The invitations are in the mail. Jennifer Beltz and T.J. Gurski of Commerce Township, Mich., are defying the odds ”” they’re taking the plunge a second time.
“When I got divorced, I said, ”˜I’m never getting married again,” says Beltz, 41, who works in marketing.
That sentiment seems to be quite common among those jaded by a failed first union: A new analysis of federal data provided exclusively to USA TODAY shows the USA’s remarriage rate has dropped 40 percent over the past 20 years.
I have an interesting anecdote to contribute to this thread. Just last week i got a phone call from my cousin Carole, who informed me of the sad news of her mother’s death. She caught me up on a lot of the extended family news. (Being overseas, I’m out of touch with a lot of my cousins…)
In sharing about her sister, who was divorced about 15 years ago, she told me that her sister is in a very good relationship right now, but they are not thinking of marrying. She said that even their 80 year old parents advised her sister not to remarry, but just live together to avert legal and financial complications and the mess of a prenuptial agreement, etc. etc. Carole said, “Boy, that is not something I ever expected to hear my parents ever recommend!!!”
Truly there has been a sea-change in views about marriage and sexuality, and it is not just limited to the younger generations!
It’s a sign of a civilization in decay and decline.
Thanks for the revealing anecdote, Karen. You’re right about the sea change in the culture, and Br. Michael is right that it’s a very gloomy and dismal sign of a culture that’s in moral free fall.
On a somewhat happier note, I’m reminded of the famous quip by Mark Twain, no paragon of Christian virtue himself but an astute observer of human nature, that remarriage represented “the triumph of hope over experience.” I love that.
People have gotten accustomed to the idea of cohabitation, and have fallen for the lie that it’s like testdriving a car you’re considering buying. Statistics show that it’s far less innocent than that. Numerous objective studies by social scientists have shown again and again that cohabitating couples are more likely to break up later than married couples, and that when folks who have lived together first later do marry, their divorce rate is much higher than couples who haven’t lived together first. It does seem that with marriage, as with so much else in life, attitudes and expectations are almost everything.
The real scandal is that the cohabitation rate among Christians, even among professed “born again” evangelicals, is almost as high as it is among non-Christians. That’s the really scary and discouraging part. “[i]If the salt has lost its savor…[/i]”
David Handy+