The marriage of husband and wife is actually only a type of the relationship between Christ and his Church. I’m pretty sure we will have a special bond with our spouses since we had a sacramental connection with them in this life, but it will no longer be marriage because our fulfillment will be in our eternal communion with God, of which our marriages were just a shadow. Our joy with our former spouses will be found in our common life with God.
The Scripture tells us we will be like the angels not given or taken in marriage. Angels are sexless and do not procreate. Presumably, our desires will also be changed in our new bodies. So, marriage as we know it here will no longer exist. D
The purpose of marriage is to bear and raise children; there is no need for that in heaven. In heaven the relationships we have had here (parent/child, husband/wife, brother/sister…etc) will change; we will all love God above everything else.
Aren’t we supposed to love God above everything else in this life? I can see why marriage as a procreative union won’t be necessary in Heaven but does that necessarily preclude their marital love from continuing to exist for eternity?
I agree with you, I think.
There will be no marriage and no sexual relations in the life to come. However, if we were especially close to someone in this earthly life, we will be able to love them all the more in our resurrected life to come. People who had a close marriage will still be able to enjoy the closeness of their love, but it will be changed in character, perfected, as others have said.
Marital love is an imperfect expression of the unity that we desire to have with our spouse in a covenant before God (same as sexual relations with our spouse are a form of unification and procreation). In heaven, we will be perfected in our Union with God and, through God, in our union with and love for others. The communion we share together will be perfect.
As others have already pointed out, love is perfected in heaven, so in that sense the love we share on earth is not temporary. However, I think an important point that needs to be kept in mind for the sake of this discussion is that the sacramental bond of marriage between a couple is, indeed, temporary. The vows stipulate that the bond does not last forever, but until the couple is parted by death. This is why the Church teaches that a widow or widower is free to enter into another marriage.
Spouses (should they both reach Heaven) will not be spouses there. The bond of marriage is broken upon death. There is no marriage in Heaven.
Double +1