Mahwidge

There have been a lot of divorce-related statistics floating around for quite some time now. The general consensus regarding these statistics is that the divorce rate amongst Christians is more or less equivalent to that of non-Christians. This is find very troubling, as a single, male Christian (who enjoys long walks on the beach and good, wholesome conversation).

I don't, however, doubt the validity of the statistic. I do believe that 35% (or whatever the figure may be) of people who say they are Christians and entered into a marriage have suffered divorce. However, what I don't believe is that all of this 35% are in fact Christian. I'm sure there are Christians who for very unfortunate circumstances (i.e. sexual impurity) have had to end their marriage, but my guess (and this is just a guess since I don't have facts and figures and all that) is that most of these failed marriages were anything but Christian, entered into by people who may have been Christian by name, but knew nothing about being Christian by character.

Take the Catholic Church here in Ireland. Now I have a number of theological issues with the Catholic Church in general (none of which I'll discuss here and now), but I have major problems with the way the Catholic Church operates in Ireland. One of those problems is the way the sacrament of marriage is treated so cheaply.

To my understanding (and please correct me if I'm wrong), so long as you've been baptized into the Catholic Church and have gone through the various other membership processes, you're good-to-go in terms of marriage. What a misconception that really is. Going through a series of motions no more makes someone Catholic than if I were to call myself Australian by going surfing and putting another shrimp on the barbie.

That is not how true Christianity works. All you're doing is taking external actions and proclaiming them as internal truths, which is just not right.

Paul deals with this in relation to the Galatians by saying,

For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation.

You can replace the term 'circumcision' with any number of things. The point is, being a Christian has nothing to do with outward actions or signs - it has to do with an inward transformation.

The Catholic Church in Ireland seems more than willing to marry any Joe and Mary, provided they've gone through the external rigmarole. Forget about the fact that Joe and Mary have been living together for the past 2 years; forget about the fact that Joe and Mary don't really buy into that whole 'no sex before marriage' thing; forget about the fact that Joe and Mary only attend Mass twice a year; forget about the fact that they don't read their Bibles, don't pray, don't have any living faith in Jesus. Provided they say they're Catholics and have the relevant documentation to prove it, then what God has joined together let no man put asunder. What a joke, and what a mockery of what the Bible considers marriage.

The Catholic Church in Ireland has a lot to answer for when it comes to marriage, because they are marrying people under the name of God, when in reality some of these people have no more interest in God than an atheist. That's nothing short of taking the Lord's name in vain, which is no trivial thing.

Of course this isn't just restricted to the Catholic Church, and I don't mean to sound like I'm singling it out (which I kind of am I guess). Living in Ireland, I can't help but use it as an example. If you take a trip across the Atlantic, I have no doubt that a similar modus operandi takes place in the 'born-again' circles of America.

Christians are constantly campaigning against homosexual marriages, a topic which I won't go into right now. However, I think that Christians need to start looking at heterosexual marriages taking place within the Church, and putting a stop to some of those. That's right - down with heterosexual marriages!

Okay allow me to qualify that. What I mean is that if a couple is to get married in a Church and be 'joined together by God', then whoever is marrying them better be as sure as possible that this couple are new creations, to use some Pauline language (by that I mean the language of the apostle Paul, not the language of my mother who is called Pauline).

I mean take a Christian kids camp for instance (I'm going somewhere with this - trust me). When I've had to apply as a leader for one of these camps, whoever is organising it doesn't just accept me on the basis that I say I'm a Christian. That would be absurd. No. They ask me questions about my faith, they ask me about previous experience working with kids, they ask me for references from my local church. Basically, they want to know that I'm living out the Christian life, and therefore whether I'm suitable or not for the task at hand. Surely a more thorough approach should be taken for something as important and sacred as marriage, right?

Joe and Mary walk into a church. They say to the priest or reverend or pastor 'So, would you be able to marry us?' The priest/reverend/pastor says ,"Let me ask you a straight up question first: Are you having sex?" Joe and Mary reply 'Well...um...yes'. The priest says 'Do you think that's wrong?' Joe and Mary say 'Err...no' and the priest says 'Well come back to me when you do'.

That's kind of a strange example I know, but I think it illustrates my point...kind of [?].

If 'Christian' marriages actually involved two people actively living out their faith, how much less would this divorce rate be? No two people should be said to be joined together by God when they haven't even been joined with God individually, and yet this is happening all around us.

A concrete solution to this I can't really offer, though I can categorically say I'm not talking about something along the lines of License to Wed, which is not a funny movie in case you ever wondered (Oh Robin, where did it all go wrong?). But surely the Church Of Jesus Christ has to have standards. Any couple that is joined together by God must then live under the lordship of God. To proclaim the former while knowing that the latter to be a sham is, as I've said, to take the Lord's name in vain. This must avoided at all costs.

There are of course numerous other reasons as to why Christian marriages are failing, even amonst Christians who do have faith in Jesus and who are regular Church goers etc etc. In his sermon based on Colossians 3:15-17, Charles price says,

Now I am fully aware of course, and fully sympathetic to the fact that there are issues which cause a marriage not to continue. But somewhere along the line it would seem to me that the way we conduct our marriages is not out of a rich indwelling of the Word of God, but out of a pragmatism and personal preference and a self-indulgence which permits us, when it's inconvenient, to jettison the Word of God in favour of our preferences.

This depreciation of the Word of God is another huge issue in the church, but not one I'll talk about now (consider it added to the list containing 'Catholicism' and 'Homosexuality').

The point is, if the divorce rate amongst Christians is similar to that of non-Christians, then something is severely wrong with our definitions of both 'Christian' and 'marriage'. Maybe it's time Christians stopped focusing so much energy on stopping gay marriage, and started focusing more on cultivating God-centred, Christ-empowered heterosexual marriages.