The new normal: births outside marriage — Part 2 of 2

In yesterday's post, I wrote some commentary on a recent New York Times article. The story cited a study that says a baby's birth to an unwed mom "used to be called illegitimacy. Now it is the new normal. After steadily rising for five decades, the share of children born to unmarried women has crossed a threshold: more than half of births to American women under 30 occur outside marriage."

I don't doubt the study's results are legit. (In fact, I'm responsible for putting birth announcements in the newspaper for the county in which I work, and at least in that neck of the woods, babies with unwed parents far outnumber babies whose parents are married.) I don't disagree that lots of people opt not to get married after conceiving a child or after giving birth. But, as I pointed out in Part 1, the story about this unintentionally implied that marriage and "a piece of paper" are one and the same when, in fact, they are not. Marriage is a miracle that helps us "to overcome self-absorption, egoism, pursuit of one's own pleasure, and to open oneself to the other, to mutual aid and to self-giving,*"

Which is awesome.

But as awesome as that is, few people our age are interested in it. Few currently-married couples exemplify it. And so I was compelled to ask a question:

Why?

Unfortunately, I can't answer that. For one, I don't know (at least not with any kind of exactness), and for two, I do know the answer is so complex that I couldn't do it justice if I tried. What I can do is list some factors that, in my opinion, contribute to why few people our age are interested in marriage, and why few married couples exemplify what marriage actually is.

1. People don't know what marriage actually is.

Refer to Part 1.

2. People don't think enough (some can't, some won't).

Part of the story says the following:

A woman, "27, was in an on-and-off relationship with a clerk at Sears a few years ago when she found herself pregnant. A former nursing student who now tends bar, (she) said her boyfriend was so dependent that she had to buy his cigarettes. Marrying him never entered her mind. 'It was like living with another kid,' she said."

Another part says this:

"In Lorain as elsewhere, explanations for marital decline start with home economics: men are worth less than they used to be. Among men with some college but no degrees, earnings have fallen 8 percent in the past 30 years, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, while the earnings of their female counterparts have risen by 8 percent."

The point the story makes is that these women aren't marrying the fathers of their children because to do so would be financially irresponsible and/or of no financial benefit. But if our focus is on deciding not to marry a man because marrying him is of no financial benefit, we miss a deeper point. The young woman in the story wouldn't dare marry a man-child who can't afford his own cigarettes, which is good, and I commend her, because she shouldn't. But, then, I'm left wondering: if a dependent guy isn't good enough to marry, why is he good enough to date? Why is he good enough to make a baby with? This points to the deeper point:

There are so many questions to ask before we promise exclusivity to someone and before we make babies with him or her — questions that few are asking.

Questions like is this person emotionally, socially, spiritually, financially fit to be my spouse? Would he or she make a good parent? Do I want kids to turn out like this person? Am I emotionally, socially, spiritually, financially fit to be a spouse? Would I make a good parent? Do I want kids to turn out like me?

We need to think about our answers to these questions, which implies we have to answer them. I think lots of humans are so generally horrified that the answer to any of them will be no that we neither ask nor answer them. But know that if an answer is no, it does not not mean it has to be no forever. It means somebody has some work to do — some growing to do. And that's ok, and always will be.

Lots of other humans do think about their answers to the questions, but their thoughts backfire because they are are under the impression that if an answer is no, the act of entering into a marriage — or even just moving in together — will transform the non-marriageable half of the couple into a marriageable one. But that's not how it works.

From the article:

"Almost all of the rise in nonmarital births has occurred among couples living together. While in some countries such relationships endure at rates that resemble marriages, in the United States they are more than twice as likely to dissolve than marriages. In a summary of research, Pamela Smock and Fiona Rose Greenland, both of the University of Michigan, reported that two-thirds of couples living together split up by the time their child turned 10."

This is because when a relationship isn't working, doing something that complicates it never makes it work. We're better off taking something out of the equation (such as one of the people, or sex) and seeing what happens.

Which brings us to a third factor that contributes to why few people our age are interested in marriage, and why few married couples exemplify what marriage actually is.

3. People treat the sacred (sex, in this case) like it isn't.

In our culture, you hit a certain age and the assumption is that if you're dating someone, you're having sex with them. And in an overwhelming majority of cases, that's a safe assumption. It's the norm. Which is one of several reasons we know what the norm isn't: treating sex like it's sacred.

Sex is not kept sacred when it's something we do with every person we date. It's not kept sacred when we participate in it selfishly. It is not sacred when we decide to have sex because we believe we can't not have sex.

"It's impossible to wait" is a lie. Humans, in my opinion and experience, are stronger than that — we can control our appetites. A couple of my favorite quotes about this are as follows:

"Temperance is the moral virtue that moderates the attraction of pleasures and provides balance in the use of created goods. It ensures the will's mastery over instincts and keeps desires within the limits of what is honorable. The temperate person directs the sensitive appetites toward what is good and maintains healthy discretion.*"

and

"The virtue of chastity comes under the cardinal virtue of temperance, which seeks to permeate the passions and appetites of the senses with reason.*"

There are far fewer people who believe that than who simultaneously a) believe marriage is a piece of paper, and b) are currently unfit for a piece-of-paper-marriage, let alone for a real one, who c) are so unwilling or unable to acknowledge that they are currently (and probably temporarily!) unfit for marriage that they d) date while they e) are completely convinced they cannot date without having sex.

And that, over time, combined with a lot of other factors, results in new normals like the one in the article.

- - - -

To read Part 1 of this post, click here.

To read the New York Times story in full, click here.

*This quote comes from the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

The new normal: births outside marriage — Part 1 of 2

In a New York Times article from Friday, a study the writer cited says a baby's birth to an unwed mom "used to be called illegitimacy. Now it is the new normal. After steadily rising for five decades, the share of children born to unmarried women has crossed a threshold: more than half of births to American women under 30 occur outside marriage."

The story is well written and worth the read. But what it points out is not so much "study reveals a new relationship trend" as much as "study reveals that what most people think is marriage is still not actually marriage."

The story says:

"Among mothers of all ages, a majority — 59 percent in 2009 — are married when they have children. But the surge of births outside marriage among younger women — nearly two-thirds of children in the United States are born to mothers under 30 — is both a symbol of the transforming family and a hint of coming generational change." 

and

"One group still largely resists the trend: college graduates, who overwhelmingly marry before having children. That is turning family structure into a new class divide, with the economic and social rewards of marriage increasingly reserved for people with the most education."

and

"Liberal analysts argue that shrinking paychecks have thinned the ranks of marriageable men, while conservatives often say that the sexual revolution reduced the incentive to wed and that safety net programs discourage marriage."

and

"Over the past generation, Lorain lost most of two steel mills, a shipyard and a Ford factory, diminishing the supply of jobs that let blue-collar workers raise middle-class families. More women went to work, making marriage less of a financial necessity for them. Living together became routine, and single motherhood lost the stigma that once sent couples rushing to the altar. Women here often describe marriage as a sign of having arrived rather than a way to get there."

I understand these points.

Marriage does have economic and social rewards. Most women do find men whose paychecks can pay bills to be more marriageable than men whose paychecks can't. Many women who work don't need a husband to pay for her stuff. A stigma once did (and sometimes still does) send couples to the altar with haste and without much thought. But these are just words that distract us from what we really ought to discuss.

The story goes on...

"'Women used to rely on men, but we don’t need to anymore,' said Teresa Fragoso, 25, a single mother in Lorain. 'We support ourselves. We support our kids.'

a) This says marriage is about money. (i.e., "I don't need a husband because I can support myself and my kid.")

"Fifty years ago, researchers have found, as many as a third of American marriages were precipitated by a pregnancy, with couples marrying to maintain respectability. Ms. Strader’s mother was among them."

b) This says marriage is about image. And this still says that when a couple today rushes into marriage because they've found out they're pregnant. (i.e., "We'll be treated better if it looks like we didn't get pregnant before we tied the knot.")

"Even as many Americans withdraw from marriage, researchers say, they expect more from it: emotional fulfillment as opposed merely to practical support. 'Family life is no longer about playing the social role of father or husband or wife, it’s more about individual satisfaction and self-development,' said Andrew Cherlin, a sociologist at Johns Hopkins University."

c) This says marriage is about self. (i.e., "Marrying this man/woman will complete me!")

And then, like in the story, people -- among them, ones who live like they believe a, b and c are true -- say...

"'I’d like to do it, but I just don’t see it happening right now,' ... 'Most of my friends say (marriage is) just a piece of paper, and it doesn’t work out anyway.'"

When the goal of a wedding revolves around money, image or self, I don't blame women or men for a second for not wanting that stuff. I don't want that stuff, either.

That stuff is a sheet of paper.

That stuff is not marriage.

Marriage is the miracle in which two become one. (Note: It is not 1/2 + 1/2 = 1, but 1 + 1 = 1. A spouse cannot and will not complete you, nor should he or she be expected to.) It is the mutual gift of self, given in love, which is patient and kind, neither boastful nor proud nor rude. It doesn't demand its own way or act pissed off about and/or keep track of it every time it doesn't get its way. It stands for justice and truth, it doesn't give up or lose faith and it sticks around, with hope, regardless of circumstances*.

Marriage helps us "to overcome self-absorption, egoism, pursuit of one's own pleasure, and to open oneself to the other, to mutual aid and to self-giving,**"

Which is awesome.

So why, then, are few folks our age interested in it? And why do so few married couples reveal this in their relationships? I'm of the opinion that it's pretty complex.

Check back tomorrow for part 2.

- - - -

To read the New York Times story in full, click here.

*Within reason. If, for instance, you live with an abusive spouse, hope won't cut it. Your spouse needs help, and you need a safety plan. Click here for more information.

**This quote comes from the Catechism of the Catholic Church.

Red is for blood.

Despite the post I wrote last night (not to mention today's date), it didn't dawn on me until I arrived at work that today is Valentine's Day.

Which is why I was horrified to realize I am wearing a red sweater.

Realize that the red and the pink and the chocolate and the "Hi, significant other! I'll treat you like you're special today because Hallmark says I should." of the Valentine's Day in which the Americans who celebrate it partake have this much to do with Saint Valentine, whose feast day is today: ZERO PERCENT.

Sorry to disappoint.

But my day was saved by friend and fellow blogger SVB:

Me: I'm so ashamed. I accidentally wore a red sweater today and I did not intend to look festive.

SVB: If people ask about your sweater, you can just tell them you are celebrating St. Valentine's imprisonment and eventual bloody ending.

 Martyrdom > consumerism.

Just sayin'. Thanks, SVB!

Valentine's Day.

I traditionally don't celebrate Valentine's Day. (That I've been single most Valentine's Days as an adult is a coincidence.)

But one Valentine's Day does go down in Arleen history as the best I ever had.

1999.

I was a seventh grader with braces and glasses, in denial that I had curly hair. One morning, a few weeks before our class's Valentine's Day party, my homeroom teacher -- Mrs. Svendsen -- passed out a sheet of paper. On it was a list of every student in our class. Our instructions were as follows:

Next to each student's name except your own, write a good quality about him or her. 

And without knowing why, we did. 

Which is why on Valentine's Day, when Mrs. Svendsen handed us each a sealed envelope, we were not expecting what we found inside it.

I wonder if Mrs. Svendsen expected it to mean as much to us as it did (at least, it meant so much to me). 

Thumbs.

If you are wondering whether what my thumb is doing is a fluke in the photo with the essay of mine that appeared in today's paper, wonder no more.

"I bet people will think my hand is deformed," I said to my friend Ster about this yesterday.

Nah, she thought. Couldn't be. But upon further exploration, she sent the following:

"Now that you mention it, I am kind of concerned about your thumbs." -Ster

Best. Response. EVER.

Facebook is going public; not me.

Click here to read my latest column, online now and in print in the Perspective section of tomorrow's Tampa Bay Times.

It's about my belief that even as part of a culture that loves social media and smartphones, another way of life is possible.

Books in 2012: Rome Sweet Home

Until I was 10, I thought everybody was either Catholic (like my mom's side of the family) or Jewish (like my dad's). My horizons widened when, in fifth grade, my parents pulled me out of public school and put me in the private, non-denominational Protestant school where I studied through my senior year of high school.

Every time a teacher discovered my Catholicism, what followed was one of three things: 1.) acceptance of me as a fellow Christian, 2.) fascination with and/or fear of the mystery that is my church or 3.) an unending aggressive attempt to persuade me to become Protestant. And the third response, to the chagrin of the teachers who tried it, ultimately achieved the exact opposite of its intended purpose.

At school, somebody would protest something Catholic and at home, I'd study up. I'd read from the Bible and from books in my mom's collection. I'd listen to cassette tapes of talks about the Church given by people like a professor named Scott Hahn. And the more I studied and read and listened, the more grateful I was for getting to grow up Catholic. So when recently, I stumbled upon the book Rome Sweet Home: Our Journey to Catholicism by Scott Hahn and his wife Kimberly, I got warm and fuzzy feelings as well as the urge to read it. As of tonight, it is the fourth book I've read start to finish in 2012.

I am not as into apologetics now as I was when I was a Catholic in a Protestant school (though I do explain, defend and question when necessary). But the book brought back memories of the years in which I was a little Catholic apologist and brought up points about why the Catholic Church teaches what it does that I hadn't thought of in years. And their story -- how the Hahns met and how they loved and the twists and turns their lives took later -- is pretty riveting. For most of his life, Scott was the kind of Protestant who so disliked the Catholic church he'd call it the whore of Babylon. He was a Presbyterian pastor, a Calvinist and on a mission to persuade all the Catholics he met to become Protestant. Kimberly, the daughter of a Presbyterian pastor, wasn't as anti-Catholic as her husband. But she never would have dated a Catholic, let alone married a Catholic. Which is why she was horrified when her husband became one. And she surprised everyone, when a few years later, she followed suit. Scroll down for some interesting points I dog-eared and/or underlined:

On studying what the Catholic Church teaches about contraception:

"Did our use of birth control reflect how God saw children or how the world saw children? ... Perhaps it was more of an American attitude than a godly one to think of our fertility as something for us to control as we deemed best." -Kimberly, page 36

On sola fide:

"We gradually became convinced that Martin Luther let his theological convictions contradict the very Scripture that he supposedly chose to obey rather than the Catholic Church. He declared that a person is not justified by faith working in love, but rather he is justified by faith alone. He even went so far as to add the word 'alone' after the word 'justified' in his German translation of Romans 3:28 and called Saint James 'an epistle of straw' because James 2:24 specifically states '...for we are not justified by faith alone.'" -Kimberly, page 41.

On sola scriptura:

"In my church history class, one of my better students ... said, 'Professor Hahn, you've shown us that sola fide isn't scriptural---how the battle cry of the Reformation is off-base when it comes to interpreting Paul. As you know, the other battle cry of the Reformation was sola scriptura: the Bible alone is our authority, rather than the Pope, Church councils or tradition. Professor, where does the Bible teach that 'Scripture alone' is our sole authority?'
I looked at him and broke into a cold sweat.
I had never heard that question before. In seminary, I had a reputation for being a sort of socratic gadfly, always asking the toughest questions, but this one had never occurred to me.
I said what any professor caught unprepared would say, 'What a dumb question!' As soon as the words left my mouth, I stopped dead in my tracks, because I'd sworn that, as a teacher, I would never say those words.
But the student was not intimidated---he knew it wasn't a dumb question. He looked me right in the eyes and said, 'Just give me a dumb answer.'" Scott, pages 51-52 (Hahn stumped several of his Protestant preacher and professor friends with the same question. None were able to answer it.)

On a day Scott spent with Dr. John Gerstner, a "Harvard-trained, Calvinist theologian with strong anti-Catholic convictions" -- a meeting the Hahns hoped would convince Scott to stay Protestant:

"'Dr. Gerstner, I think the primary issue is what the Scripture teaches about the Word of God, for nowhere does it reduce God's Word down to Scripture alone. Instead, the Bible tells us in many places that God's authoritative Word is to be found in the Church, her tradition (2 Th. 2:15, 3:6) as well as her preaching and teaching (1 Pet. 1:25, 2 Pet. 1:20-21, Mt. 18:17). That's why I think the Bible supports the Catholic principle of sola verbum Dei, the Word of God alone, rather than the Protestant slogan, sola scriptura, Scripture alone.'
Dr. Gerstner responded by asserting---over and over again---that Catholic tradition, the popes and ecumenical councils all taught contrary to scripture.
'Contrary to whose interpretation of Scripture?' I asked. 'Besides, church historians all agree that we got the New Testament from the Council of Hippo in 393 and the Council of Carthage in 397, both of which sent off their judgments to Rome for the Pope's approval. From 30 to 393 is a long time to be without a New Testament, isn't it? Besides, there were many other books that people back then thought might be inspired, such as the Epistle of Barnabus, the Shepherd of Hermas and the Acts of Paul. There were also several New Testament books, such Second Peter, Jude and Revelation, that some thought should be excluded. So whose decision was trustworthy and final, if the Church doesn't teach with infallible authority?'
Dr. Gerstner calmly replied, 'Popes, bishops and councils can and do make mistakes. Scott, how is it that you can think God renders Peter [the first pope] infallible?'
I paused for a moment. 'Well, Dr. Gerstner, Protestants and Catholics agree that God most certainly rendered Peter infallible on at least a couple of occasions, when he wrote First and Second Peter, for instance. So if God could render him infallible when teaching authoritatively in print, why couldn't he prevent him from errors when teaching authoritatively in person? ... how can we be sure about the 27 books of the New Testament themselves being the infallible word of God, since fallible Church councils and Popes are the ones who made up the list?'
I will never forget his response.
'Scott, that simply means that all we can have is a fallible collection of infallible documents.'
I asked, 'Is that really the best that historic Protestant Christianity can do?'
'Yes, Scott, all we can do is make probable judgments from historical evidence. We have no infallible authority but Scripture. ... Like I said, Scott, all we have is a fallible collection of infallible documents.'
Once again, I felt very unsatisfied with his answers, though I knew he was representing the Protestant position faithfully. I sat there pondering what he had said about this, the ultimate issue of authority, and the logical inconsistency of the Protestant position.
All I said in response was, 'Then it occurs to me, Dr. Gerstner, that when it comes right down to it, it must be the Bible and the Church---both or neither.'" -pages 74-76

On yielding to God:

"My dad could sense the sadness in my voice.
He asked, 'Kimberly, do you pray the prayer I pray every day? Do you say, Lord, I'll go wherever you want me to go, do whatever you want me to do, say whatever you want me to say and give away whatever you want me to give away?'
'No, dad, I don't pray that prayer these days.' He had no idea of the agony I was enduring over Scott's being Catholic.
He said, genuinely shocked, 'You don't?!'
'Dad, I'm afraid to. I'm afraid if I prayed that prayer, that could mean joining the Roman Catholic Church. And I will never become a Roman Catholic!'
'Kimberly, I don't believe it will mean you will become a Roman Catholic. What it means is that Jesus Christ is either Lord of your entire life, or he isn't Lord at all. You don't tell God where you will and won't go. What you tell him is you're yielded to him.'" -page 115-116.

For more information about the book, click here. For all the posts about books I read in 2012, click here.