Another question about marriage

[mic0]

Link.

What do you all think about this, and especially Kirke's answer? Obviously this topic is near and dear to my heart, since I married someone not LDS and long before we were engaged I had to decide how I felt about the whole situation (before I knew how I felt about the Church and religion itself).

I feel like a lot of Kirke's answer is understandable. Yes, you want to marry someone supportive, and someone who shares your beliefs. That said, he doesn't seem to think any non-LDS person could be fully supportive of an LDS spouse. Specifically he says "even if they are semi-supportive," as if being fully supportive is outside the realm of possibility. Is it? When Mr. Mico and I were dating he encouraged me to go to church to see how I really felt - is that only semi-supportive? I don't think so. Similarly, in my home ward (of which Kirke was once a member, though I don't think he lived there when The Big Surprise happened) there was a couple where the wife was LDS and the husband wasn't. He went to church alllll the time. Their children were encouraged to attend youth activities. The Big Surprise was that the man ended up getting baptized after like 25 years of marriage, but when he decided he believed isn't something I know. If he had never gotten baptized would he not be considered supportive of his religious wife?

Finally, just an over-stated annoyance at the answer: he said "if the gospel and the promise of the Book of Mormon are true, then any sincere non-member who's genuinely open to the Church will find out that it's true." That's quite a definitive statement which, yes, I know, is supported by the Book of Mormon and General Authorities, and yet not supported by experiences of genuinely sincere people who don't end up believing in the Church, or end up believing in something else.

Anyway, those were my thoughts reading it. I definitely appreciate the idea that both Kirke and Maven said where they want someone who is supportive or, in Maven's case, a Priesthood holder, because those are both important things. But many of Kirke's arguments against this hypothetical second marriage rubbed me the wrong way. I wonder how an older person in the Church who had been married and sealed would feel. (If only Vorpal Blade were still around, amiright? Though he might be too conservative this time around for my liking. )

[Zedability]

Well, I don't think it's unreasonable to say that marrying someone non-LDS is generally going to result in less Church support than marrying someone LDS, but I also think that there are exceptions. I know plenty of couples where one spouse converted years after marriage, and I know lots of people who married someone was LDS but then ended up going inactive. So obviously Kirke's response isn't true for every case. But, I think it's true for more cases than it is false.

Also, I think that a fully supportive LDS husband would be more of a support than a fully supportive non-LDS husband, simply because a non-LDS husband who's fully supportive still won't have a testimony or the Priesthood included in that support. But that's more along the lines of Maven's answer than Kirke's.

I do agree that it's possible for a non-LDS husband to be fully supportive, though.

[Whistler]

My husband is older than me and I've thought about this same dilemma. Definitely think it depends on the couple.

[thatonemom]

This is slightly off topic, but I was surprised no one brought up the fact that once a woman has died, she can be sealed to all the men she was married to, assuming they are also dead. Dead women can be sealed to more than one man. So the question really becomes, does it matter if you marry a person that isn't LDS.

And of course that depends on the situation. My dad is not LDS, and was not supportive of the lifestyle that went with being married to a Mormon. He said he felt like he was being judged a lot. Not necessarily by my mom, but by other members of the church. I'm sure it's hard to enjoy the occasional drink or cup of coffee when you're around people who believe those things are bad for you. He was the odd one out around my mom's LDS friends, and she was the only non-drinker around his. Being a Mormon is just a lot more involved than some other religions, and I think it poses some challenges when one spouse is actively LDS and the other isn't. Again, not to say that it never works, just that I think it makes things harder.

[mic0]

...So obviously Kirke's response isn't true for every case. But, I think it's true for more cases than it is false.

I guess I'm just one of those people who (generally) doesn't like absolutes. That's probably why (almost) every time I wrote an answer for the Board, or even comment on something here, I'm (somewhat) cautious and will sometimes present multiple sides even if it isn't what I would do/think. But yes, I recognize that being married to an LDS person will (most likely) lead to a more supportive family structure.

Which brings me to a related question. Does it make a difference to anyone the age at which this second marriage occurs? I think it is reasonable to assume that many people are more solid in their faith later in life. If you are young and your spouse unexpectedly dies and you don't have children, are you going to want to marry another LDS person more than an 80-year old whose spouse died and who is now lonely and needs companionship and a friend but not necessarily those other life-things that come along with getting married younger?

This is slightly off topic, but I was surprised no one brought up the fact that once a woman has died, she can be sealed to all the men she was married to, assuming they are also dead. Dead women can be sealed to more than one man. So the question really becomes, does it matter if you marry a person that isn't LDS.

I don't think I've ever even heard of that! But then you'd have to assume that people later will do the sealing work for you, right? Does it make a difference? Would you be assuming that your spouse will convert in the next life? (Sincere questions, I'm not trying to be obnoxious. )

To Whistler, yeah, me too.

[Whistler]

Hmmm I think if I were all done raising kids I'd be a lot more open to marrying a non-LDS person.

[yayfulness]

I'd do it based on revelation, and that's about it. I don't know if I can make any statements to apply to others, but speaking for myself, the Church and the Gospel are such integral parts of my worldview that I'd have a very hard time meshing well with anyone who didn't share them with me.

[NerdGirl]

I completely disagree with his answer, but then again I completely disagree with just about everything he says. So take that for what it's worth.

[UnluckyStuntman]

I completely disagree with his answer, but then again I completely disagree with just about everything he says. So take that for what it's worth.

I just laughed so hard at this!


I was kind of put off by the last paragraph in Kirke's answer. I feel that the generic "well if you really wanted to know if the church were true, then you would be converted/have a testimony!" is kind of a copout. But I'm jaded like that, I suppose.

[Portia]

I've struggled with this from the other side of the coin. I've often wished that the men I've been involved with would make a cleaner break with the Church. (I've wished that I would!) I definitely want to feel "supported" in my "lifestyle," which is going to include Sunday afternoons in a coffeeshop, the media I like, and more lax sexual standards. (None seem to object to this latter point!) I just don't know how much more I can handle the cognitive dissonance of guys who go every other week with their family, to be nice. I don't know how much more I can handle my own "well, fine I'll get dragged along" attitude. My testimony is no firmer, my convictions have not changed. And I just have a stronger connection with my fellow inactives; culture, location, a shared alma mater all point that way. But when a family member and I discussed this recently, it was like, "no! I'm not going to take my putative offspring to church! I'm not going to baptize them! I don't believe it's true, and I can raise them with moral values and ethics, thx" So I don't want pressure from a hypothetical husband to do so. Considering all* these guys are functionally atheist, you might think that would be easy. But we're all very nerdy, clean-cut, square, not-inherently-rebellious people.

*Yes, all, my dating life is confusing.

[yayfulness]

I was kind of put off by the last paragraph in Kirke's answer. I feel that the generic "well if you really wanted to know if the church were true, then you would be converted/have a testimony!" is kind of a copout. But I'm jaded like that, I suppose.

At one specific point in high school, I suddenly discovered that I had no testimony of the Church (although I certainly believed in a God of some sort), and it took me a year of searching to get anything resembling an answer; it wasn't until even later that I had a really confirming experience. I don't know why it took so long for me to get an answer, but I do know from literal personal experience that the idea that any good person can gain a testimony of the Church in a couple weeks and if they don't they obviously don't want to/aren't looking hard enough is totally false. Maybe God had a reason for withholding an answer from me. Maybe I was doing something wrong. Maybe I needed to learn a bit of empathy. I don't have a clue and probably never will.

Even so, I have seen far too many cases of people marrying nonmembers and eventually falling away from the Church to be comfortable with it. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn't. But there's no way I'm going to make a gamble like that unless God tells me to.

[Katya]

Finally, just an over-stated annoyance at the answer: he said "if the gospel and the promise of the Book of Mormon are true, then any sincere non-member who's genuinely open to the Church will find out that it's true." That's quite a definitive statement which, yes, I know, is supported by the Book of Mormon and General Authorities, and yet not supported by experiences of genuinely sincere people who don't end up believing in the Church, or end up believing in something else.

Kirke's statement is unfalsifiable, because he can claim that anyone who doesn't come to the conclusion that the Church is true must not have been "sincere" or "genuinely open" in the first place. That's very poor logical reasoning.

It also means that he can only support his claim by rejecting the self-reported personal experience of anyone who doesn't join the Church, which effectively sets up a dual standard whereby people are Mormon or who convert are the only ones whose personal experiences can be trusted. That dismissal of personal experience and testimony sets a very dangerous precedent, particularly in a church that is founded on the highly unorthodox personal experiences of a teenage boy.

[Yog in Neverland]

I have Opinions and Such on this, but I'd just like to pop in and defend Kirke for something--*nobody* wanted to touch that question and it took a while for him to even pick it up and answer it. That question was destined to have many people disagree with the answers given.

I do want to share my opinions on this forum, but I want to let them formulate a little more before I do. They're not opinions I felt sharing in a Board answer, but I do feel comfortable sharing them on a less formal, less "authoritative" forum like this.

[Portia]

I was kind of put off by the last paragraph in Kirke's answer. I feel that the generic "well if you really wanted to know if the church were true, then you would be converted/have a testimony!" is kind of a copout. But I'm jaded like that, I suppose.

At one specific point in high school, I suddenly discovered that I had no testimony of the Church (although I certainly believed in a God of some sort), and it took me a year of searching to get anything resembling an answer; it wasn't until even later that I had a really confirming experience. I don't know why it took so long for me to get an answer, but I do know from literal personal experience that the idea that any good person can gain a testimony of the Church in a couple weeks and if they don't they obviously don't want to/aren't looking hard enough is totally false. Maybe God had a reason for withholding an answer from me. Maybe I was doing something wrong. Maybe I needed to learn a bit of empathy. I don't have a clue and probably never will.

This already raises my pre-existing high esteem for you. As I was contemplating the Big Questions today at a rather infantilizing YSA activity (bouncy houses and cotton candy were more charming with my eighteen-year-old friend and his Kindergartener brother), it was like "eh, I could do this." It just didn't seem like a big deal any more to not do X, Y, or Z. I don't think I believe in a bearded Nordic man in the sky, but I believe in Providence, and I feel like there can be a place for the Church in my life, and it doesn't have to cause me the distress it has for, what?, four years, now. So I am glad that people were persistent, I suppose, because I hate this false narrative that it's like, "hooray! I am Mormon again. Sorry coffee you were totally wrong." Usually the scriptural narrative is that it takes people a long time to come around, and it's all highly individual. I think your momentum continued without me. I don't think I'm uniquely special (a very Mormon idea, I think), but I don't think I loathe and fear it the way I once did.

Still not looking for a temple wedding, but that's okay. That's what Divine Providence is pointing me toward, so so be it, for now.

[Imogen]

So, from my still-on-the-road-to-Catholicism standpoint (btw, Easter baptism y'all! Wish you could be here!), I'm still on the fence about marrying a non-Catholic. My faith is new to me, and it means a lot to me. But does it mean so much to me that I would turn down the opportunity to marry a wonderful man? I think it would depend on how he felt about my going to church and raising our children Catholic. Religion was one of the things that tore my parents apart (kind of hilariously since neither of them were practicing when I was a child, and now only my mom goes to services with any regularity). One of my student's moms told me how she and her husband were different religions (he Catholic, she Baptist) and they raised the kids Catholic, but the kids have since changed religions. But they're a very happy (and awesome) family.

Ironically, the guy I liked most recently was Catholic (though not practicing. I usually go for Jewish guys), but he moved away, so it's back to the drawing board.

[Emiliana]

So, from my still-on-the-road-to-Catholicism standpoint (btw, Easter baptism y'all! Wish you could be here!), I'm still on the fence about marrying a non-Catholic. My faith is new to me, and it means a lot to me. But does it mean so much to me that I would turn down the opportunity to marry a wonderful man? I think it would depend on how he felt about my going to church and raising our children Catholic. Religion was one of the things that tore my parents apart (kind of hilariously since neither of them were practicing when I was a child, and now only my mom goes to services with any regularity). One of my student's moms told me how she and her husband were different religions (he Catholic, she Baptist) and they raised the kids Catholic, but the kids have since changed religions. But they're a very happy (and awesome) family.

Ironically, the guy I liked most recently was Catholic (though not practicing. I usually go for Jewish guys), but he moved away, so it's back to the drawing board.

I didn't realize you were becoming Catholic, Imogen. That's pretty cool. I'm agnostic-ish, but often attend an Episcopal church and I looooove the liturgy.

I think inter-faith relationships can work, depending on the couple's attitudes towards it. I think it's probably very much like inter-cultural relationships -- it brings up some additional issues that you have to deal with, but it's not insurmountable.*

I'm was raised in a very conservative Christian background, and even as I became less tied to some of the stricter aspects of it (such as the belief that only Christians go to heaven) I still thought for a long time that I couldn't marry someone who didn't share my faith. My soon-to-be-fiance was actually a minister when we first met. But he's been enormously supportive of my move away from faith. I'd actually been doubting and wavering a lot for a long time, but stayed with it because the thought of not having some sort of faith was scary. One night maybe six months ago he said to me, "Emiliana, you know it's okay with me if you don't believe, right? That doesn't have to come between us." And his support was one of many things that gave me the courage to make that transition.

And I'm supportive of his continued belief. I go with him when he gets a preaching gig -- heck, I help him write his sermons. If we were to have kids (which we don't necessarily plan on), I would totally be okay with raising them in a Christian tradition of some sort.




*That's an imperfect analogy, though, because I totally wouldn't blame someone for not wanting to marry outside their own faith, but I think it would be rather closed-minded to flat refuse to consider marrying outside your culture.

[Portia]

One of the biggest problems I've found with never-Mormon guys is that they drink too much. I don't care how smart and hot you are (and that they always are), I can't handle a future Hemingway or Fitzgerald. The ex-Mormon guys I know may go through a phase, but the vast majority have been affected by socialization and rarely drink, which is my preference.

[Katya]

I have a lot of thoughts on this topic and it's taken me a while to sort them out.

First, there's a difference between causation and correlation. I don't doubt at all that Mormon/non-Mormon marriages are correlated with reduced Church activity, but it's a mistake to assume that that one choice is responsible for that outcome without examining the possible motivations behind the choice and the larger fallout that making that choice can lead to.

In my experience, most Mormons who marry outside the faith are either (a) not that invested in it in the first place or (b) have limited options for dating/marriage within the faith. (Or both.) If someone isn't that invested in their faith before their marriage, then it shouldn't be terribly surprising if they don't stay active after an interfaith marriage, but the marriage choice is just another symptom of the lack of investment, not the sole cause of it.

Possible reasons I can think of for limited dating options include (a) geography (living somewhere where the Church's presence is tiny), (b) age (a particular issue for women), (c) politics (liberal-leaning Mormons have a much smaller dating pool to work with if they want to marry someone who is at least minimally tolerant of their views), or (d) other "baggage" (children from a previous marriage, etc.).

In this case, the realistic choice often isn't between marrying a Mormon and marrying a non-Mormon—it's between marrying a non-Mormon and never getting married at all (with the possible addition of a ticking biological clock to force you to make a decision sooner rather than later). Now, there are certainly some members who believe that staying single is better than marrying a non-Mormon, but it's worth noting that single adult Mormons often find themselves marginalized by Church culture and rhetoric. One way or another, these members already fail to conform to cultural expectations. Is it any wonder that such members often go inactive?

These are all factors present before marriage, but there are factors that come into play after marriage, as well. Thatonemom provided a personal example in this thread of the way her father felt judged by Mormons. Realistically, it's hard to maintain a relationship with both your nonmember spouse and your faith community when the members of the latter are so unaccepting of the former.

So yes, I'm sure that member/nonmember marriages are "riskier" in terms of continued religious participation, but I think the reasons for it can be largely explain by personal investment and the willingness of the average member to be accepting of people who don't fit a cultural ideal.

[Portia]

Wonderful post. Choice (a) in the first list certainly applies to me, as does (c) in the second. A lot of food for thought there.

[Marduk]

(c) politics (liberal-leaning Mormons have a much smaller dating pool to work with if they want to marry someone who is at least minimally tolerant of their views)

I wonder if this continues to hold true. My visceral reaction is to say this is a changed (or at least, changing) phenomenon, that was significantly more accurate say, twenty years ago, than today. I haven't ever dated a girl who is more liberal than I am, but they've all been certainly left of the average.