Posted on 10/17/2014 12:58:09 PM PDT by NYer
The news from the Synod this day is improved. Thanks be to God, many, yes many of the bishops and synod participants have articulated how deficient and misleading the “rough draft” Relatio was. Keep praying! The struggles to lay hold of and articulate with clarity God’s stunning teaching on Holy Matrimony and family in a doubtful world will continue.
But, frankly, even at the moment Jesus uttered his unequivocal insistence that marriage was one man and one woman in an indissoluble bond, many were stunned and scoffed, If that is the case of a man with his wife, it is better never to marry! (Matt 19:10) Jesus, of course, did not back down and went on to reiterate His teaching while also affirming that celibacy (never to marry) was a positive, not negative role (Matt 19:11ff).
Our struggle to recapture and reaffirm without compromise what Jesus taught is surely challenging, especially in a climate in which so many marriages fail. I was listening to an interview yesterday in which the question of how to stem the tide of failed marriages was pondered. All the usual remedies were discussed: better catechesis, better marriage preparation, more sermons on Holy Matrimony, etc. But both participants in the interview concluded that, in a culture as troubled as ours, the “education/catechesis” model was going to have only limited effects. Both agreed that deeper cultural changes and healing would be required in order for marriage (and many other things) to recover substantially and statistically.
Let me ponder with you a deep but often unexplored root of the trouble with marriage today. It is interesting because it actually emerges from something good, but something that is good in a detached and therefore unmoored sense: our high idealism about marriage. Let me explain.
We live in times that have become quite cynical about anything being good or noble or pure. But many today still have an extremely high ideal for marriage: that it should be wonderful, romantic, joyful, loving, and happy. Yes, this is quite an ideal, rather rooted in the dreamy wishes of romantic longing, but an ideal nonetheless. Amor omnia vicit! (Love conquers all!) Surely we will live happily ever after the way every story says!
But here’s the problem: Many want their marriage to be ideal, and if there is any ordeal, they want a new deal! Yes, many are wandering about thinking, as in the U2 song, “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for!”
Yes, the problem is that there is no ideal marriage, only real marriage. Two sinners have married. A man and a woman with fallen natures, living in a fallen world, governed by a fallen angel, have entered the Sacrament of Holy Matrimony. But, like the graces of any Sacrament, those of Holy Matrimony are necessary not because things are wonderful, but because they are oftentimes difficult. Marriage is meant to sanctify but, like baptism, its offered graces gradually unfold, and they do so to the degree and at the speed with which the couple cooperates with God’s work.
Real marriage is going to take a lifetime of joy and challenges, tenderness and tension, difficulties and growth in order for a man and woman to summon each other to the holiness that God gives. And some of God’s gifts come in strange packages; struggles and irritations are often opportunities to grow and to learn what forgiveness, patience, and suffering are really all about. These are precious things to learn and to grow in. Frankly, if we don’t learn to forgive we are going to go to Hell (e.g., Mt 6:14-15). Even the best marriages have tensions. No tension means no change.
This may not be the ideal, “happily ever-after” marriage, but it is the real one, full of joy, love, hope, and tenderness, but also sorrow, anger, disappointment, and stresses.
The real problem comes not from our ideals about marriage, which are good to strive for, but from the fact that we conceive of these ideals in a hedonistic and “instant-gratification” culture.
Hedonism is the “doctrine” that the chief goals of life in this world are happiness and pleasure. (The Greek word hedone means “pleasure.”) In the hedonistic view, any diminishment of pleasure or happiness is the worst thing imaginable, a complete disaster. On account of this “doctrine,” many insist on a kind of God-given right to be happy and pleased. Even many devout Christians fall prey to the very exaggerated notions of hedonism and excuse some pretty selfish and sinful behaviors by saying, “Well, God wants me to be happy doesn’t He?” And thus, when the Church or an individual suggests that perhaps someone should do what is difficult, the hedonistic culture reacts, not with puzzlement, but with downright indignation, as if to say, “How dare you get between anyone and what makes him happy!”
So, our notion of an ideal (happy, fulfilling, blissful) marriage is seen through the lens of hedonistic extremism. And thus if the ideal is not found, many sense a need, a perfect right, to end a less-than-ideal marriage in search of greener pastures.
And this is just one more thing added to our instant gratification culture of “overnight shipping,” “Buy it with one click,” and “Download now!” If the ideal marriage is not evident very soon, the disappointments and resentments come quickly.
Yes, resentments. There is an old saying: “Unrealistic expectations are premeditated resentments.” How quickly our unrealistic notions of the instantly ideal, picture-perfect marriage are dashed on the shoals of reality. And thus we return to the premise: many want their marriage to be ideal, and if there is any ordeal, they want a new deal.
Somewhere, not only in the Church’s marriage preparation programs but also in our work of assisting personal formation, we need to teach and become aware that unrealistic expectations are ultimately destructive. Our ideals are not the problem per se, but we must become more sober of our conception of our ideals through the lens of hedonism and instant gratification. Growth takes time. Life moves through stages. Marriage is hard … but so is life. Cutting and running from the imperfect marriage, as too many do rather quickly today, is not the ultimate solution. Sure enough, one imperfect marriage yields another and perhaps yet another.
Rest assured, I do not sit in judgment over everyone who has ever divorced. I speak here to a cultural trend (perfectionism jaded by hedonism and instant gratification) that contributes to the perceived need and “right” to “move on” if happiness is not quickly and stably attained. In the (even recent) past we tended more to stick things out, to work through some of our differences and to agree to live with others of our differences. Life was more seen as hard, a kind of exile to endure on our way to our true homeland and to true happiness. Surely we looked to some joys here on earth, but we had more of a sense of the passing quality of all worldly things, whether good or bad. We would do well to regain something of this more sober appreciation that life here is a mixed bag; it’s going to have its challenges. Marriage is no exception. And though we may idealize it, we should be aware that we are setting ourselves up for resentments and disappointments if we do not balance it with the understanding that marriage is hard because life is hard.
Clearly there are many other problems that contribute to today’s high divorce rates. But here is one often overlooked root: many expect an ideal marriage, and if there is any ordeal, they want a new deal. (And we would do well to remember that in a world with adults behaving like this, it is the children who get the raw deal.) This is a deep cultural root of our divorce problem, a deep wound of which we should become more aware.
Ping!
The most common reason I find for a marriage failing is that one or both stop valuing the family over themselves.
Nicely put!
Somewhat in line with what Msgr. Pope is saying, I think a key error occurs when spouses view their family as a vehicle to satisfy their personal desires, rather than as an institution that has an existence of its own, greater than either of them individually, greater than both of them together.
One of my college professors, a Korean, talked about his family as a boat moving through time. He and his wife and children were among the current passengers/crew, but the “family boat” had a past, present, and future bigger than all the current passengers.
I’ve tried to cultivate in my own family the attitude that we all have to serve the organization, crew the boat, to some extent. We are not only the crew of the family boat, but that’s part of the life vocation for every family member, and it has to be taken seriously. I think it’s perfectly reasonable to ask, about a proposed activity or expressed desire, “How does this benefit the family?”
I currently work where husbands and wife make purchases that both of them use equally. Nine times out of ten, when there is a difference of opinion, the husbands will either acquiesce to his wife or if he holds firm the wife will return the product or part of it. Feminism has turned the home's chain-of-command on its head. Men and women both have been propagandized to accept that biblical patriarchy is some form of injustice. 75% - 90% of divorces depending on which source is referenced, are filed and instigated by the woman. Feminism has made its goal the destruction of patriarchy by means of the elimination of marriage. Women have been taught that they are victims, they have been encouraged to complain and be discontent. Both Husband and wife have been inculcated to view love and lust as the proper context for sex rather than marriage for the proper context for sex. Wives have been instructed and encouraged by the clergy to withhold sex until her husband does something or other.
There has never been a greater threat to families - Feminism is thy name!
What is the product?
The reason for the failure of most marriages is in a word: Feminism. —
I believe it is money-
tied to Soooo many mothers- (started in the 40’s/50’s)
moving into the work force— HEY that EXTRA cash really
Helps!!- to Hell with raising the children, to Hell
with making a home, to hell with my husband.—
Come to think about it... to hell we all go
Feminism has taught women they don’t need men in a family.
Pray America wakes
This is a good reminder: “Two sinners have married.”
Cynics don’t know what to do with that info. But followers of Christ can humbly reflect on that truth, to the benefit of their marriages.
Love is an affirmative act, it does not just happen.
We SPEAK Love into existence just as God spoke light into existence.
“Being unequally yoked with a non-believer” is a major problem as well.
Five love languages, great book, secret to a happy marriage. Its about meeting each others needs, sure you can delude yourself that religion can make you a better spouse but our base nature is to have our needs met, how we are wired.
As an aside this type of thinking, the self flagellation, to impugn yourself is just as corrosive as “sinning”. We are not BORN sinners, we sin as an conscious act of rebellion. This is bad theology a construct of the nan made religion. A dog is born to bark, a bird to fly, a dolphin to swim. We are not born to murder, steal and cheat on our wives. We are born perfect, not corrupted or flawed. We CHOOSE to act one way or another. Adam ran and hid in the garden not because he was disgusting in God’s eyes but because he PERCIEVED himself as disgusting. A distinction with a difference.
Ah, that explains it. A mattress is a female mat, and a man needs only a mat.
(OK, it sounded funny when I first thought of it.)
LOL I actually got it.
Speaking from personal experience here.
We were on the brink. We went to counseling. One of the exercises was to write out the top five things that you valued in your marriage—what you were willing to work for.
We did them apart and brought them to the next meeting.
All five were the same. We had the order of #4 and #5 switched.
I got goose bumps and teary eyes. The counselor said that the score was usually three out of five. Almost never five for five.
After that moment everything started getting better.
We get so busy and drawn apart. The grass starts looking better EVERYWHERE else. But, I doubt I was ever going to find anyone who could give me, or me them, 5 out of 5.
And tomorrow is 28 years for us.
I used to say 28 years, 25 of the best years of my life.
But that is a lie. Even in the bad ones I learned important lessons. And, boy...I don’t want to learn them again!
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