THE HOLY STATE
Love is all there is.
Love is all you need.
Two forgivable extremes.
Ordinary life suffers when compared to that kind of certainty.
Maybe a bit of the world suffers, too.
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When young people asked me to do their weddings years ago, they used words like ‘authentic’, ‘meaningful’, ”personal’, ”special’ to describe the kind of event they were after. But by far the most common touch they hoped for was ”real’. As if these were all synonyms for ‘good’.
But ‘real’ includes the whole mad, chaotic, heartbreaking thing, doesn’t it? Real includes everything that isn’t good, might never become good. When things are real, the world beyond the door, ruly and unruly, is there too. It takes nerve to get some of that into your I do’s.
*
Modern weddings are under so much pressure to be flawless, affirming and magical that the real world can’t get a seat in the hall, or at the table. It can’t even get an invitation.
But I knew what I owed the young people coming round for help: an occasion in which their ancestors would recognize them, favour them, claim them. They wanted a celebration.
I owed them a ritual.
Just about nobody goes to a wedding to change the world.
I did, though.
Matrimony: Ritual, Culture and the Heart’s Work is the story of what happened when I went after the real thing. It’s a love letter to those who entrusted their betrothal to me for a while. It is, frankly, a throw down, a challenge to the current regime of self improvement, personal sovereignty and safety-first autonomy to earn its keep. It is a vow I made to those young couples and kept, a vow to bring Old Order Matrimony to the high stakes/low voltage walk down the aisle. It is a civilian’s guide to a ritual life, a this-world chronicle of cultural redemption, two by two.
For real.
Stephen Jenkinson
Founder of Orphan Wisdom
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