When people talk about preaching to the choir, it’s normally described as a bad thing, but sometimes the choir needs to hear it, too. What brought this idea to mind for me happened just a couple weekends ago when my fiancée and I drove up to Flagstaff, Arizona for part of the Diocese of Phoenix’s marriage preparation program. I don’t want to speak for anyone else, but my expectations for the weekend were pretty low. Not to sound arrogant, but I literally teach this stuff. I mean, admittedly, I teach it to juniors in high school, so at a significantly different level than they do, but still. I figured it would be a nice break from the heat, a good opportunity to take a mini-getaway with my bride to be, and a day full of banal discussion of things I already knew and believed.
To be honest, I wasn’t even all that wrong. We took our seats amongst the other couples, ready to nod along from our choir seat as the people who this was really for(you know, converts, non-Catholics marrying Catholic spouses, cultural Catholics who went to church more out of routine than anything else) were exposed to the profound beauties of the Church’s teachings about the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony. For eight hours. With a nice lunch provided. Again, I didn’t think it would be bad, per se. I just didn’t expect it to be valuable, for me. A strange thing happened, though, in the choir loft. As I kept hearing more and more things that I already knew and believed, that old news started to hit like new again.
As people who were living their married vocation continued to speak out the way these truths had made the transition from theory to practice in their lives, I was hit with a startling revelation that was actually no newer than the teachings I was hearing. I’m a sinner and a hypocrite. I believed all the things that they were talking about. I knew, intellectually, that they were true. I could mount compelling, logical defenses for each of them. Yet, when I looked at my life and my relationship, there were gaps between my faith and my life. The reality is that the choir are every bit as human as anyone else, and from time to time, God reminds us of that. Over the course of the two and a half hour drive home, and much of the following week, my fiancée and I talked about the things we already knew, but that we wanted to integrate more into our lives and relationship. So please, all of you who preach, when you’re telling people about God, make sure you remember that the choir needs to hear it, too.
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