“And he said: Let us make man to our image and likeness: and let him have dominion over the fishes of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and the beasts, and the whole earth, and every creeping creature that moveth upon the earth. And God created man to his own image: to the image of God he created him: male and female he created them.”
This glorious world that was created, this mirror of beauty made to lead the mind back to its Creator, was set. The wedding venue had been adorned in appropriate majesty. The Bridegroom in joy sits with eagerness as all that He had made in love moved, lived, existed… All of this is good because it is. All things are beautiful; the Lord gives life and being and beauty to all things, that you, His dear spouse, may rejoice in their splendor. However, in all things that are visible, there is none so beautiful as a person, for each person is made in the image and likeness of God, the one visible creature capable of love. For all other things, God is the Creator, but for you and your neighbor, He is Father, Spouse, and Spirit, making you child, beloved, and temple. The Father, by the Word Love, spoke each person into being out of a sheer abundance of love, each possessing the capacity to know and thereby love, and in this man eclipses all other things in creation. Furthermore, the virtue of charity extends to God and neighbor: “’Master, what is the great commandment in the law?’ Jesus said to him: ‘’Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart ,and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind.’ This is the greatest and first commandment. And the second is like to this: ‘Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself’’” (Matthew 22:37-39). Other created things exist to lead one’s mind to God and thereby enjoyed: “Thou art worth, O Lord our God, to receive glory, and honour, and power: because thou hast created all things; and for thy will they were, and have been created” (Apocalypse 4:11), but true love exists only between two persons, be these Divine Persons: “The Father loveth the Son: and he hath given all things into his hand” (John 3:35), the divine and the angelic or human: “As the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you. Abide in my love” (John 15:9), and between rational created persons, which are angels and humans: “My dearest, if God hath so loved us; we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11); “Are they [the angels] not all ministering spirits, sent to minister for them, who shall receive the inheritance of salvation?” (Hebrews 1:14). This is not to disparage the rest of creation, for “The Lord God took man, and put him into the paradise of pleasure, to dress it, and to keep it” (Genesis 2:15), to be a loving steward of the earth and reap her fruit, but to realize that every person you encounter is more precious than the rest of creation, for they are called to love and be loved: “Every one that loveth, is born of God, and knoweth God” (1 John 4:7). The loveliness of the human soul is extraordinary, surpassing all jewels on earth, and thus your beauty, your preciousness as His child, is captivating to God: “Thou hast wounded my heart, my sister, my spouse” (Canticle 4:9). The whole created order is here for the service of love, all the praises of what has come before are compliments on the décor of the wedding venue, but these all fade into the background when the bride comes forth; when she does, adorned in white and splendor, all eyes move to the central point of the love story: “Behold thou art fair, O my love, behold thou art fair, thy eyes are as those of doves” (Canticle 1:14). So do all these good things fade, but the love in your heart remains forever: “And now there remain faith, hope, and love, these three: but the greatest of these is love” (1 Corinthians 13:13). It is also important to remember that God created you, and all people, in His image, not in the image of creatures. How magnificent is your dignity, that you share a part in the splendors of visible creation, while being closer in dignity to your God than you are to the things you see around you. While there are many created things that God sees as good, “One is my dove, my perfect one is but one, she is the only one of her mother, the chosen of her that bore her” (Canticle 6:8). Now, God brought forth two, that there may be complementary pieces of the same mystery, that there may be equals that stand on either side of love. For the Trinity said, “let us make man in our image,” and “Where there are two or three gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20). Love can only exist when two or more are gathered, and in this is a Trinitarian image: Lover, Beloved, and Love; “Dearly beloved, let us love one another, for love is of God” (1 John 4:7). How the love of God is reflected in His people, for they would not know what it means that “God is a spirit; and they that adore him, must adore him in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24) if it wasn’t for the spirit of love that exists between His people. This love leads to the love of True Love, the Trinity of Truth and Love that expresses I Love You to you in the most perfect manner and with the utmost harmony, which He longs to give you, for if He did not, He would not have made you for the sake of His love. You, and all people you meet, are made from love and for the sake of love; “He that loveth not, knoweth not God: for God is love” (1 John 4:8), and you would not be made for this purpose if Love Itself did not wish to love you unto folly: “For the foolishness of God is wiser than men” (1 Corinthians 1:25)! Run, o Theophila, embrace your Bridegroom, by constantly embracing love. Look at your every neighbor thinking, “How wonderful it is that you exist!”, for if it were not so, they would not be, they are wrapped in life’s love poem as well, no matter where they are in their respective story, and are another masterpiece of God. So God made them, wrapped in beauty and wonder He created them.