Last week my husband and I had dinner with a couple we hadn’t seen in two years. We spent the evening catching up, having heated debate and laughing loudly. At one point the wife leaned over to me and whispered, “Are you guys really happy in your marriage?”
The way she asked the question made it seem as if she expected to be disappointed by my answer so I was surprised when I answered, “Yes” and she breathed a sigh of relief and said, “Us too!” Her tone said — “Can you believe it!”
Lisa Cole Smith
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She went on to tell me what a relief it was to be able to have a conversation with another couple about how good marriage is. Her experience was that many couples have only complaints about their spouses and the general state of being married. While they are glad to be married, they aren’t necessarily happy.
This was an ironic conversation to have the week the Supreme Court heard arguments about the Defense of Marriage Act and same-sex marriage. It makes me wonder if so many people are unhappy being married, what all the fuss is about? It’s like a joke I heard. A married man asks another married man, “What do you think about same-sex marriage?” His friend answers, “I don’t have a problem with it. Why shouldn’t they have the right to be miserable just like everybody else?”
It is common these days to encounter the idea that marriage equals the end of freedom and personal exploration and therefore the end of happiness. In 1957, a time when 70 percent of Americans were married, a survey from the University of Michigan showed that 80 percent of those surveyed believed that people who preferred being unmarried were “sick,” “immoral” or “neurotic.” Today, according to census data, only 51 percent of adults are married and those attitudes have completely changed. In fact, a 2012 Pew poll showed that at least half of the respondents said marital status is irrelevant to achieving respect, happiness, career goals, financial security or a fulfilling sex life. It is only when having children comes into the picture that people begin to feel marriage is preferable (although certainly not necessary).
I don’t know what to make of the reality that marriage is on the decline among heterosexuals in the United States in the midst of the hot and heavy debate on the rights of homosexuals to marry. How can marriage be so important an “issue” and at the same time have such a bad rap? And these attitudes are not only among non-Christians. Sure, many people are still looking to get married, but too often a successful marriage is thought of as an ideal almost like a fairy tale rather than an achievable reality. While marriage does require “work,” I wonder why we are so surprised and disappointed to find that is the case and why so many people believe it is not work worth doing.
I think sometimes we Christians forget to speak about the deeper, subtler gifts of marriage. Through the commitment of marriage I am able to learn something about God’s love for me. It is common to speak of God as father, but the Bible also uses imagery of a bridegroom and there is something very special in that symbolism. There is work, disappointment and frustration, but there is also the joy of being known and loved for our 6-o’clock-in-the-morning selves by someone who has said, “I am committed to you no matter what.” There is a sense of the tangible the same way that bread and wine help us touch Jesus’ flesh and blood, and water leaves us feeling the cleansing of the Holy Spirit. The commitment of marriage can be an experience of one who chooses to love us not for what we do but because we are covenanted together.
Regardless of the outcome of the Supreme Court’s decision, the concept of marriage could still use a little defense. Wouldn’t a happily ironic outcome from the controversy be an interest in the deeper benefits of marriage and a renewed commitment to healthy ones?
Lisa Cole Smith (lsmith@convergenceccf.net) is pastor of Convergence: A Creative Community of Faith, in Alexandria, Va.