Till Death Do Us Part

The sharp divisions between Protestants and Catholics in late 19^th century Netherlands led to a strange historical period marked by a phenomenon known as pillarisation. Society literally self-segregated according to denominational affiliation. Catholics and Protestants lived, worked, educated, and did business in the separate sectors or pillars of society. Every aspect of life was divided – schools, banks, businesses, universities, newspapers, political parties and broadcast media. Many Catholics and Protestants literally had no personal contact with the other.

Yet it seems that no amount of politico-denominational segregation could keep one man and one woman apart, despite that fact that they were from opposing pillars. J.W.C. van Gorcum, a Protestant colonel in the Dutch Cavalry, fell in love with J.C.P.H. van Aefferden, a Catholic of noble upbringing and they married in 1842. The town of Roermond was up in arms but it mattered little to the young couple who enjoyed 38 happy years of marriage before the colonel died in 1880.

Anticipating her own death, Lady Aefferden gave up her rights to be buried in the family’s noble plot so that she could be laid to rest next to her beloved husband. Yet Dutch pillarisation law prevented it. The best that could be done is that the bodies be buried on either side of the wall that separated that Catholic from the Protestant sectors of the cemetery. Close as they were, it seemed that the sectarian divisions of religion were too great for even them.

The unrelenting Lady Aefferden was simply unwilling to concede. She made specific arrangements for her grave to be placed as close to the wall on the Catholic side while her husband’s grave be positioned as close to the wall on the Protestant side. And after her death, she had two stone hands added to the back of their gravestones, transcending the wall and embracing one another in a final symbol of love’s victory. They are still holding hands today.

“What God has joined together, let no one separate.”

Mark 10:9

On a broader level, the Bible beautifully expresses the theological truth that God created humanity as one family.  While that family has been torn apart by sin, it is Jesus’ explicit desire that “all may be one” just as he and the Father are one.[1]  Protestants and Catholics, high church and low church, traditionalists and progressives – we were created by God to share the love that we have all experienced in Christ Jesus.

What walls are dividing you from your Christian brothers and sisters today?  Do not settle for the pillars of injustice that continue the narrative of division and segregation. We are the body of Christ. Let love’s victory be trumpeted in your life today.

For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will be able to separate us from the love of God,

which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Romans 8:38

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[1]           Sandra M. Schneiders, “Religion vs. Spirituality: A Contemporary Conundrum” Spiritus (3.2 2003), 163-185.