Fighting The Real Threat to Family Values
Copyright 2003 by Shea Oakley
All rights reserved.
Not long ago a prominent American Evangelical leader made a statement that was long overdue. He told his audience that the biggest threat to the family in the United States is not homosexuality, it is divorce. In the midst of our loud and vituperative attacks on the growing acceptance of the gay lifestyle we have ignored a much greater danger. As the Evangelical divorce rate here has soared in recent years many churches have failed to recognize the more urgent priority of reinforcing marriages.
According to the latest polls the percentage of Christian marriages ending in divorce is around 50%, about the same as the national average. It is important to note here that these polls also include second marriages ending so they are not indicative of the failure rate of first marriages alone. The numbers would be considerably lower if only first marriages were included. But even these lower numbers leave us with the sobering realization that far too many Christian families are being torn apart by divorce.
The most tragic result of divorce is its effect on children. Studies have shown that children who come from broken homes are more likely to suffer depression, anxiety and learning disorders. They also tend to be more prone to engaging in drinking, drugs and illicit sex. The alienation and despair that is increasingly common among adolescents shadows the increase in divorces. The bottom line is that we are badly damaging our kids insuring, among other things, that their own attempts to bond in life-long unions will likely be even more problematic than our own.
With such stark evidences of what failed marriages produce in our children alone one might think that churches would be doing everything in their power to insure that Christian unions survive. No doubt many are and for that they should be commended. Unfortunately, however, what seems to be happening instead in much of the Evangelical subculture is a growing tolerance of divorce. The stigma of a failed marriage is no longer as powerful a deturrent as it was in years past. These days marriages ending among Christians, is more often labeled "tragic" than sinful. Such a value-neutral term seems a bit evasive for a people whose God clearly states that He hates divorce.
It should not be easy for a believing husband and wife to dissolve a union whose foundation rests on vows they made to one another before God. For starters the Church needs to staunchly support laws designed to make it more difficult to divorce, especially for reasons other than adultery. Pre-marital counseling should be vigorous, in depth, and occur over a longer period of time then is sometimes the case today. Divorce should be strongly and unapologetically discouraged from the pulpit, not occasionally but often. Finally couples who plan to ignore biblical and pastoral counsel and end their marriages for the wrong reasons should know beforehand that their church will censure them publicly if they choose to sin in this way. Perhaps they should even be told that disfellowship is a possibility.
If this sounds overly stern to some ears it should be remembered that for most of the history of Christianity divorce has been very strongly discouraged. For centuries there was a healthy fear of the spiritual consequences of ending a marriage for reasons other than unrepentant adultery. The fact is that the advent of a higher tolerance for divorce during recent years is not a sign of a progressive church but a regressive one. We might do well to remember that 2000 years ago a religion that had made divorce easy to justify and obtain was roundly condemned by Jesus Christ Himself. That fact alone should give pause to many a married person considering his or her options.