Don’t get me wrong. We love priests and religious. Our wedding was concelebrated by five priests and served by two of our Benedictine monk buddies. We named our firstborn Peter Melchizedek (yes, really). Our son will be unable to spell his name and fail out of kindergarten because his parents love the priesthood just that much.
We pray earnestly for an increase in vocations to the priesthood and religious life every week at Mass, and we sincerely hope God will answer our prayers. At the back of our minds though we wonder, what about us? What about the millions of Catholics whom God has called to the Sacrament of Matrimony?
In marriage there is no superior looking out for your spiritual well-being, no bells to call you to prayer or habit to set you apart from the world. You are in the trenches, back to back with your spouse, fighting the war against evil. In the daily rhythm of ora et labora, our ora is half a Hail Mary snatched between dirty dishes and dirty diapers. Our labora is the thousand seemingly insignificant ways we choose to die to ourselves to love each other — an exhausting work which the world finds laughable.
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