\u201cOnce upon a time, marriage made sense.\u201d So write Jessica Bennett and Jesse Ellison in the June 11, 2010, edition of NEWSWEEK magazine. The two women who wrote the article are both young adults who identify themselves as \u201ccommitted to our careers, friendships, and, yes, our relationships.\u201d But, as for marriage, not so much.<\/p>\n
As Bennett and Ellison explain their case, marriage once made sense, at least for women, because it \u201cwas how women ensured their financial security, got the fathers of their children to stick around, and gained access to a host of legal rights.\u201d But now, thanks largely to the feminist movement, they claim, the financial and legal rights are theirs without marriage. They never actually get around to saying much about fathers sticking around to take responsibility for children.<\/p>\n
The NEWSWEEK article represents what may be the most direct journalistic attack on marriage in our times. Though only an op-ed column, it presents arguments that had to date been made largely, if not exclusively, outside of mainstream circles. Consider this column an opening salvo in a battle to finish marriage off, once and for all.<\/p>\n
Both women identify themselves as secular, and their rejection of marriage reflects the inevitable crumbling of a marriage culture in the wake of a moral revolution. As they explain, reserving sex for marriage is simply unthinkable to them and their peers. \u201cAnd the idea that we\u2019d \u2018save ourselves\u2019 for marriage? Please.\u201d Interestingly, they quote a young man who makes a remarkable case for why the loss of moral stigma for premarital sex breaks down the institution of marriage itself: \u201cIf I had to be married to have sex, I would probably be married, as would every guy I know.\u201d<\/p>\n
And when it comes to having children without marriage: \u201cWe know that having children out of wedlock lost its stigma a long time ago.\u201d They then point with envy to Scandinavia, where a majority of children are now born out of wedlock, but parents claim to spend more time with their children than parents of other nations.<\/p>\n
The secular worldview represented by Bennett and Ellison is joined to their status as young professionals. Marriage does not enhance professional prospects, they argue. Women who take their husbands\u2019 last name are considered less professional, less competent, and less ambitious than women who keep their own names.<\/p>\n
As they explain, \u201cWe are also the so-called entitled generation, brought up with lofty expectations of an egalitarian adulthood; told by helicopter parents and the media, from the moment we exited the womb, that we could be \u2018whatever we wanted\u2019 \u2014 with infinite opportunities to accomplish those dreams. So you can imagine how, 25 years down the line, committing to another person \u2014 for life \u2014 would be nerve-racking.\u201d<\/p>\n
And just who are they seeking as partners, anyway? They explain that their generation of young women is looking for a \u201csoulmate\u201d \u2014 a fantasy they admit is hard to define and even harder to find.<\/p>\n
And an adult lifetime is just too long for any realistic commitment, they insist. \u201cWith our life expectancy in the high 70s, the idea that we\u2019re meant to be together forever is less realistic.\u201d So while their generation of young women is, by their admission, unrealistic in what they are looking for in a partner, they are supposedly cold sober realistic when it comes to calculating the value of marriage, and finding it wanting.<\/p>\n
This duo of young women go so far as to claim that \u201cthe permanence of marriage seems naive, almost arrogant.\u201d Others, of course, might be forgiven for seeing unbridled arrogance in dismissing an institution that has been central to human flourishing for thousands of years.<\/p>\n
They cite authorities who make the predictable arguments that humans are not hardwired for monogamy, anyway. Bennett and Ellison propose that perhaps a series of short, mostly monogamous relationships is best. \u201cFor us, it\u2019s not that we reject monogamy altogether \u2014 indeed, one of us is going on six years with a partner \u2014 but that the idea of marriage has become so tainted, and simultaneously so idealized, that we\u2019re hesitant to engage in it,\u201d they explain.<\/p>\n
In their essay, Bennett and Ellison cite a considerable body of research on marriage and make reference to our disastrous divorce rate. Nevertheless, it never seems to cross their minds that the very social trends they celebrate were the cause of marital decline \u2014 both in terms of individual marriages and the institution of marriage itself.<\/p>\n
The moral revolutions of the late-twentieth century brought personal autonomy to preeminence. These moral revolutions included the rise of \u201cno fault\u201d divorce and a host of other developments that subverted marriage. Chief among these was the \u201cliberation\u201d of sex from marriage. Once sexual intercourse was no longer limited to married couples, marriage lost respect and binding authority, becoming more like a mere legal contract. Once having children out of wedlock was normalized (at least in many sectors of the society), marriage became a lifestyle option and little else.<\/p>\n
There is an amazing lack of humility in the article by Bennett and Ellison, and a breathtaking lack of concern for other women as well. What about women who are not so professional, so secular, and so liberated from a desire for marriage? They are simply thrown under the bus, run over by the very social trends and moral revolutions these women champion and celebrate.<\/p>\n
The Christian church should take careful note of this essay, not because its arguments are unprecedented, but because its distillation of these arguments in one of the nation\u2019s two major newsweeklies must not escape attention. Christians see marriage, first of all, as an institution made good and holy by the Creator. Its value, for us, is not established by sociology but by Scripture. We also understand that God gave us marriage for our good, for our protection, for our sanctification, and for human flourishing.<\/p>\n
In other words, the Bible compels us to see marriage as essential to human happiness, health, and infinitely more.<\/p>\n
The essay by Jessica Bennett and Jesse Ellison is an undeniable reminder of our challenge to rebuild a marriage culture, and to start inside our own churches. \u201cOnce upon a time, marriage made sense,\u201d Bennett and Ellison assert. One essential task for the Christian Church is to rebuild and maintain a marriage culture \u2014 even when marriage itself no longer makes sense to so many around us.<\/p>\n
________<\/p>\n
Jessica Bennett and Jesse Ellison, \u201cI Don\u2019t: The Case Against Marriage,\u201d NEWSWEEK, June 11, 2010.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cOnce upon a time, marriage made sense.\u201d So write Jessica Bennett and Jesse Ellison in the June 11, 2010, edition of NEWSWEEK magazine. The two women who wrote the article are both young adults who identify themselves as \u201ccommitted to our careers, friendships, and, yes, our relationships.\u201d But, as for marriage, not so much. As […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[802,26,239,68,4613],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5190"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5190\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}