Why marry?

Census Bureau: Fewer couples getting married

It seems that getting hitched has fallen out of favor. The U.S. Census Bureau reports that marriage rates have sunk to an all-time low.

By John Labus

Friday, October 1, 2010

=====================================================================

Blame the economy. Marriage tends to take a hit in tough economic times, but Christy Gurley, director of Family Ministries at St. Thomas Presbyterian Church, says this time it's coupled with low expectations among young people.  

"They don't expect to have the same career with the same company," said Gurley. "They don't expect to have the marriage with the same person for their entire life. And children (who) have grown up with two and three generations of divorced adults in their life — they're expecting the same thing."

Gurley says children who grow up in such ever-changing environments suffer the most.  "It would be great to re-instill this in kids as they're growing up — to expect the longterm relationship ... as far as 'for life.' Because to not have something or someone they feel like they can depend on, you're losing a big part of what it means to have family."

Relationship expert Julie Nise echoes those concerns.

"When people live together, babies seem to happen a certain percentage of the time," said Nise. "And to continue to bring more children into the world in these incomplete, or broken, or never-really-formed family units is very confusing and detrimental. Younger people today have a real misunderstanding about what marriage is and (is) supposed to be ... It's actually true that people who live together before marriage experience a higher divorce rate."

Nise says the era of the "shack-up" and the "baby-daddy" is not teaching society anything about the hard work involved in committing to another person.

"It really does annoy the ever-loving heck out of me that people continue to think that living together is the same thing as marriage," she said. "It is not, in any way, shape, or form.  They're delusional if they keep putting themselves in the position where they're not doing the real work of being in a relationship. They're just playing at it.  And the consequences of doing that are profound and long-reaching." (wiod news- news radio 610 wiod)

==================================================