Faith-filled spouses from across Western Sydney and the Blue Mountains have been recognised for their enduring love and fidelity during a heartwarming Wedding Anniversary Mass. Source: Catholic Outlook.
More than 400 people converged on St Patrick’s Cathedral, Parramatta, to celebrate the Mass alongside 100 married couples, ranging from honeymooners to couples married over six decades.
The longest-married couple present, at 64 years, was Elaine and Les Gade.
“Today, we honour and thank these couples for their commitment to Christian marriage and to the values of the Gospel,” Bishop Vincent Long OFM Conv told the gathered faithful.
He said this while presiding over the Solemn Mass on Sunday, October 27, reminding those gathered that “everyone in this church, whatever our past history, is capable now of loving and receiving love”.
The Diocese of Parramatta’s Wedding Anniversary Mass is an annual event where newlyweds and long-standing couples pack into the cathedral to renew their vows and receive a blessing.
For Greg Dunn, reliving his wedding vows after 60 years of wonderful marriage was an emotional moment. Looking dapper in a suit, he kissed his wife Judith tenderly on the forehead and pulled her closer to him after receiving the Bishop’s blessing.
“We’re very opposite but together we make one,” Judith said, adding that “marriage is like a shiny shoe — it rubs and it pinches, but now we’re like a pair of old slippers because we’re so comfortable together.”
The pair met and fell in love in their teens while volunteering with the Scouts.
“We were both giving ourselves, and here we are still doing it,” Judith said, listing church volunteering, leading cathedral tours, and caring for the graves at St John’s Cemetery in Parramatta (Australia’s oldest surviving European cemetery) among their common passions. That’s not counting the volunteering they do separately.
Asked what has kept them together over the decades, Judith said: “It’s hitting speed bumps but working your way through it and not giving up.”
FULL STORY
Wedding bells ring once again as 100 couples renew their vows during Diocesan Wedding Anniversary Mass (By Isabell Petrinic, Catholic Outlook)
