I don't see any positives about marriage

[Xantippe]

BDDFC,

Wow, that was really edifying.

It sounds like you aren’t currently a great prospect for marriage, but your particular experience doesn’t reflect life in general. My grandparents have been married 68 years and have a great marriage. My parents have been married 44 years and are very fond of each other. My husband and I have been married 16 years and your description of the trajectory of married life doesn’t really fit us (I’m not going to brag about our sex life–I’ll just say you couldn’t be more wrong).

 

[Blue_Rose]

BDDFC,
I think people will say the whole “you aren’t suited to marriage with that attitude” thing to you as they did with me but I understand how you feel.
Could I ask, if you married, is there a possibility of finding a job that you could be at home more?
I know of young women whose partners are in the military and even though it’s hard being apart they are faithful and wait for them. And because of the time the spend away from each other, when they are together they really value it.
Of course, it doesn’t work for everyone.

I think good marriages are rare these days but with God they are possible.

 

[TARRAT]

To be perfectly honest with all of you, I have really negative views on marriage too. With my career I’m home maybe 150 days out of the year and there’s always whores running around trying to bang my brains out, drug dealers/users, lots of booze. What woman wants to sit at home while her husband is out working a job like that? After 3 or 4 years of a Catholic marriage where you follow all the rules the sex is just gonna end, so the guy has to jerk off in secret to get some kind of sexual satisfaction because doin it once or twice a year is far from enough. Eventually down the line you both just hate each other. I’ve watched this happen to my grandparents, my parents, almost all of my aunts and uncles, my friends are either not married or in their first year of marriage so they’re still somewhat happy but give them a few years and they’ll go down the same path that the rest of my family and their families have. I know this is gonna **** a lot of people off, especially the language I’ve been using, but I’m just posting my opinion. I agree with the OP. She’s pretty much dead on. Married life looks like it sucks. This is going to get me banned.

Maybe this isn’t a good forum for you to visit? But MAYBE this is the best forum for you to frequently visit? Look at all the great marriages and people here.

 

[maryjk]

To be perfectly honest with all of you, I have really negative views on marriage too. With my career I’m home maybe 150 days out of the year and there’s always whores running around trying to bang my brains out, drug dealers/users, lots of booze. What woman wants to sit at home while her husband is out working a job like that? After 3 or 4 years of a Catholic marriage where you follow all the rules the sex is just gonna end, so the guy has to jerk off in secret to get some kind of sexual satisfaction because doin it once or twice a year is far from enough. Eventually down the line you both just hate each other. I’ve watched this happen to my grandparents, my parents, almost all of my aunts and uncles, my friends are either not married or in their first year of marriage so they’re still somewhat happy but give them a few years and they’ll go down the same path that the rest of my family and their families have. I know this is gonna **** a lot of people off, especially the language I’ve been using, but I’m just posting my opinion. I agree with the OP. She’s pretty much dead on. Married life looks like it sucks. This is going to get me banned.

So, my first thought was “what is he, 12? And trying to impress everyone with his bad language?”

But you said you have a job. So you aren’t 12.

So you are using language to get a rise out of someone. Grow up.

Oh, and you know very little about marriage.

 

[gardenswithkids]

… You come from a broken family which has shaded your view. …

:sad_yes:

One of the great things about marriage is that it provides a stable home with both a mother and a father for the children that may result from the marriage act. The man and woman make a lifelong commitment to each other, but it’s not just for their own sake but for the sake others–their children. Statistics show that children do better when raised in homes with both a mother and a father. The couple benefits from honoring the commitment they make to each other and so do their children.

Marriage is one path to holiness. We can learn to be less selfish when we think of the needs of both the other spouse and of the children. If one marries well, the other spouse is also growing in holiness and becoming less selfish. And if one does not marry well, marriage is still a path to holiness.

I am sorry that you come from a broken family. One or both of your parents failed at keeping your childhood home together. It’s happened so often these past few decades that our society is forgetting what marriage even is anymore!

One of the greatest positives of marriage is children. “The ‘supreme gift of marriage’ is a human person.” CCC 2378

I encourage you to read more from the section of the catechism that addresses marriage.

 

[gardenswithkids]

You (the product of your parents) are what is good about marriage.

 

[EasterJoy]

To be perfectly honest with all of you, I have really negative views on marriage too. With my career I’m home maybe 150 days out of the year and there’s always whores running around trying to bang my brains out, drug dealers/users, lots of booze. What woman wants to sit at home while her husband is out working a job like that? After 3 or 4 years of a Catholic marriage where you follow all the rules the sex is just gonna end, so the guy has to jerk off in secret to get some kind of sexual satisfaction because doin it once or twice a year is far from enough. Eventually down the line you both just hate each other. I’ve watched this happen to my grandparents, my parents, almost all of my aunts and uncles, my friends are either not married or in their first year of marriage so they’re still somewhat happy but give them a few years and they’ll go down the same path that the rest of my family and their families have. I know this is gonna **** a lot of people off, especially the language I’ve been using, but I’m just posting my opinion. I agree with the OP. She’s pretty much dead on. Married life looks like it sucks. This is going to get me banned.

You post like someone who has succeeded in getting himself banned before.

I don’t know what your line of work is, but it hardly sounds emotionally or psychologically healthy for a single man, either. I don’t know how you get through the day with such a low opinion of essentially everyone around you. You seem to know a lot of people enslaved to booze, drugs, and meaningless sex, and the ones who aren’t sound desperate and lonely. If that is all you see, could you possibly get yourself into a less soul-devouring line of work?

 

[His_helpmeet]

A priest once told me if I get married I need to be a “good wife” and sleep with my husband whenever he wanted because the priest said he gets many men go to confession frustrated over their wives lack of interest in sex.
Also, I find it hard to believe as a young person that any man would be willing to wait until marriage because it’s so rare now even amongst Catholics. NONE of my Catholic friends waited until marriage. And they use contraception too. Who would stay with a woman who was a devout Catholic and actually wants to follow the Church’s teachings? This is how I feel you see

A good husband considers his wife’s needs as well as his own. A good wife also considers that by responding to her husband she is helping him to stay faithful to her. There’s a lot of give-and-take involved. (I’m on antidepressants. My husband’s family has a history of very high libido. Need I say more? This is the approach we take.)

My husband only became Catholic in ~2005. He had also been married prior to marrying me. (His ex left him and the marriage was declared invalid.) Consequently I was not his “first” partner. But he was very, very adamant that we NOT have sex until marriage (and I agreed with him). He understood that it can cause serious damage to a relationship - the primary reason he and his ex married was because she was pregnant and he wanted to be a father to the baby. He also is firmly against artificial birth control. (At present we do not have children together, though we would like to - I am subfertile due to a medical condition but we are placing it in God’s hands.)

I can truly say I am married to my best friend. We have been married for 3 years now. We are very similar in many respects, but we have enough differences that we don’t annoy each other I believe that if God calls someone to marriage, He has created a person whom He would like that person to marry. This is part of His Will for that person’s life. Whether or not those two people choose to marry each other, however, is up to them - but if they do, it will be the surest and most direct route to heaven. Not to say that they could not work out their salvation in other ways, but this will be the easiest. I was very fortunate that I found that person in my life. God assured us multiple times before we married that this was His Will for us.

As a child, I left my future in God’s hands. Today, he has given me an outstanding career, a beautiful stepdaughter (9) and a loving husband. I truly believe that listening to and following His Will will bring us the greatest happiness - in this life and in the next.

 

[Groo]

You post like someone who has succeeded in getting himself banned before.

I don’t know what your line of work is, but it hardly sounds emotionally or psychologically healthy for a single man, either. I don’t know how you get through the day with such a low opinion of essentially everyone around you. You seem to know a lot of people enslaved to booze, drugs, and meaningless sex, and the ones who aren’t sound desperate and lonely. If that is all you see, could you possibly get yourself into a less soul-devouring line of work?

I get the impression that he is in a blue collar field with mostly men. The language in such environments is a bit coarser, but does not bother me.

Some electricians for example travel and work a ton of hours for 6 months, and then are off 6 months. I could see such work environments being prime targets for drugs and sex. That is not an indictment of the field, though. Not everyone can or should work in a corporate white collar job.

It is sad that his experience of married couples was so poor.

 

[JamalChristophr]

One thing I would like to say is please don’t judge us men like we were all the same, it’s not fair at all.

God created us, each one of us, in His image and likeness, and there are men who love God every bit as much as any woman might, and we’re not all just interested in sex as you say. That’s not true.

God Bless You.

 

[AnneTeresa]

I get the impression that he is in a blue collar field with mostly men. The language in such environments is a bit coarser, but does not bother me.

Some electricians for example travel and work a ton of hours for 6 months, and then are off 6 months. I could see such work environments being prime targets for drugs and sex. That is not an indictment of the field, though. Not everyone can or should work in a corporate white collar job.

It is sad that his experience of married couples was so poor.

Yes, people in blue collar service/maintenance and industry have these work conditions. My husband did and in his field you have to travel if you want to work. He is now retired but he used to describe the culture to me of hanging out at strip joints, etc. I met his coworkers and have seen it to be true.

There are many places where porn is in the restrooms, factory workers hit on you when you come there to work, and women target men because they know the men are on the road and vulnerable. All which reminds me of the need to keep praying for men in those situations…

 

[EasterJoy]

I get the impression that he is in a blue collar field with mostly men. The language in such environments is a bit coarser, but does not bother me.

Some electricians for example travel and work a ton of hours for 6 months, and then are off 6 months. I could see such work environments being prime targets for drugs and sex. That is not an indictment of the field, though. Not everyone can or should work in a corporate white collar job.

It is sad that his experience of married couples was so poor.

He sounds as if he is in a field that requires travel and down-time away from home and in the company of people who have (for whatever reason) no stable relationship to call their own–perhaps simply because their profession keeps them from home, which does break more relationships than a situation where spouses can be together most evenings. These are situations where a lot of people are self-medicating their personal problems by buying drugs and sex from people who profit from selling vice. He could be in sales or long-haul transportation or any of a number of necessary professions.

 

[ATeutonicKnight]

I don’t want to offend anybody so please understand I’m only posting my point of view. I would like to see the positives about marriage so please do let me know what they are.

I’m not married and am discerning religious life but family and friends keep encouraging me to date (which I don’t).

I think what is the point of marriage? Rarely anyone finds a good partner that follows the faith, married life is full of problems, all men are only interested in sex, I think why should I bring children into the world to suffer and I think there are too many people in the world anyway and lastly can you really love someone for a lifetime and not get sick of them ?

Please remember I don’t wish to cause offense because there are reasons why I feel this way about marriage (growing up in a broken family, hearing about friends being abused in relationships)

I just don’t get it. But I want to. Please help me see the good in marriage and what God uses it for.

Don’t be so rash to judge. Sex is not what all men what. Don’t get me wrong: All men want sex. But not all men let that desire become their sole focus in a relationship. I would never have sex before marriage. In fact, I don’t even want to have my first kiss until my wedding day. Not because I don’t want to have sex or don’t want to kiss, but because I want the relationship to be more focused on other things. If I had a girlfriend/fiancee and she wanted to have sex with me, I would tell her no.

 

[Cricket2]

Marriage has many positives but is not for everyone. However, you need to be very sure you are not seeking religious life as a way to escape the possibility of marriage or life in general. Living with others is no small feat and especially a larger group of people.

Many people may think that because “it is a religious community” there is little room for difficulties, disagreements, personality clashes and stress. Nothing could be farther from the truth. In many ways it is a place where life is boxed up into one location and all the same difficulties, faults, trials and problems have to be confronted within that small community. It is not a place to escape problems or find a guarantee of tranquility and peace.

If marriage is not for you fine, but be sure you can see the good in this vocation, the promise of life, the joy of children, the battles fought and won by couples and their extended families. It is about love, and love is hard work, it is about sacrifice and shared sufferings and joys. Marriage is not some magical event that means life will be trouble free, any more than religious life is.