{"id":6908,"date":"2018-10-02T08:10:31","date_gmt":"2018-10-02T13:10:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/?p=6908"},"modified":"2018-09-26T15:34:10","modified_gmt":"2018-09-26T20:34:10","slug":"october-7-2018-taking-marriage-seriously","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.elca.org\/faithlens\/october-7-2018-taking-marriage-seriously\/","title":{"rendered":"October 7, 2018–Taking Marriage Seriously"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Wertz, Blacksburg, VA<\/strong><\/p>\n

Warm-up Question<\/strong><\/p>\n

Have you ever attended or participated in a wedding?\u00a0 Which elements of the wedding were the most memorable?<\/p>\n

Taking Marriage Seriously
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Have you ever heard someone say, \u201c50% of all marriages end in divorce?\u201d\u00a0 While that statement is frequently made in discussions about marriage and relationships, the research today on marriage suggests that this widely accepted statement isn\u2019t true.\u00a0 According to University of Maryland sociology professor Philip Cohen, divorce rates have dropped by 8% from 2008 to 2016 driven primarily by a declining divorce rate among millennials (those born between 1981 and 1996).<\/p>\n

\u201cThe change among young people is particularly striking,” Susan Brown, a sociology professor at Bowling Green State University, said of Cohen\u2019s results. “The characteristics of young married couples today signal a sustained decline [in divorce rates] in the coming years.\u201d<\/p>\n

In fact, according to a study from the Centers for Disease Control, between 2006\u20132010, the probability of a first marriage lasting at least 10 years was 68% for women and 70% for men. While broken relationships and divorce are still a painful part of life in the world, statistics suggest that for those choosing to get married in 2018, the chance of divorce is far lower than it was 40 years ago.<\/p>\n

Discussion Questions<\/strong><\/p>\n