Jack entwined his fingers in mine. He was handsome in his black suit and knotted blue tie, his hair slicked back. Without a cigarette or pipe, his mouth held only a shy grin. A great wash of love and admiration, and the realization of miracles, filled me with a swelling ecstasy that surged inside me like a sacred sea.
“Can I ask you something before we start, Father Bide?” I asked.
“Of course.”
“How did you finally decide that this was sanctioned? That the Church of England would give permission? We’ve asked everyone we know, even the bishop.”
“I asked the only source that mattered.” Father Bide paused and closed his hands around the black prayer book in his hand. “The only court of appeal I thought had the final argument—and that was God himself. What would he do in this case? And the answer was clear.”
“Then let’s get married,” I said and turned my face to Jack.
He squeezed my hand. “Yes, then let’s be married.”
So it came that on March 21, 1957, while I lay in bed in a nightgown with my left leg lifted high on ropes and pulleys, I finally married the love of my life.
Father Bide began to speak the words of the ceremony, and I listened to the melody of the Church of England’s holy matrimony litany.
In the presence of God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
We have come together
To witness the marriage of Helen Joy Davidman and Clive Staples Lewis
To pray for God’s blessing on them
To share their joy
And to celebrate their love . . .
Peter continued in the most serious voice, as if we were standing at the altar of Westminster Abbey and the queen herself was in the congregation—the hospital room no deterrence to solemnity.
“Jack,” he finally said, “will you take Joy to be your wife? Will you love her, comfort her, honor and protect her, forsaking all others, and be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?”
“I will,” he said, and then again for emphasis, “I will.”
“Joy,” Peter asked, “will you take Jack to be your husband? Will you love him, comfort him, honor and protect him, forsaking all others, and be faithful to him as long as you both shall live?”
“I will.” Tears rolled from my eyes and down my face where Jack kissed them away, the wetness of them on his lips.
Warnie and the ward sister, whose name I never learned, also cried silently. Maybe it was the line “as long as you both shall live,” or the boundless love that filled that room, I didn’t know. Peter finished the ceremony—vows, rings, and declaration.
It wasn’t the wedding a small girl dreams of—the white lace dress and a flowing veil. There were no bridesmaids or a symphony orchestra or long trails of white roses. But what does a small girl know of real love? I hadn’t ever known how to dream. I hadn’t known that love would arrive in the most unlikely of places—a hospital room where fear and despair usually reigned. I hadn’t known that love could not be earned or bought or manipulated; it was just this—complete peace in the other’s presence.
All the years wasted believing that love meant owning or possessing, and now the greatest love had arrived in my greatest weakness. In my supreme defeat came my grandest victory. God’s paradoxes had no end.
Peter ended the ceremony with the final prayer. We closed our eyes, Jack’s hands in mine.
“The Holy Trinity make you strong in faith and love, defend you on every side, and guide you in truth and peace; and the blessing of God Almighty, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit be among you and remain with you always.”
It was Warnie who let out a great whooping sound. “Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Lewis.”
“My wife,” Jack said, and laughed that resonating merry sound that had buoyed me all these months.
“My husband.”
We set to laughter, and the ward sister shook her head. “I’ve never seen such celebration in a hospital room.”
“Well, you’ve never seen anyone quite like the three of us,” I said.
“No, I haven’t.”
I knew what she believed: that this was a deathbed marriage, one to satisfy the sad woman in the cast with cancer. But it was no such thing. It was holy matrimony between a man and a woman who had grown to love in ways that no words or explanations could contain.
It was then that Peter turned around and brought a tray to us both, offering us our first Holy Communion as husband and wife.
“Peter,” Jack said when we had finished the Eucharist. “If I may impose with one more request.”