling nervous/shaky—a mother's dream!)

I’m proud to share the marriage liturgy he put togeher: the idea to call it a marriage liturgy came from me, adding an official-sounding descriptor.
                                                     * * * * * * *

Mark Twain said: “Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than the things you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover”

A lasting marriage will be one where you Explore, Dream and discover together!  My wife and I believe that a lasting marriage is also about laughter and friendship. Laugh at yourselves and each other often.

Be friends. Nietzsche said: "It is not a lack of love, but a lack of friendship that makes unhappy marriages.”

This is just a short poem I wrote for you about friendship, love and marriage.
                                   
You

You
who is always there
next to me in my
breathing space
gentle like precious and pure diaphanous lace.
    You
who holds me when I’m weakest
who congratulates me when
I’m strongest
You raise me up
and let the world know
I’m in the star you think is brightest
It is you I yearn to laugh with
to sit by the fire with
on those cool San Francisco nights
It is your profile I want to see
through the gap
in the kitchen door
in the twilight of evening
as you prepare supper
    You
It is you who will adventure with
me near and far
running the coast down beach
by beach
spending the day in wet swim suits
forgetting where our shoes are
    This is love.
    This is friendship
You who calls me randomly to
say hi, to say hello
I will forever be there to make you laugh
to make you smile as best I can
to quietly listen
when you vent or cry
to say thank you
    You
My dearest friend
                          
         © June, 2015, Rob Brakeman (robbrakemanpoetry.com)


"Pastor" Rob called after it was over, also sent a photo on iPhone of the happy couple, and himself looking appropriately pious, bowed head—and with a triumphant Rob grin: "I did it!"

I texted back: I love you. He replied: Thanks, Mom.

Is there a better mutual blessing than that to be thankful for?