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Bonhoeffer on the sacrament of marriage



"God makes your marriage indissoluble. 'What therefore God has joined together, let no man put asunder' (Matthew 19.6).  God joins you together in marriage; it is His act, not yours.  Do not confound your love for one another with God.  God makes your marriage indissoluble, and protects it from every danger that may threaten it from within and without; He wills to be the guarantor of its indissolubility.  It is a blessed thing to know that no power on earth, no temptation, no human frailty can dissolve what God holds together; indeed, anyone who knows that may say confidently:  What God has joined together, can no man put asunder.  Free from all anxiety that is always a characteristic of love, you can now say to each other with complete and confident assurance:  We can never lose each other now; by the will of God we belong to each other till death"

-- Bonhoeffer, "Wedding Sermon", Letters and Papers from Prison