A good friend of mine recently attended the celebration for his grand parent’s 60^th wedding anniversary.  60 years!  He was talking to his grandmother at the party, and he asked her, what the secret was to staying married for 60 years.  His grandmother told him, that when she married his grandfather, she was going to make a list of the top ten bad things that he could do in their marriage, and she would love him enough to forgive him for and let pass, all because they were on her list.  She said that she never did get around to making that list.  But every time his grandfather did something that really made her mad, she just imagined that it was one of the things on her list.  She said it was a good thing her list was so inclusive, because if it wasn’t, she would have kicked him out years ago.  And this was at their 60^th anniversary party!  It’s hard to be married.   You don’t even have to married to know that.

      At first glance, our readings today all sound like they are about marriage.  And on one level, they are, of course.  But there’s a much bigger concern underlying all of this talk about marriage today, and that’s a theme of integrity.  These readings call all of us, whether we are married or not, to an integrity of life.  And that’s a big challenge for us today.  We have so many people living secret lives.  They say one thing, and they do another.  Their words don’t match up with their actions.  They are hypocrites.  And the charge of hypocrisy has done more to harm the Kingdom of God, than any thing else.  We have hypocrites all around us today it seems.  How many conservative, pro-family values politicians have we had in the last couple of years, that have turned out to be NOT so conservative or pro-family values when it comes to their own lifestyles?  Everybody cheats.  And everybody lies!  How many sports stars, and movie and TV stars, and music stars, have gotten caught in the last several months, doing terrible things that they tried to keep hidden from their fans?  They apologize and they ask for forgiveness, but we all still left feeling like would they really be sorry, if they hadn’t gotten caught?  We have a severe crisis in integrity!  And the Church itself has not been immune.  Some of our Church’s own leadership needs to go back to seminary and take Morality 101 on integrity.  We aren’t supposed to lie.  We aren’t supposed to cheat.  We aren’t supposed to take what isn’t ours.  We aren’t supposed to bear false witness.  We are supposed to live lives like we have some kind of values, not like animals.  That’s what these reading are talking to us about today.  Integrity!  We are all supposed to be living honest, integrated, faith-filled lives.  We’re not supposed to be hypocrites.

Not when it comes to our marriages.  And not when it comes to any part of our lives.

       You know, we say that we want things to get better.  We say things like “Why can’t we have better politicians, and sports heroes, and entertainment stars?”  When are things going to get better?  Things are going to get better when all of us start making integrity a more important value in our lives!  It’s not going to start with John Edwards, and David Letterman, and Kobe Bryant.  It’s got to start with us.  It’s got to start in our marriages and families.  It’s got to start in our communities.  It’s got to start with each one of us saying, “I’m going to live a better life and be a better person.”  That’s integrity!

      And what’s one of the biggest reasons that we need to do this?  The clue is right there in our Gospel text today.  Did you notice that right after Jesus delivers these strong words about marriage and divorce, He welcomes these children to Himself.   Who pays the biggest price when marriages and families breakdown?  It is the children, of course.  Who’s going to suffer the most if we continue to allow integrity to disappear from our lives?  Guess?  Again, it’s our children and our youth.  We have young people today who don’t know what truth is, because everybody lies to them.  Everybody lies.  And when everybody is doing it, IT MUST BE O.K.!!!  As Catholic Christians, we’ve got to change this for our future.  The crisis in integrity is paralyzing the Church!  We can’t do what we are supposed to do, if we are NOT people of integrity.

       We’ve got a lot of work to do on our marriages.  Jesus makes marriage very clear today.  Divorce is not supposed to be an option.  At the heart of all of our mess, is integrity.  But the problem is much bigger than just with our marriages.  We need to strive daily to be honest people – with others, with ourselves, and with God.  May we let Jesus show us how to live lives of honor and honesty!

May God bless us today,  Father, Son, and Holy Spirit…AMEN !!!

St. Maria Goretti…Pray for us !!!