Living together before marriage

[puppylove]

I have a 19 year old friend who is ready to move in with her boyfriend before they get married. She has a 22 month old son with another young man who doesn’t support the child. Her boyfriend has taken the reigns of father of the child. Help, what should I tell her to deter her from making this grave mistake?

Puppy

 

[Edwin1961]

The boyfriend sounds like he has a general interest in raising the child (which I commend) but that can still be handled outside of living together.
If your female friend is Catholic, does she know that the Church teaching is on the subject of living together before marriage? Having a child before marriage to begin with, gives me an indication that she is NOT strong in Church teaching.

Currently a young couple here, who were living together since Oct 2002 just moved out to a larger apartment. This couple moved in while they were both 19. They are 21 now and the young woman gave birth to their first son. I had mentioned to her about having the child baptized and she told me that she was raised Catholic and the father a Baptist. (However neither of them go to any church at all) I have been praying for them and hope that just my mention about baptism could plant a seed for them to get offically married and have the baby boy baptized.

Then this brings up the topic of being ‘civily married’.
I will pray for your friend along with the couple I know.

go with God!
Edwin

 

[Mummybee]

Living together makes one or both ‘partners’ very complacent about their relationship. (I know this from experience. ) One or both get comfortable, and take each other for granted. There is no unity. It’s really just a domestic/physical convenience. If the young man in question truly cares for your friend and her child, he will be willing (she as well!!!) to live apart until they are ready to commit. If they hesitate, then it’s clear that this is only ever going to be a temporary solution to the long term need of a stable environment for her son. There’s no way to sugar coat it. It sounds like she wants to hold on to a good thing, and is willing to compromise to do so. Emphasize to her that what is best for her son is for her to set a good example, and living together will never accomplish that.

 

[space_ghost]

How about something different… how about marriage… might fix it, what do you think?

i guess i’m getting old…

 

[raphaela]

Living together makes one or both ‘partners’ very complacent about their relationship. (I know this from experience. ) One or both get comfortable, and take each other for granted. There is no unity. It’s really just a domestic/physical convenience

I don’t understand this, maybe because i am not married, but how living together is different from being married (except the obvious reasons). Couples can get complacent, comfortable and take each other for granted in a marriage as well. I’ve seen lots of marriages go down the tubes from these reasons. My sisters marriage was one of them.She took him for granted, he got sick, he couldn’t do the things he used to do for her, she left him.

If you believe strongly in the sanctity of marriage, and believe that marriage should be a priority and you have to be an active participant, then living together isn’t going to change the unity.

That is my opinion, but again, I’m not married. But I do live with my fiance. It’s not in sin cause there is no sex, and yes it’s for financial reasons. But since we don’t and haven’t taken each other for granted as of yet, or got complacent, I fail to see your arguement but again, i admit I won’t know that for sure until I am married.

 

[Weezir]

Is your friend Catholic? How long has she been seeing this man? Are they engaged?

Weezir

 

[Tom]

raphaela:

I’m not married. But I do live with my fiance. It’s not in sin cause there is no sex, and yes it’s for financial reasons.

Normally when one hears people “living together” the assumption is they are having sexual relations. This of course is a sin outside of marriage. However “living together” can also be sinful if it leads to the occasion of sin. For example sinful thoughts. You don’t have to justify your actions to me but you do to God.

 

[puppylove]

In reply to Weezir:
My friend is Catholic (she goes to church every Sunday). She has been seeing this man for about 8 months. They are not engaged. She told me this past weekend that they would probably get married by the a Justice of the Peace like her sister did because it would be easier. She explained that you have to go through classes and had to take a compatibility test and the church could refuse to marry them if they were incompatible. I think I know what the say to her now, but any words of advice would be very helpful.

Puppy

 

[TreeHugger]

in response to raphaela…

I too am engaged, and a student, so i know how much it could save my fiance and i to live together before we are married, especially since we each pay for our own university educations and we’re paying for our wedding next august. however, we have decided there are several good reasons why waiting until we’re married is a good idea. for one, temptation. but the one i like even better is the witness we give. for our family and friends that didn’t realize we are not only Catholic by name, they now know that we are also Catholic in action. when people ask us why we are not ‘trying each other out’ first by living together, we can tell them we are Catholic. it’s interesting to see the reactions of our other ‘Catholic’ friends and family.
When i first met my fiance, he was living with his two best friends, who had been dating for 4 1/2 yrs (a guy and girl, i’ll call them P and K respectively). At the time, he was attending a university in another town, so i would go to visit him every couple of weekends. when my friends from university asked me about his living situation, i would say that he lived with a couple. they would give me a funny look because they imagined he lived in a 2 bedroom apt, and i would then try to explain, ‘oh no, they each have their own bedroom’. needless to say, everyone assumed they were sleeping together until i clarified. P and K went to a retreat with us the same year i met them. the theme the priest emphasized was, ‘we are responsible for other people’s holiness’, and K realized the witness they were giving. Despite having consulted a priest before the three of them moved in together, she decided to talk to the priest who ran the retreat we were at. little did she know that P was planning on asking K to marry him when they went home. The 2 decided that although they had been talking about marriage, they had to move out and set a different witness. P ended up asking K sometime after they got separate places, and i’m happy to say they’re getting married in less than a month.
my fiance and i really hold to heart that we are responsible for other people’s holiness. the way we feel is, what a better way to do it than to show it during our engagement, in particular, when everyone’s eyes are on us and our relationship.

 

[TreeHugger]

oh, something just came to mind…

when i went to a retreat, one of the speakers who spoke about marriage said that an unmarried couple who lives together cannot receive communion. they didn’t differentiate between those who are intimate or not…does anyone know anything about this?

 

[The_Hidden_Life]

Raphaela, there is also a sin of scandal, yes, it is a real sin and yes, you are committing it even if you are not physically intimate with your fiance while living together.

The problem with thinking cohabiting is just like marriage only without the piece of paper legalizing the relationship is that marriage changes everything. It changes your expectations of how your spouse should behave, of what your short and long-term goals are. You start thinking eternally rather than just moment to moment. You begin to see your spouse with different eyes. Not to mention the actual graces recieved by the Sacrament of Marriage.

I have a friend who was also a lapsed Catholic, attended Mass regularly with her parents, but also had a child out of wedlock with her live-in boyfriend/fiance. She kept saying they were going to get married someday, but she really wanted a fall wedding! (As if the wedding counted for two hoots in comparison to the actual marriage!) Finally, she got pregnant again and they married civilly during the second pregnancy. Now they have two children and still are not married in the Church, despite her attending Mass regularly.

I have never heard of a couple being turned away for negative compatibility on a standardized test. Perhaps she is afraid that because her boyfriend is a different religion that there will be some other obstacles? Really, all she would have to do (assuming she is a Confirmed Catholic) is go to Confession, repent of whatever sins she has, including living together, fornication, etc. They would have to remain celibate after that and until the wedding. Six months (minimum marriage preparation in most parishes) is not so long to live without one’s beloved if the rewards are eternal! If finding another place for the boyfriend to live is a problem, tell the priest and maybe he can find another family or man willing to host him until the wedding. Find out the details for her and maybe she wouldn’t be so frightened to ask the right persons the right questions.

 

[Mistermerlin]

raphaela:

I don’t understand this, maybe because i am not married, but how living together is different from being married (except the obvious reasons).

I posted this response in reply to another thread here.

My wife and I are the co-ordinators of the Pre-Cana program our parish offers.
Probably between 50-60% of the couples that register are living together.
We make it a point during our program (four sessions-approximately 16 hours total) that living together prior to marriage can be a hindrance to the success of that union.
There are a number of reasons that it’s not a good idea, many of which have been touched on here, including:

1. According to the Rutgers study (mentioned previously) people who live together prior to marriage have a 47% GREATER risk of divorce that those who do not.
2. Marriage is a covenant between the couple and God. Living together does not have the ‘covenantial experience’ (I think I just made up this term ) No matter how you slice it this is not like being married. We’ve even had couples who told us after they were married that it is far different than lving together.
3. Living together LOWERS one’s expectations of commitment, i.e., if this doesn’t work we can walk away with no problem. These lowered expectations are then taken into the marriage. However, after marriage it becomes a major problem because neither party can now walk away ‘scott-free’.
4. Sex…is an incredibly strong unifying bond between two people. Having pre-marital sex can cause one (or both) parties to overlook the shortcomings of the other (he’s a slob, she spends money like there’s no tomorrow, etc…) especially if the sex is ‘good’. Once they’re married and the ‘thrill’ of sex has worn off (and it does), those faults are still there and still need to be addressed. Often times they’re not and the couple finds they have ‘irreconcilable differences’. You need to get to know the other person in a non-sexual context.

We ask all couples, especially those who are living together, to refrain from sexual intercourse until their wedding night…so that they can get to know each other on a different, non-sexual level. (The looks we get when this is asked are sometimes priceless.)

We do have one story where one couple (a very good looking couple, I might add) actually got up and told the other couples that they had decided to refrain from sex until their wedding. I thought that this was pretty courageous on their part.

All in all, living together before marriage isn’t a good idea…period.
But then again, all we can do is point it out to people. It’s ultimately up to them what they want to do with (and for) their immortal souls.

The Peace of the Risen Lord be with you all

 

[iguana27]

My husband and I planned to live separately before we got married. The deal on the apartment fell through. At the time we were planning to live separately, we were sleeping together . We were mostly planning to live apart to keep up appearances. We were not commited to the idea of pre-marital chastity in any way, we just wanted to look good for the relatives.

We decided that the only way we could make things work financially was to move in together.Once we moved in together, I had a change of heart. I knew that sex before marriage was wrong, and I became acutely aware that our poor decision and outright sin might have consequences for our marriage and future children.

I threw away my birth control pills and had a talk with my fiance. No sex until we were married. We would live like brother and sister until then.

It worked. We lived up to our commitment. My fiance (now husband) loved me enough not to sleep with me…

In the mean time, I learned about NFP, and got the birth-control hormones out of my system.

God blessed us on our honeymoon. We conceived our son.

I am sorry that I made the wrong choice and slept with him before we were married, but I believe that God honored our change of heart.

He is merciful.

God Bless,
Iguana