Life is just a dance

Have you ever been awed watching two people dance? I do not mean two little children on the dance floor of a wedding, who capture the attention and love of all, or even two glittery ballroom dancers on TV or at a dance. I mean the love, closeness, sincerity and sacred nature seen in a couple married over 50 years, while they are dancing! They move as one, each of them aware of the other’s movement almost before it happens.

This is the joy that can be found in marriage. It is a union possessing all the traits of a good friendship, concern first for the good of the other, giving of self, time and energy for the other, giving without worry about what one will get back. There is intimacy, warmth, stability and a deep trust that two truly do become one in the dance of marriage.

It is the trust and ability of a man and wife returning to their seats in a dark movie theater and the husband asks a fellow seated on the aisle. “Did someone step on your feet while going out at intermission?”

The man replied, “Yes, you did,” as he expected an apology.

The man looked at his wife and said, “Okay honey, this is our row.” This is the new challenge given each day of a marriage, working so that the two of them become one and that what God has joined together no human should separate.

“May the Lord bless us all the days of our lives.” These words we pray at the Response. We hear them first in our reading from Genesis, as God names all the animals and even provides a rib so to create a partner for the man. We are called to be co-creators of love and to share in the dance of life as we create and share life with love.

On this Respect Life Sunday, we are called to realize how precious life is, and to realize we were created in God’s image. We are made in the image of God and created to be in relationship with each other, and it is not good for man to be alone. God gives us the best example of relationship in the Trinity of God’s relationship as Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The flow of love from one person to another is a necessary constitution of conscious life from the

start, as we dance and share together. Jesus even needed to share in our humanity to fulfill his mission. We are brothers and sister with Jesus, for “he who consecrates and those who are being consecrated all have one origin and this is One With God.”

Human weakness is found in all who follow Christ. No one is perfect in the dance of love and life. However, God is merciful and does not measure his followers by their mistakes but by gentle love, forgiveness, understanding and both willing to ask the question and answer it by dancing together. Love delights, eliciting joy from those loved. Deny yourself a little to dance with another, and to give new life, in the name of the Lord of All Life.

Be like the sign in an old shoe repair store, …. “We will heal you, We will save your Sole, We will even Dye for you.” What more do we need in the Dance of Life than a partner, willing to do these for the other?