The BBC reports,
\n Couples who want to apply for a marriage license in Beijing will have to dress smartly in the future, or risk being turned away. The city\u2019s Civil Affairs Bureau has announced a new rule stipulating that couples won\u2019t be issued a license to wed if they show up in shorts, T-shirts or other casual wear, the state newspaper Beijing Daily reports.<\/p>\n
The bureau\u2019s marriage registration director, Han Mingxi, says people aren\u2019t showing sufficient respect for the process. \u201cIt is not unusual to see couples registering in shorts and slippers. It shows their carelessness and disrespect for marriage,\u201d he tells the paper. \u201cFrom one glance you can see that marriage registration is being treated as a casual affair, and this is prone to many problems.\u201d
\nThe \u201cmany problems\u201d refers to China\u2019s divorce rate, which has been growing for more than a decade. This has the bureau asking experts to \u201cpropose methods and ways to promote marriage and family happiness,\u201d in order to stem the tide of millions of divorces, 3.6 million in 2014 alone.<\/p>\n
It may be true that the registration process is being treated \u201cas a casual affair,\u201d but that\u2019s not why marriages are failing at such a high rate in China. These marriages are \u201cprone to many problems\u201d because God has been left out of them.<\/p>\n
God has a lot to say about relationships, commitment, and sacrificial love. When we disregard the power of God\u2019s love, our marriages are going to suffer. Sadly, the best the Chinese can come up with to help these struggling marriages is to enact a stricter dress code for the application process, when it\u2019s not a dress code, but a love code that\u2019s needed.<\/p>\n
When we know Jesus\u2019 forgiveness, we are empowered and motivated to be more forgiving. When we understand Jesus\u2019 sacrifice, we are empowered and motivated to be more sacrificial. When we\u2019ve experienced Jesus\u2019 love, we are empowered and motivated to be more loving. What the marriages in China need is Jesus.
\n \u201cHusbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her\u201d (Ephesians 5:25).
\n________<\/p>\n
\u201cNo shorts\u2019 rule for Beijing marriage licence applicants,\u201d by News from Elsewhere, BBC Monitoring, June 3, 2016.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The BBC reports, Couples who want to apply for a marriage license in Beijing will have to dress smartly in the future, or risk being turned away. The city\u2019s Civil Affairs Bureau has announced a new rule stipulating that couples won\u2019t be issued a license to wed if they show up in shorts, T-shirts or […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[68,1811,352,1205],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6446"}],"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=6446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6446\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}