Now here is a great exercise for every married couple: Think back to the time you first fell in love with your husband/wife. Remember the excitement, the passion, the urgency you felt for one another? Being in love was easy, a joy and a natural priority.
Then along came the children, the in-laws, the mortgage, the added work pressures and a million other responsibilities. Not to mention all the little hurts and disappointments which build up along the way. Gradually, without even meaning to, you began to lose the freshness of being in love. Being married became a daily chore rather than a daily delight.
Is this the way marriage is meant to be? Sadly, a lot of people think so. But this is not the vision God holds out to us. As married couples, God calls us to love – but not just to love in a ‘dutiful’ way. God wants our passion and delight for one another to be a lifelong experience; a powerful wellspring that keeps us wonderfully intimate through good times and bad.
Possible? Yes! But it doesn’t just happen. There is ‘art’ to marriage. There are insights, tools and exercises that can help us fine-tune the way we relate as a couple. Taking time out to learn and practice these tools can make all the difference between being ‘dutifully loving’ and ‘passionately in love’.
One tool that has been immensely helpful to our own marriage is the Celebrate Love marriage enrichment seminar. Celebrate Love is a weekend program for couples in strong marriages that looks at the sexual and spiritual dimensions of married life. It consists of a series of presentations by married couples and exercises shared privately between husband and wife. There is no counseling and couples are not asked to share their relationship with anyone.
Drawing on the insights of the Theology of the Body and current relationship research, Celebrate Love gives couples new understanding of themselves and their spouse and provides practical strategies for them to use beyond the seminar in their everyday life. It is a program in the Catholic tradition, although couples or spouses of other faiths are very welcome. The program is non-residential, however meals are provided. We warmly recommend it to every couple who enjoys a solid marriage and would like to explore their untapped potential.
Celebrate Love is now being offered for the first time in Perth(Oct 9 & 10). Become one of more than five hundred couples in Australiawho have already benefited from the seminar or read their testimonies at www.celebratelove.com.au. For bookings phone Brad & Mary Prentice (08) 9401-0596.
Written By: Byron and Francine Pirola
