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When i was new in the church, the whole idea for marriage to last for eternity was another cool doctrine. As a single person, finding someone I loved and got along with, and to know that relationship would survive forever pending meeting certain conditions was marvelous. Another reason to the join the church. Fast forward a couple years into marriage. I was not happy. There were many unexpected things, and I was extremely miserable and confused about how someone’s view of the world could be so different than mine. Even on basic matters like hygeine, overpowering stench from animals commented on by others, the role of work in life, etcetera. Some of you know about other issues that were distressing for a 28 year old man at the time.
What kept me in the marriage was this “commitment” aspect I BELIEVED formed part of the marriage covenant. That I had agreed to stay with the person for eternity (as far as I can remember). Now, 25 years later involving a lot of staying, and trying, and having many ups and many, many, deep downs, I am starting to question this whole temple marriage thing. Here’s why
1. Why keep trying if it makes you miserable?
All of a sudden, eternal marriage is a poison pill if you believe no further amount of trying is going to lead to a general level of happiness. You aren’t relieved from your suffering at death — it continues into eternity with process and stigma attached if you are even able to cancel the sealing after death. Not sure if you lose your kids being sealed to you, something no one ever discussed…
I will remember one investigator on my mission who was married and was progressing pretty well in the investigator lessons. It looked like a sure thing he’d be baptized, and we had a date set. Then he turned cold. In confidence, he told us it was the eternal marriage concept we had taught him at the end of the lessons. He said his life with his wife was miserable, and that he only stayed for the kids. If he was baptized, she’d want to push him for temple marriage, and he said no way. If he had to be with her for eternity he would “refuse to die”.
2. It divides families.
Although no one said much about it, I know it’s a sad thing to my wife and daughter that I sat in the reception room of the temple at my daughter’s wedding. She called me in tears a while ago apologizing if she’d ever been judgmental about my attitude toward the church. She had a day when she didn’t want to go, felt out of touch with the Ward, etcetera. The empathy took over.
The thing was, I wasn’t aware of the judgmentalism she was apologizing for….so I assume it exists due to the fact I wasn’t in the temple with her when she got married.
And of course, the whole thing where non-members are excluded from the big day since no civil wedding is allowed.
This was something I thought about a lot when I started opening up to the idea of a non-temple marriage to a non-member. One day, I had this realization: would I rather be with a 9/10 for 60 years or be stuck with a 8/10 for eternity? The choice seemed obvious to me: 9/10 nonmember > 8/10 member. I felt that temple marriage limited my options enough that it would force me to settle on someone I don’t really like all that much andbe stuck with her for eternity. Somewhere down the road, I had this realization that the expectation for lifelong marriage might actually be silly as well. I think it’s best to avoid divorce while raising children, but aside from that, I see no real objective reason why married couples should have to stay together their whole lives. People change. Goals change. Sometimes, that sort of relationship ceases to be meaningful or even becomes harmful. Sometimes it continues on, strong as ever. The way I see it, it’s fine either way. Divorce isn’t necessarily a failure.
Perhaps the reason that divorce was frowned upon for so long is because women didn’t work and needed husbands to provide for them. Now that we’ve let go of the idea that women shouldn’t work, divorce isn’t quite as earth-shattering as it once was.
1) Old-Timer has told me (with scripture references) that whatever happens after death will be both just and wonderful beyond our wildest dreams. Different people have different ideas about what a perfect heaven will be like – theoretically all these people would be satisfied by what happens.
2) I like the ideal of eternal families and the focus on families generally. I believe that LDS families are better than average as far as providing a safe, wholesome, home life.
I look at it as a general standard that has exceptions and is not helpful for all people at all times.
Beefster wrote:
Somewhere down the road, I had this realization that the expectation for lifelong marriage might actually be silly as well. I think it’s best to avoid divorce while raising children, but aside from that, I see no real objective reason why married couples should have to stay together their whole lives. People change. Goals change. Sometimes, that sort of relationship ceases to be meaningful or even becomes harmful. Sometimes it continues on, strong as ever. The way I see it, it’s fine either way. Divorce isn’t necessarily a failure.
I can understand this in theory. I think that setting divorce as the default setting (rather then lifelong marriage as is our current cultural default setting) is that it opens some cans of worms that may be a problem. There is a different mindset if you approach a problem knowing you can “bug out” at any moment if you or the other person change too much rather then expending the energies needed to get through the rough patches that lead to a more rewarding marriage. Also, who is going to become a support system for the person if the couple gets too old, divorce because “People changed” due to illness or age, and the parties decide on a late age divorce. It’s fine if there are people who decide to shoulder the old of taking care of the parents in the equation because they divorced, but if there aren’t others (adult children, other relatives, or good friends), then the costs of care will be absorbed by the state and attendant financial issues.
I agree that divorce is not a failure, but I don’t think it should be the default mindset at this point in time.
Beefster wrote:
Perhaps the reason that divorce was frowned upon for so long is because women didn’t work and needed husbands to provide for them. Now that we’ve let go of the idea that women shouldn’t work, divorce isn’t quite as earth-shattering as it once was.
As a person who has been closer to divorce then she would like (and yes, I am the breadwinner of the family so that wasn’t it), it’s really not simple.
For marriage to have meaning, the idea of being able to change up to someone else the way that a person changes a shirt is cold, calculating, and defeats an essential part of marriage. Part of my meaning and identity is derived from having a spouse who sees me in a certain way, and fulfills/handles things that I cannot. I can learn to become an automated, self-sufficient person. I have faith that I could rebuild my life successfully and with meaning if I got a divorce. But my spouse and I work through the marriage because in our narrative, divorce is not on the table for us (for right now). I am not saying that it won’t ever be on the table or a matter of serious consideration, but that is not our focus. Our focus is that we are an eternal (or at least life-long) unit and we need to develop the protocols, family culture, and patterns of behavior that work for us and strengthen our teamwork. It might change once our children are grown.
I wonder if we rush marriage in the LDS. i am SA and have found no one but the idea of marrying what may have been my childhood sweetheart? One was mostly lesbian AFAIK, another a sociopath, and another plain boring. None of them quite got me. I believe anyone living for “eternity” would get depressed or go insane (married or not). I also think the world is built in cycles… things are born, they die, they are reborn, they die again. Circle of life, and all that. IMHO, believing something is bound to last forever, leads to taking it for granted, and bitterness at its loss. But setting that aside… I agree with Amy. If a marriage isn’t entered in with the intent to last at least a lifetime, it’s not a marriage. What would you be promising in your marriage vow? “I promise to stay with you, as long as its convenient. I promise to cherish you unless I find someone I like better. I promise to stand by you as long as we’re in love and you make me happy.” That’s no commitment. There is no security. You might as well not say anything at all, and save the expense. I think the main reason divorce is so high is not because women can (and IMHO are expected to) work. I think it’s for two reasons:
1. We’ve overly romanticized marriage.
2. We’re increasingly individualistic.
From our earliest days, we’ve been brought up with a strong sense of
Romanticism. We are taught that we must find “The One”. We will fall in love without even trying, understand each other perfectly without even speaking. They’ll understand our needs perfectly, and jump to fulfill those needs in just the right way. We’ll feel exactly the same about each other 5… or even 50 years into marriage as we did on our wedding day. Sex will passionate and harmonious, and it will happen on average once a day. We will always enjoy their company and share common interests, and as Beefster touched on, common goals. Beefster suggests that the fact these expectations are wrong (which I agree) should be reason enough to disband a marriage (which I do not). It’s a problem of expectations, not a problem with marriage itself. Special note for Beefster:9/10 men get the WORST deal out of a divorce. I’m saying this from a completely secular standpoint. Women far too often get the kids, the house, the wealth… they have many resources to lean on, both socially, psychologically, and financially. Men will almost always end up paying alimony, even if the wife works. Depression for men skyrockets, and so does suicide. It’s a raw deal for men. For your sake, I’d rather see you “living in sin”, than in a marriage with the intent to divorce. Individualism has a lot of bad sides. It also means selfishness and loneliness. AmyJ wrote:
For marriage to have meaning, the idea of being able to change up to someone else the way that a person changes a shirt is cold, calculating, and defeats an essential part of marriage. Part of my meaning and identity is derived from having a spouse who sees me in a certain way, and fulfills/handles things that I cannot.
I agree. I almost blew a gasket in an LDS marriage class when another participant said that if one spouse fails to live up to covenants the worthy spouse will be reassigned to a worthy partner in the eternities. The thought that a lifetime of shared experiences, living, loving, striving, and crying together (in short becoming one) could be made interchangeable with any TR carrying priesthood holder was maddening. Luckily the instructor saw my reaction and handled it like a pro. He said something to the effect that there are many details of the next life that we do not know but we do know that God will be fair and merciful.
Quote:But my spouse and I work through the marriage because in our narrative, divorce is not on the table for us (for right now). I am not saying that it won’t ever be on the table or a matter of serious consideration, but that is not our focus. Our focus is that we are an eternal (or at least life-long) unit and we need to develop the protocols, family culture, and patterns of behavior that work for us and strengthen our teamwork. It might change once our children are grown.
We do not say the D (divorce) word to each other in our marriage. The idea is that if we were to threaten divorce in anger then the feeling of safety and stability in our marriage would be undermined. No longer feeling safe to be vulnerable, we both may begin withholding certain aspects of our selves and grow distant over time.
In my life, I find significant value in being wholly known, accepted, and supported by a single lifetime spouse. I cannot say that life will not throw me a curveball but my plan is to give everything I have to my marriage and hold nothing back. (I can imagine if something terrible happened and my current wife left me or died then I would remarry and subsequently give everything to that subsequent marriage.)
Roy wrote:
We do not say the D (divorce) word to each other in our marriage.
We’ve got that rule too. It’s a very good rule to live by. My wife has told me, if I’m abusive, she’d leave me, but we will always be married. It’s given me a lot of comfort and strength to know our marriage is forever.
dande48 wrote:
Special note for Beefster:9/10 men get the WORST deal out of a divorce. I’m saying this from a completely secular standpoint. Women far too often get the kids, the house, the wealth… they have many resources to lean on, both socially, psychologically, and financially. Men will almost always end up paying alimony, even if the wife works. Depression for men skyrockets, and so does suicide. It’s a raw deal for men. For your sake, I’d rather see you “living in sin”, than in a marriage with the intent to divorce.
I have no intent to marry with the intent to divorce for that very reason. I’m just saying maybe there is something worth reconsidering for society at large. I think monogamous marriage is absolutely critical for raising children in the healthiest way possible (so marriage when there are kids at home should be kept together at all costs, so long as it isn’t abusive), but outside that role it only has minor societal benefits such as lower rates of STDs and deeper emotional connections (which are really more of personal benefits). Making marriage last as long as possible is the way to go, but accepting divorce as a real possibility and in some cases the best option is a healthier way to look at it IMO than insisting that every married couple suffer trying to make it work. Yes, many marriages can and should be saved, but some shouldn’t and that’s okay. I think people should go into marriage recognizing that it might end in a divorce, but at the same time not treat it as the easy way out, realizing that if it comes to that, it doesn’t make them bad people or failures.Humans didn’t really evolve to be lifelong monogamous. In fact, it’s a very rare trait in the animal kingdom (though it’s not uncommon for animals to be monogamous while raising their young). It’s honestly impressive it has worked as well as it has.
I think I hear you saying that lifelong monogamy is the general ideal however individual circumstances may require individual adaptation. I agree with that. Indeed if I found myself single tomorrow, I would not become celibate. I would eventually seek a new relationship. Therefore, in a way, I am serially monogamous. That does not take away from the fact that as long as my relationship lasts I will remain loyal, committed, and devoted to it.
Roy wrote:
I agree with that. Indeed if I found myself single tomorrow, I would not become celibate.
My forecast is that I would never get married again. I think I would be lonely, but I wouldn’t seek another relationship. The freedom from the many expectations others bring to you — -that you never imagined, plus the circumstances life throws at you because of your relationship with another person make it difficult — illness, other unexpected personality traits.
Having raised all my children (almost), and had that experience. I think I would enjoy being single. My life as a married person has allowed me to be somewhat independent emotionally, spiritually and in other ways, so I don’t think it would be much different, except I’d probably have bouts of loneliness on Friday and Saturday evenings.
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