Good advice for engaged couples

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I agree with what the good Monsignor said in his parish bulletin, but obviously there are instances where a cohabitating couple cannot live separately until the marriage. Many people have begun families with children out of wedlock and the children would be deprived of their father or mother. Some could not afford to live separately, and may have bought houses with considerable mortgages that rely on both partners’ incomes. Sometimes one of the partners is disabled and needs care from the other partner.

Based on what I know about this pastor, I think he would be reasonable in such circumstances and make exceptions, provided of course that the partners agree to live as brother and sister under the same roof until the wedding.
 
TheLittleLady said:
People who did not have premarital sex will likely have more religiously/morally conservative values and be less likely to consider divorce as an option.
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Yes I read study that people who marry without previous partners have about 0-5% chance divorce, whereas people with 2-9 partners have 5-6 times greater chance divorce (30%+) and for more than 10 partners its obviously much higher. Ironically, it didn’t seem to matter if someone had 2 pre-marital partners or 9 pre-marital partners, once they reached 2 pre-marital partners, their risks were all about 5-6 times greater than someone with 0 pre-marital partners.

ifstudies.org

Counterintuitive Trends in the Link Between Premarital Sex and Marital Stability

American sexual behavior is much different than it used to be. Today, most Americans think premarital sex is okay, and will have three or more sexual partners before marrying. What, if anything, does premarital sex have to do with marital stability? This research brief shows that the...
ifstudies.org ifstudies.org
 
Psalm30 said:
because
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I am sure some in the church say that. I taught high school religion for many years. What I taught was that sex is a gift from God whereby God allows man to participate with Him in the creation of new human beings! Sex is a sacramental right and something sacred. Best to wait until marriage where sex can be enjoyed without guilt and where you can provide for any children that may result! I know that is a very Catholic view!
 
PatK63 said:
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Psalm30:
because
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I am sure some in the church say that. I taught high school religion for many years. What I taught was that sex is a gift from God whereby God allows man to participate with Him in the creation of new human beings! Sex is a sacramental right and something sacred. Best to wait until marriage where sex can be enjoyed without guilt and where you can provide for any children that may result! I know that is a very Catholic view!
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That’s the approach I would take, if I were teaching it. Some people will probably still find an argument against it, but I think it’s harder to argue with than “A lot of bad things will happen if you go against this teaching.” Ideally people would respect God and trust that following His commands has merits. Unfortunately not everyone respects God, so I guess that’s when people try to persuade them by explaining all the negative consequences of sin. But at the end of the day, people will not hear what they don’t want to hear.

I’m currently a catechist teaching fifth grade. If the subject ever comes up I will probably quote your post. 🙂
 
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HomeschoolDad said:
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Psalm30:
We should not lower our standards for fear people will not do what God commands. A house build on a poor foundation will not stand!
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I was thinking just today, if there is any teaching, practice, or commonly held idea within the Church, with which I have a problem, it is this business of the “wheat and tares” — accepting that good and evil can exist side by side. There are churches that never heard of such a thing — they insist that their members live by their religion, not scandalize their fellow brethren, and if they don’t comply, they’re kicked out. I guess, then, “wheat and tares” is the only alternative. Then the only thing to do, is for the Church to nag people to death**, keep reminding them over and over again that these are the Church’s teachings, there is no “wiggle room”, and you are the one that needs to change, not the Church, because the Church isn’t going
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Isn’t that what the Catholic Church does?
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Aquinas11 said:
Yes I read study that people who marry without previous partners have about 0-5% chance divorce, whereas people with 2-9 partners have 5-6 times greater chance divorce (30%+) and for more than 10 partners its obviously much higher. Ironically, it didn’t seem to matter if someone had 2 pre-marital partners or 9 pre-marital partners, once they reached 2 pre-marital partners, their risks were all about 5-6 times greater than someone with 0 pre-marital partners.
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People do themselves serious damage when they have premarital sex, and not only from a purely spiritual standpoint. They can’t help but “compare” their partner with past partners, and they have done the damage of uniting themselves to a person, in the most intimate way possible, without being permanently committed to that person. If they unite with a partner whom they will later marry, and have never had any other partners but that one, that is bad enough, but at least they are not in the position of “having become one flesh” with someone who will later be a stranger to them.

Divorce also causes the same kind of damage. Sadly, I know this all too well.
 
I know many couples, particularly of older generations (born in the 1930’s-1960) who had long marriages, that I would not call successful.
Many probably should not have married to begin with, but because they were Catholic, divorce was not an option (their words) or there were financial reasons to stay together.
Their marriages were not happy, and often led to abusive and neglectful actions towards each other and their children.
 
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FiveLinden said:
Is there any evidence for the claim that couples who live together before marriage have a decreased chance of a permanent union?
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Yes.

The statistical evidence is overwhelming, and the divorce rate is significantly higher.

I haven’t seen one, though, that controlled for the different attitude towards marriage itself between those that cohabitate before and those that do not.

That said, since the studies started coming out a couple of decades ago, I haven’t heard of a single one that did not find a statistically higher divorce rate.
 
Also true. Correlation and causation but even when controlled for, it still bears out.
 
The problem, as I see it, is we are trying to change people who are already doing/have been doing these things. We need to start teaching younger people what true Catholic marriage is all about and help form them into mature young adults, who are properly catechized and empowered to make the right choices.

Months, sometimes years, of preparation goes into the day, but not too many think about preparing for the next 40+ years as husband and wife.
 
Neither of these studies address the claim in the OP, that couples who themselves live together before their marriage to each other, have longer-lasting marriages.Is there a study that shows this?
 
My mistake. This was a statistical claim I brought into the thread earlier that I thought you were asking about. I’ll let doc look for it if he wants.
 
How about including those that cohabitate and because of it decide to not get married. How would these be included into the statistics? It’s not like all those that cohabitate always get married, right?

Another question that came to mind reading this thread…
In earlier times, many Catholics didn’t have access to a priest to marry them for long periods of time so they handfasted which is basically a promise to either marry or separate after a year and one day. In a loose sense, it was an engagment with them promising to marry. I need to look into it further but I don’t think the church condemned this. It was a solution to a problem and it sort of looks like cohabitating today. Just curious on your thoughts?
 
FiveLinden said:
Can you cite an example of the statistical evidence please?
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Not off the cuff; this is from decades of observation, including with professional interest as a statistician.

They are common enough that there are no reasons to suspect that I can do an internet search better than anyone else . . .
MiserereMeiDei said:
I’ll let doc look for it if he wants.
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given that the first hit on the first thing I tried produced such a study, I’m not inclined to do the searching for those unwilling to even take a stab on a topic with this heavy of ready coverage . . .
Pattylt said:
How about including those that cohabitate and because of it decide to not get married. How would these be included into the statistics?
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A good question. I don’t think they belong in the “stayed married” category . . . but then, maybe they did marry someone else and stay married. As a SWAG, though, I would think they would fall more strongly in the divorce column–but I wouldn’t bet even a cold cup of coffee on it . . .
 
Pattylt said:
In earlier times, many Catholics didn’t have access to a priest to marry them for long periods of time so they handfasted which is basically a promise to either marry or separate after a year and one day. In a loose sense, it was an engagment with them promising to marry. I need to look into it further but I don’t think the church condemned this. It was a solution to a problem and it sort of looks like cohabitating today. Just curious on your thoughts?
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As long as handfasting didn’t include sexual relations, I can’t see anything wrong with it. It sounds more like an Old Testament betrothal to me. Are you suggesting that they lived together? In a private residence with nobody else in the house? Shared the same bed?

People have engaged in premarital sexual relations from time immemorial. It is not as though everyone used to be chaste, used to be fearful of eternal damnation, and that people only started having sex before marriage in the past 50 years. It was less common for women to have had multiple sexual partners before marriage, and to be forthcoming about it, as many modern women are today. It was more common for women to be chaste, and for many men to frequent brothels or find “loose” women, if they wanted to have sex before marriage. (I’m not condoning this, I am just describing the state of affairs back then.) And Catholics in those days feared going to hell.
 
dochawk said:
given that the first hit on the first thing I tried produced such a study, I’m not inclined to do the searching for those unwilling to even take a stab on a topic with this heavy of ready coverage . . .
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What search criteria did you use, and how did you vet the source?

Normally I say here, if you make the claim and someone asks for the source it’s usually a courtesy to provide it, not say “go search it yourself”.

I could jump on google and “proove” the earth is flat or that aliens exist too.

My $0.02…It’s a pet peeve of mine when someone makes a statistical or scientific claim and then is asked for sources to said claim they just say “search it yourself”… I will bow out now…
 
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TC3033 said:
What search criteria did you use, and how did you vet the source?
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try simple keywords like “cohabitation” “marriage” and “divorce”
TC3033 said:
Normally I say here, if you make the claim and someone asks for the source it’s usually a courtesy to provide it, not say “go search it yourself”.
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If I were putting out some detailed or specific claim, yes.

This is a very basic thing that gets reported on enough that it’s hard not to trip over it in the media.

I also won’t go look up cites for you on the speed of light being 186,000 per seconds, there being 100 senators, or the Ambrosian Rite being part of the Roman Catholic Church.

These things are basic, and it’s tough to have a discussion when someone wants citations to fill holes in his basic background.
 
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