Marriage Vows Trivialized by Modern Trends
In our current over-commercialized, consumer society, we know the price of everything, and the value of nothing, and this is also true of marriage. In Britain, commentators have advocated making divorce more difficult, as a way to strengthen marriage, because there are too many divorces. Nearly half of British marriages will end in divorce. This figure destabilizes any society and, however much the wooly-headed spout to the contrary, affects children most, all research shows that children develop best in a stable partnership, with two committed parents. A recent survey, showed British children as the unhappiest in Europe, and this would seem to be coupled with Britain’s high divorce rate, one of the highest in Europe.
The marriage vows in the traditional Anglican wedding service say everything about what marriage should be. That a husband and wife should be an enduring partnership, in good times and bad, in sickness and in health, until death do us part. The current trend for translating the marriage vows into modern English seems to remove something from the seriousness of the promises, that the couple make during the service. A wedding is not the frills and furbelows, it is the making of a legal contract between two people, and is the most important contract that they will ever make. The old English, that the traditional wedding vows are couched in, emphasizes that the ceremony is the special part of the wedding, and that everything else is irrelevant and that what a couple is doing in declaring their intentions before their friends and relations, is the most solemn and important thing that they will ever do. The language that they use to do so should make plain that the promises that they make are extra special, and super important.
The modern focus is very much on the wedding, and not on the marriage. Bridal magazines, romantic stories and children’s fairy tales all end at the church door, as if the social part of the wedding, and the trappings added by modern society, are the end of the story. A marriage takes hard work, sometimes a husband, or wife, must give until it hurts, and then go on giving. Marriage takes work every day, and yet some people think of marriage as a disposable commodity, and, at the first sign of trouble they file for divorce, some people even enter marriage thinking that, if it does not work out, they can get a divorce.
People need to think far more seriously, before getting married at all. Marriage is much more than a white dress and a big party. It needs stamina and hard work. It means sticking together and not giving up at the first hurdle. Marriage is a serious undertaking, and, as the marriage service says, is “not to be taken lightly, or frivolously, but soberly and reverently”.
The modern frivolous attitude to marriage is underlined, and exacerbated, by celebrities’ behaviour. Some almost seem to marry as a career move. Many celebrities’ weddings feature in gossip magazines, only for newspapers, months later to report the couple’s break-up, and subsequent, acrimonious divorce.
The British need to change their attitude to weddings, and marriage. Although some advocate that making divorce more difficult will strengthen marriage, they are wrong. What society needs is to stop focusing on weddings and to start focusing on marriage. We all need to learn that marriage is not a frivolous undertaking, but something needing very careful thought. A couple build a marriage, piece by piece, over many years, it takes hard work, tears, laughter, sharing, memories and much, much more. The wedding is merely the beginning of the story.
