Christ in His Sacraments

PDF pp. 374-77: "marriage & virginity" p. 360: > marriage, like all signs, is at once a mainstay and an obstacle. […] The union that the consecrated virgin realizes immediately in her heart is also re­alized by the married woman, aided and at the same time hindered by the sacrament. […] Virginity is not a sacrament because it is not a sign, or at least it is not a new sign […] The virgin contracts immediately within her heart the eternal marriage to which the married woman aspires by means of marriage. For the married woman, the virgin is an eschatological sign of her aspirations [hence the necessity of virgins befriending and leading marrieds]. […] Even if Christian marriage is inferior to consecrated virginity, it is none the less far superior to marriage under the Old Dispensation, for the latter did not then have the privilege of being a sacrament or of bringing this ["virginizing"] grace with it. pp. 418-420 (PDF pp. 434-6) are on Sts. Mary's & Joseph's marriage.