The Case for Earlier Marriage?

I'm not sure I agree with all his arguments, but I thought this article in Christianity Today was an interesting piece about the problems of abstinence education and the trend of later marriages in Evangelical Christian circles (much of it can be applied to Catholics as well). Here's a tidbit:

Virginity pledges. Chastity balls. Courtship. Side hugs. Guarding your heart. Evangelical discourse on sex is more conservative than I've ever seen it. Parents and pastors and youth group leaders told us not to do it before we got married. Why? Because the Bible says so. Yet that simple message didn't go very far in shaping our sexual decision-making.

So they kicked it up a notch and staked a battle over virginity, with pledges of abstinence and accountability structures to maintain the power of the imperative to not do what many of us felt like doing. Some of us failed, but we could become "born again virgins." Virginity mattered. But sex can be had in other ways, and many of us got creative.

...It might sound like I devalue abstinence. I don't. The problem is that not all abstainers end up happy or go on to the great sex lives they were promised. Nor do all indulgers become miserable or marital train wrecks. More simply, however, I have found that few evangelicals accomplish what their pastors and parents wanted them to.

Indeed, over 90 percent of American adults experience sexual intercourse before marrying. The percentage of evangelicals who do so is not much lower. In a nationally representative study of young adults, just under 80 percent of unmarried, church- going, conservative Protestants who are currently dating someone are having sex of some sort. I'm certainly not suggesting that they cannot abstain. I'm suggesting that in the domain of sex, most of them don't and won't.

What to do? Intensify the abstinence message even more? No. It won't work. The message must change, because our preoccupation with sex has unwittingly turned our attention away from the damage that Americans—including evangelicals—are doing to the institution of marriage by discouraging it and delaying it.

...The abstinence industry perpetuates a blissful myth; too much is made of the explosively rewarding marital sex life awaiting abstainers. The fact is that God makes no promises of great sex to those who wait. Some experience difficult marriages. Spouses wander. Others cannot conceive children.

In reality, spouses learn marriage, just like they learn communication, child-rearing, or making love. Unfortunately, education about marriage is now sadly perceived as self-obvious, juvenile, or feminine, the domain of disparaged home economics courses. Nothing could be further from the truth.

In sum, Christians need to get real about marriage: it's a covenant helpmate thing that suffers from too much idealism and too little realism.Weddings may be beautiful, but marriages become beautiful. Personal storytelling and testimonies can work wonders here, since so much about life is learned behavior. Young adults want to know that it's possible for two fellow believers to stay happy together for a lifetime, and they need to hear how the generations preceding them did it.

Abstinence is not to blame for our marital crisis. But promoting it has come at a cost in a permissive world in which we are increasingly postponing marriage. While I am no fan of the demographic realities I outlined earlier, one thing I will remember is that while sex matters, marriage matters more. The importance of Christian marriage as a symbol of God's covenantal faithfulness to his people—and a witness to the future union of Christ and his bride—will only grow in significance as the wider Western culture diminishes both the meaning and actual practice of marriage. Marriage itself will become a witness to the gospel.

If you have time, go check out the article. I particularly appreciated his thoughts on the extended adolescence of young males, a subject Mr. Red and I have discussed at length as we would like to avoid this with our boys. In addition, I appreciated how he highlighted the things parents sometimes do to discourage young marriage, as many have a preconceived notion for their children as to the right time for them to marry. I'm not saying we should all push our children into marriage at the age of 19--definitely not--but rather that we often have ideas about what should be accomplished before a good marriage can take place (such as college, grad school, financial stability), and that sometimes our notions may interfere with God's more perfect plan for the vocation of our children. Obviously each situation is different, which is why I find my own "plan" for my children so glaringly problematic!

I was a little uncomfortable with the strong emphasis on sex--which is typical of my feelings regarding some Evangelical discussions on marriage--but I think his overall point that the current societal trends are working against God's design for our body was both very accurate and compelling. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

8 years ago today

I've seen this floating around on some other blogs. Since my romantic side is still under development, I figured answering these questions was a pretty low key way to let you all know a little bit about my relationship with Mr. Red ;-) Enjoy!

1. Where or how did you meet? 6th grade homeroom

2. How long after you met did you start dating? Late senior year of high school

3. How long did you date before you were engaged? 4 years. We got engaged after our junior year of college while celebrating our 4 year dating anniversary.

4. How long was your engagement? 13.5 months

5. How many people came to your wedding reception? 212, and I can't believe I still remember that number.

6. What kind of cake did you serve? Vanilla pound cake with real buttercream icing, we went for taste over looks.

7. Where was your wedding? In the Catholic church of our hometown. Our reception site was about 25 minutes away, just a mile up the road from where we live now.

8. What did you serve for your meal? Chilean Sea Bass (my favorite) and Filet Mignon (Mr. Red's favorite).

9. How many people were in your bridal party? 6 bridesmaids and 5 groomsmen (why do they have to be the same number anyway?)

10. Are you still friends with them all? I'm still friends with all the of the bridesmaids (2 were relatives), including B-mama, but we have lost touch with one of the groomsmen.

11. Did you or your spouse cry during the ceremony? No, but I was so nervous that I was shaking as I said my vows. Mr. Red still laughs at me whenever we watch our wedding video.

12. Most special moment of your wedding day? There are so many it is hard to pick just one, so I'll pick 3. 1) The feeling we both had when leaving the church--pure joy! 2) Our best man's toast--it was short and sweet and beautiful. And 3) looking around at the reception and realizing that everyone in my life that I love was right there in that room celebrating with us--such a gathering will never happen again.

13. Any funny moments? As we were about to go into the church, my Dad let me know this was my last chance to bail ;-)

14. Any big disasters? It rained so hard that the corridor between the hotel and our reception room flooded. I had no idea until the wedding coordinator frantically informed me that they were cleaning it up, and then begged me not to tell my mother.

15. Where did you go on your honeymoon? We went to Bar Harbor in Maine for a week. 9 months later we took a longer 2nd honeymoon to Europe. We visited Paris and Rome, and had our marriage blessed by John Paul II!

16. If you were to do your wedding over, what would you change? I would have worn a different head-piece, and possibly cut a few guests off our list.

17. What side of the bed do you sleep on? The right, but I'd prefer the left. This is just one of the many compromises in our marriage.

18. Greatest strength as a couple? Our communication and our sense of humor.

19. Greatest challenge as a couple? Our communication. And of course, the death of our daughter Therese Joy.

20. Who literally pays the bills? Mr. Red.

21. What is your song? Grow Old with Me. Mr. Red played this song for me after he proposed. We danced to it at our wedding.

22. Describe your wedding dress: V neck, capped sleeves, A-line, heavily beaded with lace up top that carried through the waist and train. Covered buttons down the back, large poof at the bottom with large heavily beaded lace train. I bought this dress after going to one store, and trying on less than 15 dresses. I wanted it to be big, as I figured I'd never wear a dress like that again in my life.

23. Are your wedding bands engraved? Yes. They are engraved with our wedding date and the reference (John 17:23) to a verse that we hope and pray represents our marriage: "With me in them and you in me, may they be so perfected in unity that the world will recognize that it was you who sent me and that you have loved them as you have loved me."

24. What are you doing to celebrate your anniversary? We are going to a Phillies game and eating cheesesteaks--my pick!

Thanks for reading! I have many prayers of thanksgiving today for my husband, and for all the wonderful marriages of friends and family we have been able to witness through the years.

Comfort Levels

As Mr. Incredible was about to head out the door with the two big boys, I jokingly suggested he take Incredibaby along, too.

His response: "If we have N children I think I will be comfortable handling N-1!"

I hear you sweetie! Some days I think I can handle N-N children (you do the math) and other days when I long for N children to the Nth power!

Maybe we'll keep up our record N children in N years of marriage. 4 years, 3 boys here and 1 in heaven. Happy 4th Anniversary, my love!

How we handle Paper

Erin wrote:

Our biggest problem area is paper-- mail, bills, cards, owners manuals, newspapers, interesting magazine articles, letters, shopping lists, coupons, receipts we think we might need but really never will... all this paper seems to take over our kitchen and family room and drive me crazy. Any tips for controlling the paper frenzy?

My father in law has a saying "you take your mail, and you deal with it" -- what that meant to the young adults who had come back to the nest after college was that if you mail was not off the counter by the next morning it would be thrown away! I am not a "paper person" by nature, but I really took this advice to heart, and I think that my husband and I have found a great way of dealing with our paper, so perhaps it will work for others.

We have a drawer of our living room desk devoted to mail. It used to be a basket, so if you don't have a drawer, no worries. When I get the mail, the trash goes straight in the trash, the bills, invitations and other things go into the drawer, often unopened. I also throw in doctors receipts that my husband will need to submit at work, papers from household maintenance, anything that is going to need to get filed or dealt with.

Every (almost) Sunday night after the kids are in bed we sit down and sort through the drawer. We pay the bills, or put them back to pay the next week. We balance our check book, we look over our calendar and make any plans for the coming week or month. My husband puts the things that he needs to take to the office right into his bag. If it is not too late, I might RSVP for parties right then, too, or else I make myself a little Monday morning "to do" list.

We have a large file box (plastic, from Staples), we have moved so often that a file cabinet did not make sense for us, but we may switch over to that in the future. At the end of each Sunday meeting, there are usually two or three things that need to get filed. You can google for a list of what papers and receipts really need to get saved and which can get thrown out or shredded.

If we do our filing right then, it only takes a few minutes because the pile is always small. The bills tend to come in heavier some weeks of the month than others, but even on a busy week the process only takes about a half an hour.

Now -- once this system is going it really is easy, but this may not seem helpful if you have a dining table full of mail and more mail coming in every day. Here is what I would do -- make two baskets. One will be your ongoing Sunday (or some other time) meeting basket, and new mail will go in there. Into the other basket, sweep all that nagging paper that is cluttering up your surfaces. For the next few weeks, when you sit down to meeting, do the new basket first, then plan to spend half an hour sorting through old stuff. Do NOT stay up all night working on it, just do some and stop. When two of you are working, this goes really fast, I do secretarial stuff like address envelopes, open letters, etc, while my husband pays the bills online, so it all goes really quickly. If you have a super ton of paper that needs to get dealt with, you might want to tackle that basket a few extra nights a week until you get caught up, but don't sit down to it until your other evening chores are finished, dishes, etc. Put down your knitting or other hobbies for a few days until you get it all under control, but really, it will go fast. Have a trash can right at your feet, and if there is stuff that you cannot decide about on your own, move it to the Sunday basket to discuss with your husband.

Our file box has a lot of categories, but since we bought our own house I have decided to also keep a home maintenance notebook that is separate from the file box. I keep this in another drawer of the secretary, and for now I am just tossing things that need to go into the notebook in the drawer. One quiet evening I will sit down with my whole puncher and catch up those files so that will also switch to something that just has to be maintained.

I also have a notebook for recipes that I keep on the shelf with my cookbooks, if I pull something out of a magazine, print it out or get it from a friend it goes into that notebook.

With this baby (#5), I have used one all season diaper bag the whole time and I have kept the baby's immunization and growth record right in a pocket of that bag, and this way I don't have to remember it when I go to the doctor. Mrs. Kennedy (the mother of John F.) kept a note card file for each of her children's health records, which I don't do but think is a great idea, it would be an easy thing to jot down "stomach flu" or "well visit" or "head lice" and the date, and hopefully you never need the record but if you have a child who turns out to be chronically ill, it would help, for example, a certain number of ear infections per year and you are supposed to get tubes, but in the midst of the nasty ear infected winter can you remember if your child had six or three last year, or who had what? I have a terrible memory, so a paper trail would really help.

Well, I hope that some of those are things that can help you conquer the paper trail. If Sunday night is not good for you, or if you pay the bills alone, I still think it is great to have a regular time to do it so that it will really get done.

One last thing. I can't say that we always do this, but I try hard to remember to offer some prayers during this Sunday meeting, prayers for the activities we have coming in our week, prayers for generous hearts and good stewardship of what we have, prayers of thanksgiving that we are able to pay our bills, even on the weeks when things seem really tight or tense. This helps us to have perspective. Oh, and if your husband doesn't want to do this with you, you can tell him that looking at the bills each month has been a reality check for me, and they say the one who pays the bills spends less, so if you do it together you will have better stewardship of your money -- I go around turning off lights now like I am my own grandpa, and I love to watch the electric bill go down!

Work I Never Expected

I can remember the day I sat down with a friend to hear how the first months of her marriage had gone. She was one of the first of "my girls" to get married--the rest of us looking to her to report back on her marital findings before the we "took the plunge"! We were meeting up at a coffee shop and I couldn't wait to hear about how "over the moon" she was now being married to her beloved husband; how they were madly in love; how their intimacy was like no other; how life was like clockwork and she and her hubby like peas and carrots.

We sat down and began to chat...

"B, marriage is great, but its hard," she began, "It really takes work."

"What? No way!" I responded. Her thoughts were a shocker to my romanticized notions.

I laugh now when I think back to my innocent response. Wasn't marriage supposed to be a trip to the end of the rainbow, a frolic through a happy field on the journey of life? Wasn't marriage supposed to be natural and easy and God-blessed at every moment?

I have come a far cry from such thoughts now six years into matrimony. Mine is a neophyte marriage compared to so many others, like my grandparents' marriage of 63 years plus. I can only hope that I'll someday gain the wisdom such veterans command, but I would like to think that the past six years have taught GG and I a bit as we've traveled this journey together. Along the way there are frequent highs, and the occasional low; level paths, and plenty of bumps. But throughout the journey, on the whole, we've tried to continually build one another up in our sacramental union, offering prayer and forgiveness along the way. And we haven't done too poorly at it, thanks be to God.

Inspired by Mary Alice's posting, I thought I'd pass along some of GG and my marital nuggets of wisdom to encourage all of our married readers out there:

1) If you're not working on your marriage, something else is at that moment working against it.

(Shared as a comment in MA's post) There are too many distractions in this world to think that marriage can be a free ride without effort. It's like oral hygiene: we must brush and floss everyday to maintain our tooth enamel and work against the forces of plaque. Even flipping on the TV at night can potentially be working against our marital union. Work schedules, worldly busyness, family obligations, etc.--all of these can take away from our personal investment in our marriages! We need to be constantly working at communicating, communing, loving, expressing, encouraging, etc. There is ALWAYS work to be done. We can never be idle in our commitment of love to one another.

2) No marriage is immune from sin.

GG and I talk often of how we need to be on guard against Satan and his attacks on our marriage. Humans are sinful creatures, called to be redeemed by Christ and to strive to live each day according to His Holy way. This is tough stuff, and no one is perfect at it! I am reminded of the verse discussing the Devil as a prowling cat:

"Be self-controlled and alert. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a
roaring lion seeking whom he may devour. Resist him and stand firm in
the faith..." I Peter 5:8-9

I cannot begin to express the sadness we've felt watching GOOD marriages fall victim to the woes of sin. People to whom GG and I have looked up have sadly fallen prey--wonderful Christian marriages and families... and the aftermath is not pretty. We want to desperately avoid such outcomes at all costs. Recognizing our own propensity toward sin and how it affects our marriage is a great way to start.

3) Our marriage relationship takes precedence above all other earthly relationships.

Children are blessed by having happy parents who are happily married. Investment in that husband-wife relationship should always take precedence. That investment can be made in many ways. For example, the occasional weekend away from the children might be just the ticket to encouraging a good marriage, even if the kids miss us so! On the work front, GG and I have committed to having mutual friends across all venues. Never will either of us foster relationships (particularly with the opposite gender) that don't involve knowledge and involvement by our spouse. I can remember having great working relationships with males in my department (back when I was teaching), but insisting that GG come into school and meet everybody and attend picnics in order to make friends with these male buddies of mine. Referring back to #2, GG and I recognize that no one, not even happily married Christians, can ever be too aware of the temptations that lurk within personal relationships.

4) It is never good to assume in a marriage. Our spouses aren't mind-readers.

GG and I get into big trouble when we begin to assume things about one another (and let's be honest, it's usually me assuming things about him!) Essentially, this point involves the need for GOOD communication always in a marriage. Here's a hypothetical example:

I am making dinner and the kids are a wreck, needing distraction. GG is busy tackling work in his study. Meanwhile, I become more and more exasperated that he is hearing the calamity and not coming to my aid. And there I am trying to make dinner to serve my family... I become the victim and GG the perpetrator. By the time dinner is ready, I am angry and ready to leave the dinner table upset and emotional.

In such a scenario, where have I gone wrong? I've made woeful assumptions in a variety of ways--I've assumed GG hears what's happening (though how do I really know?) I've assumed he knows I am trying to get things done and that the kids are driving me crazy (though how can he really know?). I assume that he's taking the easy way out and avoiding us altogether (though how is that fair to presume the worst in a spouse's intentions?). I assume that he is unwilling to help. ENOUGH!!!

All I have to do is ASK. GG is not a mind-reader and won't know my needs until I express them. Communication goes a long way to correcting such a situation! If I just humble myself enough to request his help (in a loving, non-accusatory, non-victimized way), GG is my knight-in-shining-armor and comes to the rescue----most of the time ;). There. Evening saved. :) We are definitely better off asking than assuming.

5) Marriage is more about the GIVE than the take.

As Catholics, GG and I are called to administer the Sacrament of Matrimony every day in our marriage. Administering means we are called to lay down our lives and humbly offer ourselves to one another always. Though we are not perfect at it, by focusing our relationship on service to one another, we are most often able to avoid the pitfalls of selfishness that can come and steal our day-to-day happiness. And an added benefit is that we feel most satisfied with each other when we are serving him/her.

Back to #1, though, it all still takes WORK. And work we will!

God bless you today in your marriages!!