Ship of Fools: What's your theology of marriage?

Thread: What's your theology of marriage? Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

Same-sex marriage discussions focus on who may get married. Divorce discussions focus on ending marriage and on remarriage. While these things are often passionately discussed, it can be harder to discover what we might believe about marriage itself.

So what makes a marriage good? How important is equality? Does marriage reflect or model something about God?

Posted by Macrina (# 8807) on :

I'll just start off by saying am not married. Nor do I really want to be. So my comments are biased in that direction.

What makes marriage good? I think it provides a degree of permanence and stabilty to relationships and a means of ensuring accountability from persons within a marriage towards the obligations that a partnership brings eg kids, shared possessions etc.

On the equality question I finding this harder as I get older. I would call myself a liberal and I identify as Queer in the broad sense so I hate listening to myself sound (to my own ears) like a relic from the 1800s.

I would like to firmly believe that gender roles are outdated and irrelevant but I really am beginning to question if this is so. I think we're actually doing harm to our society by seeking to establish equality by sameness and not equality which understands and respects differences in personhood. Femininity and masculinity are qualititively different things and I think we need to find an equality that allows for that whilst not placing barriers or restrictions on people. So maybe in the past marriage was a way of creating harmonious units of maleness and femaleness. I don't think this is the case anymore but I sympathise with people who do hold that view.

Does marriage reflect something about God? Maybe in its idealised form Christian marriage can be said to aspire to this. But I think it's more of an ideal than a reality.

Posted by Schroedinger's cat (# 64) on :

Marriage is a committed relationship, overlaid by a legal structure.

I am not sure I have a theology of marriage, because I don't think there is a theological aspect to it. It is good to ask for Gods blessing on such a relationship, as on all sorts of other things.

All of the biblical laws are actually about trust, fulfilling your expectations, doing what you promised. The commitment needs to stay even when things get difficult. But I don't think the idea of "promises in the sight of God" or "married in the eyes of God" mean anything. Surely all of our promises are in Gods eyes, because he is everywhere.

Posted by Marvin the Martian (# 4360) on :

quote:
Originally posted by hatless:
So what makes a marriage good?

Love.

quote:
How important is equality?

As important as the people in the marriage want it to be. So long as both parties freely agree to the roles each of them will play in the marriage, I don't see a problem with inequality per se.

quote:
Does marriage reflect or model something about God?

To the extent that it models love and commitment, yes it does reflect something about God.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

All perfectly good theology so far.

The trouble is in two thousand years time, the Universal Church will say that the Dead-Alive Dood said that,

"The commitment needs to stay even when things get difficult."

means that no matter that 'difficult' is a euphemism, no matter that the parties live in different cities and cannot communicate due to a horribly clever, subtle, worsening and utterly untreatable condition, no matter that all financial considerations are more than generously taken care of to a degree that is thought insane and a sign of guilt by outsiders, no matter that faith was irrevocably lost years before on one side, no matter that NOBODY sinned in the matter, that all the children are reconciled and in agreement and still supported, there is no freedom. No moving on from scorched earth, gutted grief. No grace. No forgiveness (of all the sins born of weakness and ignorance in the marriage, all repenetd of where known). No humanity. No love.

Posted by Adeodatus (# 4992) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Schroedinger's cat:
Marriage is a committed relationship, overlaid by a legal structure.

Yes: and I think it's very important to distinguish any theology of marriage from why governments promote marriage. Governments mostly promote marriage because of money - taxation, inheritance, and the expense of bringing up children. A theology of marriage probably shouldn't have much to say about money.

One thing in particular always struck me as odd about the CofE's claim to have a theology of marriage. As many will know, a CofE priest, presiding at a wedding, acts both as priest (witnessing the vows and giving the nuptial blessing) and registrar (making a legal record of the marriage). But there was a time when we weren't allowed to preside at the wedding of divorcees, but we were allowed to bless their civil marriage. In other words the Church didn't allow us to perform the legal function, but did allow us to act as priest. Surely if the CofE was saying something theological about the marriage of divorcees, it should have been the other way round?

This, and similar considerations, lead me to think that the CofE's theology of marriage is, always has been, and probably always will be, totally cuckoo.

My own theology of marriage is a mishmash of words like consent, commitment, intended permanence, and love in all possible meanings of the word. And it's in the last of these that I would say that a true marriage will always in some way be an ikon of Christ.

Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
I'll just start off by saying am not married. Nor do I really want to be. So my comments are biased in that direction.

What makes marriage good? I think it provides a degree of permanence and stabilty to relationships and a means of ensuring accountability from persons within a marriage towards the obligations that a partnership brings eg kids, shared possessions etc.

On the equality question I finding this harder as I get older. I would call myself a liberal and I identify as Queer in the broad sense so I hate listening to myself sound (to my own ears) like a relic from the 1800s.

I would like to firmly believe that gender roles are outdated and irrelevant but I really am beginning to question if this is so. I think we're actually doing harm to our society by seeking to establish equality by sameness and not equality which understands and respects differences in personhood. Femininity and masculinity are qualititively different things and I think we need to find an equality that allows for that whilst not placing barriers or restrictions on people. So maybe in the past marriage was a way of creating harmonious units of maleness and femaleness. I don't think this is the case anymore but I sympathise with people who do hold that view.

Does marriage reflect something about God? Maybe in its idealised form Christian marriage can be said to aspire to this. But I think it's more of an ideal than a reality.

Masculinity and femininity are social constructs and vary massively between cultures. They also vary across genders - aside from the fact that not everyone is male or female, many who self-identify as women are masculine and vice versa. Gender and gender identity are complex and fluid.

Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Masculinity and femininity are social constructs and vary massively between cultures. They also vary across genders - aside from the fact that not everyone is male or female, many who self-identify as women are masculine and vice versa. Gender and gender identity are complex and fluid.

This is often said, but the constructivist view always comes up against the evident biological structures. I think the correct way of saying this is that masculinity and femininity are both socially constructed and biologically constructed. One group may pee standing up, the other not so much.

Posted by MrsBeaky (# 17663) on :

quote:
Originally posted by no prophet One group may pee standing up, the other not so much.

Unless you live and work in rural Africa where the only thing available is a long drop latrine...take it from me, it's an acquired skill!

Still musing on the marriage question

Posted by Jade Constable (# 17175) on :

quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Masculinity and femininity are social constructs and vary massively between cultures. They also vary across genders - aside from the fact that not everyone is male or female, many who self-identify as women are masculine and vice versa. Gender and gender identity are complex and fluid.
This is often said, but the constructivist view always comes up against the evident biological structures. I think the correct way of saying this is that masculinity and femininity are both socially constructed and biologically constructed. One group may pee standing up, the other not so much.

No, this is deeply cissexist and transphobic. Sex =/= gender, many women have penises and many men have vulvas. And what does peeing standing up have to do with masculinity or femininity? You can identify as male and pee standing up and still be feminine. You can identify as male and be masculine and not be able to pee standing up.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

We think it retains the three ancient steps.

LEAVING: Originally intended to reflect leaving the parental home, We think it means a conscious putting behind oneself both the single state and existing relationship priorities.

BEING JOINED: Setting up a new family unit, establishing a new relationship priority in which your partner comes first, has preference over prior ties of friendship and family. The former ties do not disappear, but they are put in a subordinate place.

BECOMING ONE FLESH: Working out in practice what the leaving and the joining really mean; growing together, making the relationship work.

Scott Peck argued in "The Road Less Travelled" that in our society the journey from "falling in love" to "loving" was not easy. The cultural emphasis on love as primarily about feelings and desires gets in the way of the journey towards a less self-centred understanding. Unselfish loving is not always easy, can be very hard work, require a lot of mutual adjustment, much of which was not realised at the start.

The Ephesians 5 picture still comes across as a bit sexist, but it does contain the picture of mutual submission in love (where the word used always for love is agape - unselfish loving). Interesting how often 1 Cor 13 (which provides a kind of working definition of what unselfish loving is, and is not, is often read out at marriage services. Most of us find it easier to read than to live.

That's the challenge of a lifelong commitment in a marriage. To make that kind of loving work in the day to day of living together.

"Being joined" and "becoming one flesh" clearly picture the great joy of sexual union with someone you love. And there is no doubt that for most of us our journey starts there, whether with or without "benefit of legality or clergy".

It can't stay there. Unless our understanding of what love us can both embrace and transcend desire, we'll have difficulties in making a lifelong commitment work.

We find out a lot about ourselves and our partners in marriage that we may not have been aware of before the adventure began.

(B62 and Mrs B62, 45 "not out").

[ 07. March 2014, 12:50: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]

Posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras (# 11274) on :

My own view of marriage is that it is a committed relationship that involves an ultimate loyalty to one's partner. That loyalty - or fidelity, if you like - can only be achieved and maintained where there is love, and indeed I would say a self-sacrificial love. The nature of such a relationship creates and nurtures the possibility of the deepest sort of emotional intimacy.

That, of course, is the ideal, but the giving of oneself in loyalty (and you might also say in trust)to the other represents the necessary condition for the marriage to endure and to emotionally thrive. That is not to say, of course, that the ideal is necessarily perfectly achieved or maintained at all times, but there must be some adequate approach to the ideal for the marriage to endure, thrive, and nurture the two individuals in the relationship. That will likely require a capacity for self-reflection and repentence, as well.

So I think a true marriage reflects the enduring love and loyalty that we impute to the nature of God, while also reflecting the reciprocal characteristics of our faith response to God.

Trust, love, and the sense of empathy or ultimate concern for the well-being of the other(that which motivates the willingness to be self-sacrificing), are all tied together. Developmentally, for us as mammals, this closely-bound emotional triad stems from our essential neurological endowment interacting with a "good enough" experience of a parent who in turn adequately possesses these capacities.

Our subjective experience of the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love are reflections of our infantile/childhood experiences of nurturing mammalian parenting, enabling us to replicate the sense of parental mammalian bonding and reciprocal attachment in our relationships with others - most intimately so with the marital partner - as well as in our subjectivity in relationship to that which we call God.

For this to be more than just the reduction of God to our own biological responses (and hence no more than a code word or metaphorical concept), an incarnational theology is required, by which we understand the essential nature of God to be manifesting itself in that which God ultimately creates. That, of course, involves very big and difficult territory that is quite beyond the topic of marriage or the human animal itself [Smile]

That's how I work it out anyway: my personal experience, a little evolutionary biology, and a dash of theism [Razz]

Posted by que sais-je (# 17185) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras:
My own view of marriage is that it is a committed relationship that involves an ultimate loyalty to one's partner. That loyalty - or fidelity, if you like - can only be achieved and maintained where there is love, and indeed I would say a self-sacrificial love. The nature of such a relationship creates and nurtures the possibility of the deepest sort of emotional intimacy.

And if both partners feel that way, it becomes self reinforcing.

Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

Barnabas62 said

quote:
Working out in practice what .. making the relationship work .. to make that kind of loving work in the day to day .. difficulties .. we find out a lot

I really like the idea that marriage is difficult, not just because it happens to be hard, but that the difficulty is part of the point of it. Each couple has to embark on a journey of discovery - how can we make this work - which others can only help them with in a limited way, because every marriage is unique, and which has an uncertain outcome. This couple may not make it. When they have been married for forty years, they will still not be sure that they will make it. Marriage tests us all the way down.

I like Lietuvos S K's 'ultimate loyalty' for conveying this sense of the open-ended risk of marriage. I think a couple that had discovered exactly how to make their marriage work would actually have a dead marriage. I think the adventure of a marriage is part of what makes it good.

It's noteworthy that no one has suggested that marriage is about handing over the care for a woman from her father to her husband - although traditional weddings strongly suggest this.

Marriage has changed a great deal. Generation by generation we re-invent it. Our parents' experience is only a rough guide for us, and our children will have to learn new things for themselves.

I'm not sure that marriage is different in kind from any other deep relationship - a long term friendship, say - but I like the idea that it is a sacrament, that it draws attention to the character and presence of God. I like the idea that God is about the challenge of love and honesty bound together - about the challenge and living with it, and not about getting something right.

I think that's why the same-sex marriage debate (and the divorce debate) depresses me. Who cares about rights and wrongs? What matters is what we make of our deep relationships and what they make of us.

I think you can be faithfully divorced. I wonder if that's what Martin PC Not is saying? You can be true to the impossible outworking of a relationship and to the pain it leaves. And that's God too.

[ 07. March 2014, 18:31: Message edited by: hatless ]

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

Nice way of putting it hatless. Works for me. Sometimes love is NOT enough. Mutual love. By people in love. With each other. Who love each other. With no betrayal. Not a whisper in a quarter of a century. And it DOESN'T work. Believe me. You would I'm sure, but there are others that will say that 'sin', whatever that is, was in there. Yeah, plenty of sin born of the ignorance and weakness goes in to and comes out of the mix, but that's incidental.

People change. Out of all recognition including to themselves. People become different people. And not just due to pathology.

I'm being typically oblique because I must be. But to put it all down to 'sin' and one sin at that, adultery, is farcical. Idiotic. Wrong. Untrue.

It was worse than death. The pain. And then then it got worse.

And I'm NOW a grave and persistent unforgivable sinner?

Fine. That's not the first expression beginning with 'eff' that came to mind.

If that's what Jesus - Love incarnate - meant, then I don't know Him, never can, never will. Outer darkness for me please. It won't be as bad.

Posted by Macrina (# 8807) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:

On the equality question I finding this harder as I get older. I would call myself a liberal and I identify as Queer in the broad sense so I hate listening to myself sound (to my own ears) like a relic from the 1800s.

I would like to firmly believe that gender roles are outdated and irrelevant but I really am beginning to question if this is so. I think we're actually doing harm to our society by seeking to establish equality by sameness and not equality which understands and respects differences in personhood. Femininity and masculinity are qualititively different things and I think we need to find an equality that allows for that whilst not placing barriers or restrictions on people. So maybe in the past marriage was a way of creating harmonious units of maleness and femaleness. I don't think this is the case anymore but I sympathise with people who do hold that view.

Masculinity and femininity are social constructs and vary massively between cultures. They also vary across genders - aside from the fact that not everyone is male or female, many who self-identify as women are masculine and vice versa. Gender and gender identity are complex and fluid.

I entirely agree with you, which is why I am struggling to reconcile what I feel is something a little wrong with the way we are operating today, something I know was wrong in the past with how we operated and how we should ideally be operating in regards to roles within relationships and society.

I believe that gender and sexual identity are along a spectrum (and those two spectrums are separate) but people do tend to broadly group into areas along it which is why we have identies and labels that people adopt to describe themselves.

I am aware of research which shows male patterned brains are better at some things than female patterned brains and vis versa (not that these brains belong exclusively in bodies that match this patterning) so that's where I am coming from in feeling that same treatment does not mean equal treatment.

[code]

[ 08. March 2014, 07:15: Message edited by: Eutychus ]

Posted by Laurelin (# 17211) on :

I'm not married but my theology of marriage would be based on, among other things, Ephesians 5 ... from an egalitarian perspective. [Cool]

I have no truck with the idea that the wife is 'subservient' to her husband. I see marriage as a reciprocal partnership.

quote:
Originally posted by Macrina:
I think we're actually doing harm to our society by seeking to establish equality by sameness and not equality which understands and respects differences in personhood.

So do I. I genuinely fear that if society goes in that direction, it will start to lose touch with objective reality. Seriously.

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
No, this is deeply cissexist and transphobic. Sex =/= gender, many women have penises and many men have vulvas.

MANY women? MANY men? [Confused]

I know literally hundreds of women and men ... none of them fall into this category and I need hardly spell out why. Of course, if any of these friends of mine are intersex, that is absolutely none of my business. But nobody I know - gay or straight - is in denial about their actual biological gender.

I've read up very briefly on this 'cisgender' business (because I'd never heard of the concept until I recently came across the phrase in a fandom discussion). I had assumed it was shorthand for 'comfortable in skin'. Seems I was wrong [Hot and Hormonal]

... but I can't help wondering how this kind of intellectual jargon actually relates to real people on the real street.

I wasn't 'assigned' my gender at my birth. Nobody 'assigned' it to me. I was female in the womb, my gender wasn't conjured up as if by magic. Biological reality is not an illusion and it oppresses nobody to say that. I can't imagine living life as a man and have no desire whatsoever to be a man. How I express my femininity - yeah, sure, that's fluid, and of course feminine people can have masculine traits and vice-versa and so on. But that doesn't change the baseline of one's gender. IMO.

[ 08. March 2014, 16:30: Message edited by: Laurelin ]

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
This is often said, but the constructivist view always comes up against the evident biological structures.

The evident biological structures are not binary. Intersexuality is a thing. Look it up. Androgen-insensitivity is a thing. Look it up. XXY females are a thing. Look it up.

The binary "there are men and there are women" fails, even on a purely biological level, let alone taking into account phenomena for which we have as yet no strictly biological explanation, such as transgenderism. Let alone the social constructs of masculinity and femininity and third (or more) genders, which can be shown pretty easily to vary greatly from culture to culture.

quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
many women have penises and many men have vulvas.
MANY women? MANY men? I know literally hundreds of women and men ... none of them fall into this category and I need hardly spell out why. Of course, if any of these friends of mine are intersex, that is absolutely none of my business.

Then how the hell do you know what they have going on in their undershorts?

[Ultra confused]

[ 08. March 2014, 16:47: Message edited by: mousethief ]

Posted by Siegfried (# 29) on :

Why must there be a theology for marriage? Shouldn't the overall arc of Christ's teachings suffice? I think that's where a lot of individual Christians and churches get bogged down and into trouble--by assuming everything must have a specific theological link. Ultimately, it comes down to love God, love each other, and don't do bad things to each other.

Posted by Laurelin (# 17211) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Then how the hell do you know what they have going on in their undershorts?

No more than they know what's going on in mine ... [Biased]

But seriously. I don't know anyone who is confused about what sex they actually are.

Posted by leo (# 1458) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:
I know literally hundreds of women and men ... none of them fall into this category and I need hardly spell out why. Of course, if any of these friends of mine are intersex, that is absolutely none of my business. But nobody I know - gay or straight - is in denial about their actual biological gender.culine traits and vice-versa and so on. But that doesn't change the baseline of one's gender. IMO.

I absolutely fail to understand how you can know HUNDREDs. Maybe you are acquainted with them. And mere acquaintance isn't enough to KNOW what 'category' they fall into.

Posted by leo (# 1458) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Siegfried:
Why must there be a theology for marriage?

Because Christ is meant to transform our lives in EVERY realm. So everything should have a theology.

Because marriage is a sacrament.

Because marriage is a vocation.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
Then how the hell do you know what they have going on in their undershorts?

No more than they know what's going on in mine ...

But seriously. I don't know anyone who is confused about what sex they actually are.

You don't know anybody who lets YOU in on their confusion and pain.

Posted by Laurelin (# 17211) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
You don't know anybody who lets YOU in on their confusion and pain.

And how would you know that? You don't know me and you have no idea about whose confusion and pain I have listened to. Or am listening to.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
You don't know anybody who lets YOU in on their confusion and pain.
And how would you know that? You don't know me and you have no idea about whose confusion and pain I have listened to. Or am listening to.

Hundreds of men's and women's, clearly. I wrongly extrapolated from the fact that knowing the marital/pain level of hundreds of people is not usual, to thinking that might also apply to you. Especially as you hadn't mentioned being a counselor or whatever, merely that you know a lot of men and women (which so many of us can also say, as it turns out). So, no, I don't know how unusual you are in that department. I didn't realize you were privy to the inner anguishes of the masses.

Posted by Gramps49 (# 16378) on :

My "theology" of marriage is very much like Martin Luther. Marriage is actually a civil contract that is regulated by the state--the church should not actually be involved, though it can bless a couple once they have married.

Marriage is very much a necessary contract. It bestows over 1,000 rights and privileges for a couple. I cannot list them all here, but the three top rights are the mutual sharing of common property; the ability to speak for your partner if that partner is incapacitated; and the transfer of property on the death of one of the partners.

Other rights and privileges are listed here: http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/marriage-rights-benefits-30190.html

I imagine while this is a US site I would say the same rights and privileges in most countries represented here.

We had a personal experience with our son. He was involved in a life threatening accident. While he was 29 and had been living with a woman for three years, she was not able to have any say in his medical care. My wife and I had to intervene on his behalf because, technically, we were the closest living relatives. We consulted her on all decisions we had to make, though.

Fortunately, our son has been able to recover and can now speak for himself. He still has yet to marry his partner, but I think it has to do more with his partner's hesitation.

A couple of years ago there was a famous case in Florida where the woman had a traumatic brain injury which left her brain dead and on life support. Her husband said she would not have wanted to be kept artificially alive; but the family she came from wanted to keep her on life support.

This got a lot of national press. It went up to the US Supreme Court. The Court ruled in favor of the husband. Congress got involved and order the court to look at the case again. Once again, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the husband.

The hospital withdrew the life support and eventually she died.

This is an example of why it is important for couples to be married. It also shows why it is important to have living wills and powers of attorney in matters of health to be in place.

Posted by tomsk (# 15370) on :

Barnabas says about leaving, cleaving and becoming one flesh. Marriage is also a covenant, a promise to continue giving, not something that can be walked away from.

The C of E service talks of marriage being a sign of the union between Christ and the church, and we are to seek to be Christ-like in our marriage.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

You can give all you want, all you can, all you know. Sometimes it still just walks away from you and you can't catch it. Then you're free in loss.

Posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras (# 11274) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard:
You can give all you want, all you can, all you know. Sometimes it still just walks away from you and you can't catch it. Then you're free in loss.

Doesn't this suggest a failure of mutuality or reciprocation between the two partners? By the same token, it implies an inability of at least one partner to fully enter into, and sustain, a covenant of love. That may be due to an incapacity of personality and to something that might fall under the category of "personality disorder" so-called. Theologically, this would in turn point to a defect in the capacity to form or develop the right disposition respecting a Christian notion of a covenanted and ultimately committed relationship of marriage. One could call that a "defect of intention", but I'm not sure that standard term of art is particularly helpful to an understanding of the essential problem(s) in such instances: the defect is more likely to be due to an emotional incapacity (and here I'm not talking necessarily about any diagnosable "pathology")than to an intellectual misapprehension about marriage. Of course, the emotional incapacities may skew the individual's intellectual processing of the world, but this is apt to be far more subtle than a straightforward failure to understand the Church's teaching about what marriage is meant to be.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

Aye, agreed Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras. Very much so. I find myself able to be inclusive of your theological argument there because you juxtapose it with a psychological narrative. Emotional capacity is dynamic obviously, despite mellowing with age generally, it can diminish. Terminally. Watched Blue Jasmine last night. Terribly apropos. Kate Blanchet deserved the Oscar. And Mr. Allen, whatever else he may or may not be (and even he may not know), is an absolute and kind and gentle genius.

Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :

The Preface from current marriage service (a little way down the page and headed 'Preface') isn't bad for as theology of marriage IMHO. "In the delight and tenderness of sexual union" is a little bit kutchy-koo, but what it's trying to convey is right and wholesome. The old version is pretty good too. It's the bit that starts 'Dearly Beloved'. In some ways, it's better as it's more realistic and less kutchy-koo. They're both though trying to say the same thing, the one for young sixteenth century people and the other young twenty-first century ones. Between them, they set out a theology of marriage a great deal better than I could.

Posted by Siegfried (# 29) on :

quote:
Originally posted by leo:

quote:
Originally posted by Siegfried:
Why must there be a theology for marriage?
Because Christ is meant to transform our lives in EVERY realm. So everything should have a theology.

Because marriage is a sacrament.

Because marriage is a vocation.

It's not a sacrament in the view of all Christians, though. And by vocation, do you mean "something you work at", or big 'v' Vocation, like being a minister/priest?

Posted by Enoch (# 14322) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Siegfried:
It's not a sacrament in the view of all Christians, though. ...

How much difference does it make to a person's theology of marriage whether they hold marriage to be a sacrament or not?

The RCC says that marriage is indissoluble, and that remarriage is a delusion because marriage is a sacrament. However, some Reformed thinkers get fairly near that point without concluding that marriage is a sacrament, simply on their understanding of scripture. Furthermore, many non-RCCs reconcile dissolution of marriage and remarriage with a sacramental understanding of marriage. They would say that a sacramental understanding of marriage stresses what a bad thing it is to break it, rather than maintaining that it means the marriage is not broken despite appearing to be dead in the same way as the famous dead parrot was dead.

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

I've no idea what a sacramental understanding of marriage is apart from the RC definition and one certainly doesn't need that to stress what a bad thing it is to break it.

Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :

Just noticed this thread. I'm interested to read what kind of theology is attached to marriage since I've never understood how most Christians view this aspect of marriage.

My denomination, the New Church, places marriage at the center of humanity's moral and spiritual universe.

Some quotes:

quote:
Love in Marriage 57 by Emanuel Swedenborg
(1) There is a true love, which today is so rare that people do not know what it is like, and scarcely that it exists.
(2) This love originates from the marriage between good and truth.
(3) There is a correspondence between this love and the marriage of the Lord and the church.
(4) Regarded from its origin and correspondence, this love is celestial, spiritual, holy, pure and clean, more so than any other love which exists from the Lord in angels of heaven or people of the church.
(5) It is also the fundamental love of all celestial and spiritual loves, and consequently of natural loves.
(6) Moreover, into this love have been gathered all joys and all delights, from the first to the last of them.
(7) But no others come into this love and no others can be in it but those who go to the Lord and love the truths of the church and do the good things it teaches.
(8) This love was the greatest of loves among the ancients who lived in the golden, silver and copper ages, but after that it gradually disappeared.

All of this is based on the premise that God is love itself and wisdom itself and that these two things make up His essence.

Love and wisdom, or good and truth, are therefore the building blocks of everything in creation, and the distinction between the two is mirrored in countless ways.

One way is the division into two sexes, whose coming together in marriage reflects the wholeness of creation - and can therefore be the basis of great happiness.

Posted by Lord Clonk (# 13205) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Laurelin:

Being trans doesn't necessarily mean I'm confused about my gender.

Since I know loads of trans people, you'll just have to take my word that there are both plenty of us out there and that there are a very many people whom we do not disclose our status to. From what I'm aware, for the majority of trans people you would never even think that they might be trans, and it's not as if knowing a trans person well means that they'll tell you that they're trans, because, like, if you see them as the gender they are then that's all that's really relevant to life.

You said this:
'But nobody I know - gay or straight - is in denial about their actual biological gender.'

Hm. I'm probably not allowed to swear at you, which is really all that comment deserves. The thing a lot of cis people like you fail to grasp is that trans people tend to have thought these matters through much more than them, and that their conclusions are far from self-indulgent, considering the society we're in. So when you say we're in denial, all we hear is that you've got an opinion that doesn't affect you that you've most likely scarcely thought about. Thing is, if you look into it, there is no such thing as a biological gender. You will find that any marker of gender that you wish to use actually has a lot more grey areas and variation in them than is allowed for in a male/female binary understanding. So the idea of a clear biological gender of which you must be one of two distinct categories is just a social construct. And a damaging one, since it makes people like you say shit like this.

Also, like, why would I tell you I'm trans if you're the kind of person who considers trans people in denial?

I could go on.

Posted by Invictus_88 (# 15352) on :

I'd be extremely cautious about taking a term "true love", and declaring it rare.

For me, I'd say that the matrimonial covenant, by which a man and a woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life, is by its nature ordered toward the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring; this covenant between baptized persons having been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament.

[ 16. March 2014, 14:02: Message edited by: Invictus_88 ]

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

Lord Clonk. [Votive]

The cis can repent ...

Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Masculinity and femininity are social constructs and vary massively between cultures. They also vary across genders - aside from the fact that not everyone is male or female, many who self-identify as women are masculine and vice versa. Gender and gender identity are complex and fluid.
This is often said, but the constructivist view always comes up against the evident biological structures. I think the correct way of saying this is that masculinity and femininity are both socially constructed and biologically constructed. One group may pee standing up, the other not so much.
No, this is deeply cissexist and transphobic. Sex =/= gender, many women have penises and many men have vulvas. And what does peeing standing up have to do with masculinity or femininity? You can identify as male and pee standing up and still be feminine. You can identify as male and be masculine and not be able to pee standing up.

My sorry attempt at some humour...

Like I said I understand the division between biological and psychological gender. I lived through the debate and separation of the two as constructs. I recall fully the debate, the issues, and the controversies. If you start from the statistically frequent and work from there, one set of understandings is gained. If you start from the infrequent, another set is gained. The current Zeitgeist is to honour all of the variability and glory in the uniqueness. You are expressing this. I expressed the other side of this, and I do think that both sides overstate their position.

Parallel: there is an analysis of sexual assault as an act of violence omitting the sexual aspect. I get the usefulness of that analysis as well, but find it can be overstated as the context for the violence is indeed sexual.

We construct our perceptions based on experience and the concepts we have internalized via experience. When you name something a particular way, like cissexual (term coined in the 1990s and gained life via the 'net), you construct the reality you declare. If my recall of personality theory holds, George Kelly taught us that.

Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Invictus_88:
I'd be extremely cautious about taking a term "true love", and declaring it rare.

I guess that you haven't seen "The Princess Bride."

Posted by Invictus_88 (# 15352) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:

quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:

quote:
Originally posted by Jade Constable:
Masculinity and femininity are social constructs and vary massively between cultures. They also vary across genders - aside from the fact that not everyone is male or female, many who self-identify as women are masculine and vice versa. Gender and gender identity are complex and fluid.
This is often said, but the constructivist view always comes up against the evident biological structures. I think the correct way of saying this is that masculinity and femininity are both socially constructed and biologically constructed. One group may pee standing up, the other not so much.
No, this is deeply cissexist and transphobic. Sex =/= gender, many women have penises and many men have vulvas. And what does peeing standing up have to do with masculinity or femininity? You can identify as male and pee standing up and still be feminine. You can identify as male and be masculine and not be able to pee standing up.

Er. No, they actually don't. And that makes me a realist, not any sort of [prefix]phobe.
I mean, "cissexist". Seriously?

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

This term 'biological gender' puzzles me. What's happened to the good old-fashioned term sex? Sex, gender and orientation were the holy trilogy, when I was involved in gender studies, but I can see that the term 'gender' has become very fuzzy.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

I think 'true love' probably means the complete application of the NT Greek agape without any tainting of self interest. All human attempts at this fall short, given that selfishness is endemic in us. Following Christ, as best we can, as best we are enabled by the Spirit of God, draws us to practice this agape, the word we translate inadequately as 'love'.

It is an 'impossible possibility', characterised by Jesus as 'giving up our lives for his sake and so finding them'. Or seeking first the kingdom and God's righteousness. Otherwsie known as the thing to do first, the only way to go.

In terms of the theology of marriage, it is a conscious mutual giving up on selfishness for the sake of our partners. It is hard to do, and so much better than anything else we can try to do. We wax and wane in our ability to do it. But without mutuality in this respect, a marriage can easily become a prison, an empty shell, a dead thing. Those of us who are fortunate to have been able to sustain a long marriage do not boast of it; we count our blessings and thank God for our partners every day.

Marriage is challenging for the same reason that giving up on any form of selfishness is challenging. And for the additional reason that we are working it out in partnership and trust with someone else, who will also find this way challenging. Given how much our culture advocates self fulfilment and discounts the value of self denial, the wonder is not that divorce rates are so high. It is that they are not even higher.

[ 17. March 2014, 07:49: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]

Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:

quote:
Originally posted by Invictus_88:
I'd be extremely cautious about taking a term "true love", and declaring it rare.
I guess that you haven't seen "The Princess Bride."

Well done!

Posted by Freddy (# 365) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
It is an 'impossible possibility', characterised by Jesus as 'giving up our lives for his sake and so finding them'. Or seeking first the kingdom and God's righteousness.

Beautifully put! [Overused]

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

Thanks Freddy.

I can't claim originality. I'm indebted to Reinhold Niebuhr for "impossible possibilities". A general observation of his re the Sermon on the Mount.

When aiming at a target, it is not essential to hit the bullseye, but it is helpful to know where it is. Seriously, somehow or other we have to avoid both the sin of perfectionism (which is normally a kind of misplaced pride) and the sin of complacency (which is often enough a form of indifference).

Maybe the best is the enemy of the good sometimes, but we need some kind of moral compass to help us in spotting the good. Calibrating moral compasses is a tricky business without help! Self interest gets in the way.

Posted by Erroneous Monk (# 10858) on :

quote:
Originally posted by hatless:

I really like the idea that marriage is difficult, not just because it happens to be hard, but that the difficulty is part of the point of it. Each couple has to embark on a journey of discovery - how can we make this work - which others can only help them with in a limited way, because every marriage is unique, and which has an uncertain outcome. This couple may not make it. When they have been married for forty years, they will still not be sure that they will make it. Marriage tests us all the way down.

My marriage is carving a hole in me. It changes constantly whether I experience that as a wounding or as construction - digging a well in a desert, maybe.

Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :

@OP.

"Untill death do you part" is part promise, part threat, part commitment and contract.

The threat is that if you enter into it and even break it there is a part of it that is ongoing. A piece of your spirit is entwined with your spouse forever. As such, marriage being stated as indissolvable is merely factual. By thjs I am not saying marriages shouldn't end, but that there is more to it than a human decision. With death do you part just ancient wisdom.

Posted by hatless (# 3365) on :

Isn't that true of all relationships? A friendship, assuming you have opened up to the other person, shared a few difficult or happy times, is going to leave the two of you intertwined. Physical intimacy (which means sharing the bathroom as well as the bedroom) puts marriage on a more intense level, but if we cry and laugh with our friends we will never forget them either.

I think we learn who we are by seeing ourselves through other people's eyes. A person with no relationships at all would hardly be a person. Without Friday, Robinson Crusoe would not have been human.

I think that all relationships and communities have the mysterious risky and wonderful effect of developing the personalities of those involved in them; calling them into a more real being.

Marriage is special only in that along with a greater intimacy than is usual in other relationships, there is a commitment to making it work. It's an all-in relationship.

Though having said that, I'm not sure how many marriages 100 years ago had that character. First the idea of romantic love, and now the idea of equal partnership have changed marriage enormously.

Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :

I would say marriage is like friendship in only the sense that they are human relationships and can be emotionally close. They are otherwise quantum leaps apart. The comparison might be of going for coffee or tea with a friend, but having a full course meal with a spouse, and having the full course meal every day. And then holding the spouse when they are sick with what you've eaten together, and they you. (And, in my case, creating miniature people together makes it rather different as well.)

Posted by Martin PC not & Ship's Biohazard (# 368) on :

I'm sure you realise how right you are no prophet.

Posted by Truman White (# 17290) on :

I read today that in an Orthodox wedding there are no vows exchanged. The idea is that God unites the couple during the ceremony. A union not a contract.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Truman White:
I read today that in an Orthodox wedding there are no vows exchanged. The idea is that God unites the couple during the ceremony. A union not a contract.

It is true, we have no vows. We believe God unites two people in a mystery (the literal translation of the Greek word for the sorts of actions (baptism, marriage, ordination) the Latins call sacraments). Like the miracle that turns bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, there is no one point in the service we can point to and say, "Before this point they're not married, and after it, they're married."

Posted by Anyuta (# 14692) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:

quote:
Originally posted by Truman White:
I read today that in an Orthodox wedding there are no vows exchanged. The idea is that God unites the couple during the ceremony. A union not a contract.
It is true, we have no vows. We believe God unites two people in a mystery (the literal translation of the Greek word for the sorts of actions (baptism, marriage, ordination) the Latins call sacraments). Like the miracle that turns bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ, there is no one point in the service we can point to and say, "Before this point they're not married, and after it, they're married."

Right. The only words exchanged are to answer two questions: are you entering into this of your own free will, and have you promised youself to anyone else. Thats it. And those answers are given to the priest, not each other. And let me tell you, after an hour+ long ceremony, you REALLY feel married!

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

We don't do anything fast if we can help it. (This is why Orthodox make better lovers.)

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

quote:
Originally posted by no prophet:
I would say marriage is like friendship in only the sense that they are human relationships and can be emotionally close. They are otherwise quantum leaps apart. The comparison might be of going for coffee or tea with a friend, but having a full course meal with a spouse, and having the full course meal every day. And then holding the spouse when they are sick with what you've eaten together, and they you. (And, in my case, creating miniature people together makes it rather different as well.)

My friends have literally and figuratively held me while I was sick. The quantum leap resides in the commitment to retain the relationship through stressors and profound differences that would otherwise erode a friendship, the legal ramifications of binding two lives together through possessions and children and the emotional fall out of perhaps seeing that important, intimate and profoundly connected relationship wither away.

Posted by Latchkey Kid (# 12444) on :

A quantum leap is the smallest of changes ;-)

Posted by Latchkey Kid (# 12444) on :

Some of my friends have made the jump from marriage back to friendship. They are much better off than those who made the jump to unfriendliness.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

quote:
Originally posted by mousethief:
We don't do anything fast if we can help it. (This is why Orthodox make better lovers.)

That made me smile. I see the Orthodox Plot™ is still alive and kicking.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
Some of my friends have made the jump from marriage back to friendship. They are much better off than those who made the jump to unfriendliness.

Without going into details I have something of this order going on with one of my offspring .

Marriage for some , rather than being the bringer of joy growing in delight over the years, can for some strange reason become a massive burden of expectation for both parties . Failure of the expectation seems to pretty much lead directly to the failure of the marriage these days.

Re OP ? My personal theology on marriage is that it is ordained by God . But like a lot of things ordained by God it is also shrouded in mystery, and not something I'll enter into lightly a second time.

[ 23. March 2014, 09:49: Message edited by: rolyn ]

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:

quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
Some of my friends have made the jump from marriage back to friendship. They are much better off than those who made the jump to unfriendliness.
Without going into details I have something of this order going on with one of my offspring .

Marriage for some , rather than being the bringer of joy growing in delight over the years, can for some strange reason become a massive burden of expectation for both parties . Failure of the expectation seems to pretty much lead directly to the failure of the marriage these days.

Re OP ? My personal theology on marriage is that it is ordained by God . But like a lot of things ordained by God it is also shrouded in mystery, and not something I'll enter into lightly a second time.

I agree about the expectation of marriage. The societal expectation can be suffocating. So much is expected, the entire weight of the world it seems sometimes. And when the entire weight of the world fails you, that's when people split.

So, maybe (because I have not a clue, not a clue, not a clue. Do I sound emotional? Uh, yea, cause I am.) we need to stop putting so many expectations on marriage. But, where do we stop and start our expectations? What are appropriate expectations? Is it up to the individuals? Both? Compromise? And if there is no compromise?

It comes down to, what are the expectations for our own individual lives? I don't know.

Doesn't "God" place a huge amount of expectation on a marriage? A relationship ordained, ordered, by God? Terrifying.

Shrouded in mystery? Sometimes it seems completely covered in mystery. A massive Rubik's cube. I just keep turning it, and turning it and turning it....

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fool on the hill:

Doesn't "God" place a huge amount of expectation on a marriage? A relationship ordained, ordered, by God? Terrifying.

Shrouded in mystery? Sometimes it seems completely covered in mystery. A massive Rubik's cube. I just keep turning it, and turning it and turning it....

Human selfishness places a huge amount of quite unreasonable expectation and pressure on marriages.

As it does on any other relationship.

There is nothing terribly mysterious involved in learning to be more loving by learning to be less selfishness. It's a challenge of course.

Posted by Boogie (# 13538) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Latchkey Kid:
Some of my friends have made the jump from marriage back to friendship. They are much better off than those who made the jump to unfriendliness.

Yes - and I also know some who have remained in the same house, as friends.

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

Ones selfishness is another's sacrifice.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fool on the hill:

Doesn't "God" place a huge amount of expectation on a marriage? A relationship ordained, ordered, by God? Terrifying.

Shrouded in mystery? Sometimes it seems completely covered in mystery. A massive Rubik's cube. I just keep turning it, and turning it and turning it....

I know the 'God' thing sounds a bit heavy , but one thing the Bible makes a big play on is fidelity . Something that seems to be entirely lost on today's generation .
Didn't I hear the other day that a good many people surfing IT dating sites are already married !?

Maybe better not to turn the cube too much FOTH , one day the colours might just all line up and it could lose some of it's allure .

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

quote:
Originally posted by rolyn:

quote:
Originally posted by Fool on the hill:

Doesn't "God" place a huge amount of expectation on a marriage? A relationship ordained, ordered, by God? Terrifying.

Shrouded in mystery? Sometimes it seems completely covered in mystery. A massive Rubik's cube. I just keep turning it, and turning it and turning it....
I know the 'God' thing sounds a bit heavy , but one thing the Bible makes a big play on is fidelity . Something that seems to be entirely lost on today's generation .
Didn't I hear the other day that a good many people surfing IT dating sites are already married !?

Maybe better not to turn the cube too much FOTH , one day the colours might just all line up and it could lose some of it's allure .

Not such a big play. I don't think infidelity is new to this generation. Though social media has certainly made it easier. And people surfing the dating sites are so not all young. I have a lot of single friends.

It's true I don't know what I'd do with myself back when I played Rubik's cube if I had ever solved it. Probably thrown it away.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fool on the hill:
Not such a big play. I don't think infidelity is new to this generation.

Well yes, I admit King Solomon didn't rate fidelity to one person very highly in his theology.
Maybe I'm thinking more of references to God not tolerating the 'adulterous' Israelites with their dabbling in other gods etc. etc . Then ,in the NT, Jesus doesn't seem to pull His punches on the theme a couple becoming 'One in the Father' and the perils of adultery.

I wasn't knocking dating sites per se , very good way to form a relationship . Just seemed a bit odd that it's been said so many married people are browsing around them.
Thinking about it , before the age of computers, I used to occasionally cast an eye over the lonely hearts column ,(as it was called then), just out of curiosity . That was before my marriage hit the rocks.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Fool on the hill:
Ones selfishness is another's sacrifice.

Sure. There's a mutuality in this. When it works, we learn together how to move from falling in love to loving. When one partner chooses to dominate or manipulate, things go wrong. They don't have to.

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:

quote:
Originally posted by Fool on the hill:
Ones selfishness is another's sacrifice.
Sure. There's a mutuality in this. When it works, we learn together how to move from falling in love to loving. When one partner chooses to dominate or manipulate, things go wrong. They don't have to.

What I mean is that at some point, selflessness turns into sacrifice. Sometimes selfishness is really a need surfacing or unmet. Sometimes the sacrifice is too great. Sometimes the selfishness dominates, and sometimes there is manipulation to get what you want or need, and yes, that is a choice, but it isn't a simple choice. You make it sound so simple. It's not.

Human beings are complex creatures and I'm not sure that two people can travel that continuum between selflessness and selfishness in tandem. Divorce and infidelity rates attest to that.

And there are so many key words in what you've said here. "When it works" (and when it doesn't?), "learn together", (and when they don't?), "one partner" (and so the other?). Even the words dominate and manipulate need defining.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

Summaries always sound simple. Perhaps it would help if I observed that falling off the tandem is normal? Tandems are quite difficult to keep balanced until you get the knack.

I'm not sure that I can incorporate 45 years of experience of living with one person in just a few words anyway. Even if I could, there is no way of knowing that the lessons in love we've learned together would read across. It's been a rich and fulfilling adventure for us, with plenty of ups and downs and not a few tandem falls. We always found it within us to get back on the tandem again. Not all couples find they can do that.

Your comments about unmet needs are wise, of course. There is no remedy for that which can be found without honest talk. Candour and vulnerability depend on trust, that the relationship can stand it. Sometimes you have to take a chance. Progress is when the unmet need is recognised not just as a problem for one of us, but for both if us. Looking not just to your own needs, but to the needs of your partner, is where the rubber hits the road in the journey towards unselfish loving.

I think it is a pity this kind of conversation doesn't happen more often in preparation for marriage, or seeking to establish some kind of long term relationship by other means.

[ 25. March 2014, 20:27: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

I'm not sure, barnabas, that these conversations before marriage would help that much. Like you said, there's no substitution for actually living it. You have to turn the rubiks cube yourself.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

I agree in part. Every attempt at marriage is unique. But it is possible to learn from other people's experience of what works and what doesn't. Folks can judge for themselves what "reads across" and what doesn't.

Doesn't it strike you as somewhat crazy that many couples spend up to a year's elapsed time, and loads and loads of planning and preparation time for the wedding day, taking advice from all sorts of folks about what will work, what is best what will make the day "just perfect"? And yet remarkably few take anything like an equivalent amount of time to consult, take advice, about how to make the long term work.

Sure, marriage is under a cloud, given current divorce rates, and I don't blame anyone who looks at the debris (particularly if they've seen it from the inside in their own families) and says, maybe this whole thing is not such a great idea. But loads of folks still want to get married. That, if you like, is the "target audience" for some serious preparation.

The debris suggest that there's a mismatch between expectation and reality. All I'm suggesting is some of that can be avoided by some serious consideration about how to make the long term work.

Posted by Fool on the hill (# 9428) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
I agree in part. Every attempt at marriage is unique. But it is possible to learn from other people's experience of what works and what doesn't. Folks can judge for themselves what "reads across" and what doesn't.

Doesn't it strike you as somewhat crazy that many couples spend up to a year's elapsed time, and loads and loads of planning and preparation time for the wedding day, taking advice from all sorts of folks about what will work, what is best what will make the day "just perfect"? And yet remarkably few take anything like an equivalent amount of time to consult, take advice, about how to make the long term work.

Sure, marriage is under a cloud, given current divorce rates, and I don't blame anyone who looks at the debris (particularly if they've seen it from the inside in their own families) and says, maybe this whole thing is not such a great idea. But loads of folks still want to get married. That, if you like, is the "target audience" for some serious preparation.

The debris suggest that there's a mismatch between expectation and reality. All I'm suggesting is some of that can be avoided by some serious consideration about how to make the long term work.

Totally agree. The only problem is that people change. So expectations change. Reality changes.

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

People do change. It's all a bit knife edged really. Marriage, or any equivalent long term relationship, is a kind of crucible. It produces challenges for us, some of which require us to adapt.

I feel it's changed me for the better and my wife feels the same. I think it's possible for the challenges and resulting changes to strengthen the relationship, not weaken it, but it sure isn't guaranteed.

Posted by Laura (# 10) on :

My own theology of marriage (which has developed over the years) is heavily influenced by the Orthodox view that it is a podvig, or ascetic labor/vocation - the way being a monastic would be. That the partners work together in grace. That it's not about love in the feeling sense, though it absolutely involves that.

So I would say, marriage is a covenantal acting out of Christ's sacrificial love between two people.

I then blend it with Quakerism. Love is a decision, followed by loving action. That decision can arise from the feeling of love, and the feeling of love is 100% a part of this loving action. But I'm not sure how many people understand how the feeling can encourage the action as much as the action the feeling. That is to say, about once a week I feel deeply in my heart that my beloved is totally wrong and really needs to be yelled at a great deal so that he will be brought to a full and deep appreciation of my correctness. But I still do my best to behave with love, even if I definitely am experiencing a lacuna in the feeling itself. And with loving action, the feeling resrfaces on a regular basis, even after two decades.

Now I will quote Fromm:

“Love is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love were only a feeling, there would be no basis for the promise to love each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge that it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and decision.”

― Erich Fromm, The Art of Loving

You're welcome!

Posted by Barnabas62 (# 9110) on :

Shouting is OK as a way of signalling "you are so annoying" or "you aren't listening".

It just runs the risk of becoming a means of both generating fear and improving the chances of getting your own way. The real point is knowing the risk to the relationship if you go down that road.

I missed noticing you were back posting, Laura. Good to see you. I like the Fromm quote a lot.

Posted by Laura (# 10) on :

Thanks!

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Shouting is OK as a way of signalling "you are so annoying" or "you aren't listening".

It just runs the risk of becoming a means of both generating fear and improving the chances of getting your own way. The real point is knowing the risk to the relationship if you go down that road.

D. H. Lawrence pointed to the fact that a couple in a second marriage often experience a kind of 'truce' that didn't exist in their first marriages.

In first marriages some couples can treat each other as emotional punch-bags ,(not in the literal sense of course), in the belief it doesn't matter.
In a second marriage/LTR one tends to not want to take that risk.

Posted by Tukai (# 12960) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Barnabas62:
Summaries always sound simple. Perhaps it would help if I observed that falling off the tandem is normal? Tandems are quite difficult to keep balanced until you get the knack.

I'm not sure that I can incorporate 45 years of experience of living with one person in just a few words anyway. Even if I could, there is no way of knowing that the lessons in love we've learned together would read across. It's been a rich and fulfilling adventure for us, with plenty of ups and downs and not a few tandem falls. We always found it within us to get back on the tandem again. Not all couples find they can do that.

... Looking not just to your own needs, but to the needs of your partner, is where the rubber hits the road in the journey towards unselfish loving....

Having just celebrated our 40th wedding anniversary, Mrs T and I agree with B62's wise words, not least the tandem analogy. Like riding a tandem, marriage is not easy but worth the effort because two people helping each other to go in one direction makes it easier for both of them. But the direction may not have been that which one of the partners had in mind initially, but which (s)he recognised as a real need of the other partner and adapted to that.

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