Just four days after the start of the German-Soviet War, a sick woman asked the local priest, Fr. Mykola Konrad, to hear her confession. Volodymr accompanied the priest, but sometime after their visit, they disappeared.

Our beloved St. Valentine is actually based on several known Valentine or Valentinus martyrs whose exact stories are not absolutely certain. The most popular telling of the legend says that third-century Roman Emperor Claudius II outlawed marriage for young men — because single men made better soldiers than those who were married.

The lesson of the parable is that if we listen to Christ, the foundation of our lives will be strong, so when tragedy and disaster and suffering and hard times come into our lives, we will remain steadfast.

But can’t we also apply this parable to our relationships as husband and wife? If our relationship is strong, then even things that might shake us up will not cause our house to cave in. Even when we face tragedy and disaster and suffering, we will be unmoved from our marriage with each other. Our relationship is strong, so our wedding is strong, so the world cannot break it apart.

“But our world has turned its back on beauty. And because of that, we find ourselves surrounded by ugliness and alienation. I want to persuade you that beauty matters, that it is not just a subjective thing, but a universal need of human beings. If we ignore this need, we find ourselves in a spiritual desert. 

I want to show you a path out of that desert — it is a path that leads to Home.”

My husband and I are not saints. God willing, we still have many decades left to foster our relationship with God, to leave a good impact on the world, to keep striving for holiness… to mess up, to get knocked down, to go into the confessional and promise to be better. We know our path won’t be a straight line but we hope and pray that we will fight the good fight, run the race, and keep the faith (2 Timothy 4:7).

So how did St. Nicholas of Myra — also known for (literally) fighting heresy — become Santa Claus? As the National Geographic says, “Nicholas was neither fat nor jolly but developed a reputation as a fiery, wiry, and defiant defender of church doctrine during the Great Persecution in 303, when Bibles were burned and priests made to renounce Christianity or face execution.”

Although we can’t really pin down its origin, one new trend from the last few decades has been the unity candle. The unity candle includes some brief ritual where the parents of the bride and groom or the couple themselves light two separate candles, which are then brought together in one larger candle in the center. Two families, two individuals, however you want to look at it, are becoming one just as the separate flames become one flame.

You might have noticed this week is National Vocations Week here in the United States. My priest talked about it this past weekend and my social media has been full of discussions about it.

One thing I couldn’t help but notice, though, was that Vocations Week only focuses on the priesthood and religious life. There hasn’t been any talk, that I’ve seen, about the vocation to marriage.