Breakpoint: "Marry in Your 20's? New Data Says Why."
New data is poking holes in what’s become a prominent cultural myth: research shows that marrying young without ever having lived together with a partner makes for some of the lowest divorce rates.
Source: “Breakpoint: ‘Marry in Your 20's? New Data Says Why.’”
In other words, as a fellow Anglican clergyman puts it, “God’s way is the best way. The Creator knows what’s best for his creatures.” Amen!
This is not the first time I’ve posted on this topic! But it’s an important one, in our current culture. The linked essay notes that
New data is poking holes in what’s become a prominent cultural myth. “When it comes to divorce,” write Brad Wilcox and Lyman Stone in The Wall Street Journal, “the research has generally backed up the belief that it’s best to wait until around 30 to tie the knot.” This is because the divorce rate is generally lower for those who wait to wed.
However, according to the National Survey of Family Growth, there’s an interesting exception to this modern-day rule of thumb. Couples in their 20s who don’t cohabitate first have some of the lowest divorce rates of any group. Though it’s not exactly clear, from the research anyway, as to why this is the case. This particular cohort is disproportionately religious, something that is linked to lower divorce rates across the board.
Hmmmm… I wonder if there might be a connection, there! Young people who are deeply committed to their faith – particularly the Christian faith – are more likely to marry young, and to take seriously Christ’s injunction that “what God hath joined together, let no man put asunder”: that marriage is to be life-long, and that problems, which are inevitable, are to be worked through, not run from.
And that is exactly what this article goes on to point out:
“We generally think that having more experience is better….” says University of Denver psychologist Galena Rhoades, “but what we find for relationships is just the opposite.” More partners mean more comparison, she argues, which can make it harder to achieve long-term contentment. Cohabitation also teaches couples that one can always head for the exit when problems seem too daunting, instead of to press in and stick it out.
Still, despite a significant amount of data that says otherwise, society pushes a very different story about living together. People in their 20s, says convention, should avoid commitment, establish themselves professionally, and certainly try living together before tying the knot. For a generation raised in divorced homes, skepticism toward marriage is understandable… as is the desire to “try it before you buy it.” After all, this is the same generation who never has to pick a restaurant before checking its rating on Yelp.
And so here we are, in a culture where both delayed marriage and cohabitation are “normal,” but relational satisfaction is rare.
Emphasis added – because this is probably the key point of the whole article. Our secular, “liberal,” “progressive” ideas about relationships, including marriage and cohabitation, have yielded a world in which both delayed marriage and cohabitation are “normal,” but relational satisfaction is rare. That is a travesty, and a tragedy.
We need to get right with God, and return to the old ways, and the good ways: as in so many other areas of life, marrying in one’s 20s without cohabitating first is not good because God says it is, so much as God says it’s good for us because it actually is! And He ought to know, having designed us that way.
Looked at in this way, the conventional “wisdom” about relationships – which is actually incredibly recent in human history, only dating back to the post-WW II era – starts to take on a whiff of brimstone… or at least, it does for me.
This is not to say that later marriages can’t work; they can and do. I know of several, within my own family. It doesn’t even say that marriage after cohabitation is impossible; it clearly isn’t. But that doesn’t mean they should be the norm, and it certainly doesn’t mean it’s what God has ordained for us.
Here’s Breakpoint again:
Given the relevant data, the idea that one should not get married “too early” emphasizes the wrong factors. Wisdom should always be exercised with commitments this big, but at the same time, age matters far less than the commitment itself. Limitless sexual experience, self-actualization, and the freedom to leave don’t actually produce relational happiness in the long term. In fact, they damage it.
In short, as a project of self-fulfillment, marriage might be worthless. As a way to reap the rewards of self-sacrifice, its value is incalculable.
Emphasis added, again.
Christians know why. Marriage is a part of the created order. Though some marriages will tragically end for various reasons and others may want marriage but struggle to find it,
[I fall into the latter category!]
the Church can provide vital community for all of its members, while still promoting marriage for the God-given good that it is.
The best description I have ever heard or read of the difference between love and lust is that lust (which is really just another way to say “self-fulfillment,” or vice versa) is all about taking, love is all about giving. Or to put it another way, lust / self-fulfillment is about me; love is about the other.
But here is the mystical paradox: when your focus becomes loving, caring for, giving to, “the other” – the focus of your love and devotion, your sweetheart and hopefully, God willing your spouse – then their good, their happiness, brings you deep joy and satisfaction, on a level you cannot attain by being selfish and me-focused.
That is, in all likelihood, one of the reasons why marriage is an icon of the Church, or rather the relationship between the Church as the Bride of Christ and Christ Himself as the Bridegroom: because in giving we receive; in sacrificing, we are rewarded; in fidelity to another, we find our own truest selves.
See also this piece, from the Institute for Family Studies: “The Religious Marriage Paradox: Younger Marriage, Less Divorce.” It confirms that
Today, more than 70% of marriages are preceded by cohabitation, as Figure 1 indicates. Increased cohabitation is both cause and consequence of the rise in the age at first marriage. But what most young adults do not know is that cohabiting before marriage, especially with someone besides your future spouse, is also associated with an increased risk of divorce, as a recent Stanford study reports.
So, one reason that religious marriages in America may be more stable is that religion reduces young adults’ odds of cohabiting prior to marriage, even though it increases their likelihood of marrying at a relatively young age.
The upshot? Marry (relatively) young – in your 20s (the “sweet spot” seems to be early 20s for those who marry directly, without cohabitating first, and late-20s for those who do end up cohabitating) – if at all possible, and don’t cohabitate first. If you must, make sure that it’s with the person you intend to marry! Preferably having the level of commitment represented by engagement.
And although it’s not in either of the articles cited, be very careful with premarital sex. Best of all, don’t do it. I say this not only based on traditional Christian morality, but on observation and, yes, my own experience. Sexual pleasure is intended not only to promote procreation (which is beyond the scope of this post), but to nurture and strengthen the pair-bond.
Because of that, it can cause you to form an attachment with someone you are not otherwise compatible with, and/or mask problems and issues which then fester below the surface until reaching “critical mass,” so to speak. Best to avoid entirely that level of physical intimacy until you are darned sure that’s the person you want to spend the rest of your life with, on other grounds than just physical!
So, what’s the ideal? Realizing that it is not always attainable, here it is: 1) Marry fairly young – in your 20s – if possible. 2) Avoid cohabitation. 3) Avoid premarital sex. And I would add, 4) Pick someone from your own, or at least a closely compatible, religious tradition. You need to be on the same wavelength, spiritually and morally.
It sounds simple; and in fact, it’s what the norm and standard was, prior to the “Sexual Revolution” of the 1960s. That’s a lot of millennia of human experience we chucked by the wayside! It may be time to go back, and retrieve it.