The Ritual of Love

packermann said:

I noticed how much ritual is in love. Take dating. It is customary that he asks her out. The guy usually shows up at the girl's house. He opens the door of the car. When they eat, he pulls out the chair for her. If they dance he leads. He walks her back to her door. The ritual is then he kisses her.

If he decides that she is the one, then he does another ritual. He buys a ring. He gets on one knee and says the customary "Will you marry me?". If she says yes, there are more rituals. They prepare for the wedding. Everything must be just right! She buys the most beautiful white gown. She has bridesmaids, all wearing the same color of dress. There is the ritual of having a maid-of-honor and a best man. The ones in the wedding come down very slowly down the aisle. The bride comes down with the one who will give her hand away. When the bride comes down, the ritual is to play "Here Comes The Bride". The priest/minister says the same thing over and over again at every wedding. The vows are exchanged. The priest/minister announces them husband and wife. The ritual of the kiss is performed.

There is a customary wedding reception. There the husband and bride greet everyone. The husband and wife do the first dance. The bouquet and garter belt are thrown. The husband and wife cut the cake.

All these are rituals. I have not been at a wedding that did not have these rituals. Why do most bridal couples insist on these rituals? Because they are in love. When you are in love, you want everything just right! The you want tradition!

If we insist on rituals in our courtships and weddings, should we not have the greatest rituals reserved for the greatest Lover of Our Souls? Does He not deserve more than three hymns and sermon? Would you want your wedding to be just three hymns and a sermon? If you want those rituals that is done over and over again at every wedding, should we not want this for our Tremendous Lover?

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Aussie Pete said:

Rituals go by the wayside once the couple are married. Relationship is way more than ritual. Why would you want to repeat the same old rituals for 50 years? It would get booooring. Ritual has a place, but surely not the prime place.

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packermann said:

Yes, the honeymoon is eventually over with many married couples. The man does not shave on his day off, does not wear a clean shirt to dinner, does not open the door for his wife anymore. Familiarity makes any effort in the relationship so boooooring. That is why half of all marriages end in divorce. It is so booooring to repeat waking to the same person every morning. They want something new such as a new spouse.

The key to happiness is to repeat things over and over again, the same old things in life, as if they are fresh and new. Jesus said that we must be like children in order to enter heaven. A child never loses his wonder of doing things over and over again. He can spend hours just driving his toy car back and forth. Throw up a child in the air and catch him. He will yell "Again!". You do it again. He giggles and yells out "Again!". This can go on and on. God is the same way. He orders the earth to revolve around the sun. Once the earth makes it around once it is like he says "Again!" God's providence is based on His love for repetition. Without this science would be impossible. Our scientific laws are based on the assumption that God is always say "Again!". (credit on this insight is given to Chesterton).

But when we become adults we are easily bored. We get bored with our jobs, our spouses, our friends. We hate repetition. We have itching ears to hear novel doctrines (1 Tim 4: 3). We scoff at tradition and want modernism. We explore the Eastern Religions because they so new to us. All because we find the same old things so booooring! But God wants us to recover the joy of our youth and still hold to the traditions that were passed down to us, whether orally or in writing, as the Bible commands us to do (2 Thess 2:15).

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