Easter Joy said:
“It is, rather, an adjustment, and it is allowed for it to take time for her to make that adjustment. It is an adjustment that she promised to make when she married her husband, but that does not imply it is an adjustment that she is duty-bound to make easily and instantly.”
It doesn’t have to be made instantly, but she needs to start moving in that direction if she wants to save her marriage. We have no reason at the moment to think that she is making any effort at all at self-control. That process needs to start now.
“Why we are all supposed to fall all over ourselves standing up for her husband and expect no compassion from ourselves for her is beyond me. If it was her husband who was suffering regret from his inability to give himself to her as a virgin (which he may be, putting her in the position of having to come to us for help in going through this instead of laying her disappointment on top of what he’s already feeling!), I hope we wouldn’t be jumping all over him about this, but rather encourage him gently to give himself time to get past what is only now, after his marriage to the woman who has committed herself to him in her entirety and for life, being experienced as the true loss that it is.”
If he was persistently regretful four months into their newylywed life, yes I would suggest that something was really wrong with him. For a psychologically normal and healthy person, the joy of new married life should overwhelm such feelings. There is something wrong here.
Well, yes, there is something wrong. Her husband slept around before he got married, albeit to a limited extent, which understandably bothers her, that is what is wrong. She’s having to adjust, she is finding that difficult, and in her first post she tried to tell people who were still virgins not to sleep around before they married. I really do not see why that is so terrible. You act as if it somehow “isn’t cheating” if someone is unchaste before they marry instead of after they marry. Well, it
is cheating. A spouse who has resisted temptation and saved himself or herself for you is naturally going to feel the loss when you did not do so for him or her.
People who had sex before marriage may find this hard to believe, but there is nothing wrong with that!! The person who saves themselves for marriage and yet feels no loss when their spouse did not is the exception, not the norm. It’s good if a new bride or groom can summon the needed generosity of heart so easily as that, but it is not the norm, and we should not imply that it ought to be.
Yes, she does have the duty to get past this. I am only saying that she is in the position of someone whose spouse was unfaithful* during *marriage who decides to take his or her wayward spouse back after an infidelity. It does not work to take the person (or to take them back) and then to dwell on the offense indefinitely–you are absolutely right about that! It is to be expected, however, that when the impact of the violation of trust is truly experienced, that is the point at which the work of getting past the offense really starts. Just as I would not be too hard on a spouse who was still struggling with the aftermath of an infidelity a mere four months after the offense, I would also not be too hard on a new bride a mere four months after she actually began experiencing the emotional aftermath of her husband’s pre-marital lack of chastity.
She does have the duty to do the work to get past this, just as she would have if he had been unfaithful after marriage and she had chosen to take him back. She ought to, however, have a good deal of compassion for having to do work to repair damage for which she is not responsible. After all, the bride had no sexual experience when she made her decision to get past the offense. She could not know exactly what she was asking of herself. Give her a break, please, and admit that there is nothing wrong with her because it is harder than she thought! I do not know why that is so hard for people to understand or accept.
Does that make sense? I’m not saying she does not have to adjust herself to this, that she has some right to grieve indefinitely or that it does her or anyone else good to hold on to her grief. I am saying that because she herself did not feel the repercussions of the offense until after her marriage began we should not pretend that the offense is far in the past. The effects began for her four months ago. Give her encouragement to adjust, yes, but don’t accuse her of being unforgiving because she’s finding the adjustment hard.
And yes, she was right in her initial post: It is well worth it to maintain one’s virginity so that one’s spouse will not have to go through this after marriage. She makes a good point, and many people who have the temptation to “sow their wild oats” will do well to take her warning into account. Fornication is not a victimless sin just because there is no pregnancy and no STDs, and transgressors do not just sin against God, but also against their future spouses. She is absolutely right about that, and does not deserve to be condemned for saying so. Those who are still unmarried do well to remember that. It may help them in maintaining themselves in a way that so many people, even within the Church, are implying is just not that important.
