Glynn Cardy 16^th February 2025

Valentine was an early Christian Saint from the period before the ‘Christianization of Rome’. He practiced and shared his faith in Rome, at a time when that could potentially get you killed.

Much is unknown about St. Valentine, but legend has it that he came to the attention of Rome’s Emperor, Claudius II, because he was performing unsanctioned and unapproved marriages. It is from these marriages that he became the Patron Saint of Love.

In some accounts, those marriages were unsanctioned because they were between Christian and Non-Christians.

Note this restriction is not peculiar to Roman days. When I was ordained in the 1980s the Anglican Church’s requirement for me to officiate at a wedding was that both parties were baptized. Most clergy I knew, in a Valentinian spirit, just somehow forgot to ask that question at the pre-wedding interview. I suspect Presbyterian clergy had a similar restriction, which most similarly forgot to mention.

Some Church laws and regulations are embarrassingly antiquated, and frankly unethical. What I mean by unethical is that I think there should be a very high bar for why a minister could refuse to marry a couple. I’ve only ever ‘refused’ one couple, and they (after seeing a counsellor I funded) made that decision themselves.

The history of marriage though shows that the Church and political authorities have long tried to control who marries whom, particularly the marriages of those who have any money or power. The lower classes and peasantry could just go and jump over a broom or the like.

Not only is marriage potentially political, so is love. The commitment of love can threaten regimes who want your first allegiance to be to them, or to their allowed categories for love. You may recall that it is likely the lovers in biblical book the Song of Songs were from different classes or races, and they therefore tried to hide their love. As the Women’s Bible Commentary says, “the Song of Songs insists in a rather dramatic manner on a woman’s and man’s right to love whomever their heart chooses, irrespective of prevailing cultural norms.” The inclusion of the book in the Bible it could be argued gives a form of precedence or legitimacy to love beyond the boundaries imposed by the powerful.

Back to Valentine. In some accounts, the unsanctioned marriages he performed (that then got him in trouble) were unsanctioned because allegedly marriage exempted men from being required to serve in the Roman Legions (the army). And similarly, in other accounts, those marriages were unsanctioned because Emperor Claudius, believed that married men were less inclined to join his wars of conquest. All of which may or may not have been true. But regardless, the thread of these stories is that St Valentine broke the rules about who could marry whom.

Which, nowadays, you would think could encourage Christian ministers to officiate at weddings of same-sex couples. Not that you’d lose your head (like Valentine) if you got caught (just your job). Valentine’s saint’s day, the day of his execution, was February 14th, 269 CE.

Of course, somewhat like St Nicholas, St Valentine has (without his consent) supported a vast industry selling cards, roses, gifts, and dinners out. The mythology, as mythologies do, has evolved, so that today February 14th is seen as a celebration of romantic love, rather than the risk-taking love of a minister who put the will and needs of couples above the will and needs of the authorities.

I hope the first reading, Edward Lear’s memorable The Owl and the Pussycat, brought a smile to your face. It is somewhat absurd, somewhat quaint, and somewhat fun. But it also on closer inspection, whether intended by Lear or not, points to more than just romantic love.

Think of the fundamental difference between these two lovers. Not just race, culture, or class – but species! An owl and a pussycat! Really?? Won’t one just eat the other? And what, pray tell, would their children look like? And where would they live? Etcetera, etcetera. Maybe its no accident that they ‘went to sea,’ running away from the eyes and voices and the anger of criticism. Is it any wonder their resources are minimal, that their ring is second-hand (from a nose no less!), that they sailed away for a whole year and a day, and that their families do not appear at their wedding. They sound like migrants, or asylum seekers, or a couple fleeing before the wrath of their society.

That’s the thing about love, the thing we need to remember, and the thing we need to tell our young: there is often great joy in love, and often great cost.

For love encompasses the wonder of deep contentment and wellbeing. But it also encompasses the grittiness, the perseverance, of commitment.

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Love is about the fulfilment of the self (of nurture, encouragement, and comfort). But is also about the giving or losing of the self, where the other is prioritized. Which sometimes comes easily, and sometimes not.

Love frequently grows, blooms, and perfumes the relationship with joy. But love is also about change, seemingly constant change, through all the seasons of existence and what those seasons demand of us and offer to us.

So love is a journey. Though maybe not quite as dramatic as the owl’s and the pussycat’s.

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In the context of our theme of love, there are three things I would point out from our second reading today, Luke’s ‘sermon on the plain.”

Firstly, it begins not with words but with actions- actions of healing and helping, being with those suffering. It begins with expressing kindness by what we do, rather than by what we say. Love is concrete and specific.

Secondly, each of Luke’s beatitudes addresses an unmistakably literal situation. “Blessed are you who are poor” (v.20) sets the tone. Then come words of hope to those who are hungry, who mourn, and who are hated and excluded. Each will receive the thing they lack, or perhaps already have.

There is no responsible way to read these as about anything other than what they seem to mean: material need and a promise of reversal. Of course these beatitudes do include interior feelings, experiences of loss and exclusion, as well as economic circumstances.

Thirdly, there is an implicit challenge in the text to those of us who aren’t poor, hungry, mourning, hated and/or excluded. That challenge is to help individuals, change the circumstances that led to their poverty and suffering, and above all show the kindness that is the lifeblood of our faith.

I read a very powerful piece by the late John O’Donohue this week. It’s about kindness. The kindness that dwells deep down. The kindness that is the bedrock of hope.

I’d like to slowly, and meditatively, read it to you:

“There is a kindness that dwells deep down in things; it presides everywhere, often in places we least expect. The world can be harsh and negative; but if we remain generous and patient, kindness inevitably reveals itself. Something deep in the human soul seems to depend on the presence of kindness; something instinctive in us expects it, and once we sense it, we are able to trust and open ourselves.

The word ‘kindness’ has a gentle sound which seems to echo the presence of compassionate goodness. When someone is kind to you, you feel understood and seen. There is no judgement or harsh perception directed towards you. Kindness has gracious eyes; it is not small-minded or competitive; it wants nothing back for itself. Kindness strikes a resonance with the depths of your own heart; it also suggests that your vulnerability though somehow exposed is not taken advantage of; rather it has become an occasion of dignity and empathy. Kindness casts a different light, an evening light that has the depth of colour and patience to illuminate what is complex and rich in difference.

Despite all the darkness, human hope is based on the instinct that at the deepest level of reality some intimate kindness holds sway.i

ⁱ John O’Donohue Benedictus: a Book of Blessings

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