Just Scratch the Seven-Year Itch?
by
Steve Watters
on Sep 21, 2007 at 10:22 AM
You may have heard about the challenge married couples often face seven years into their vows. A German politician named Gabriele Pauli made a dramatic suggestion this week for those couples:
The Seven Year Itch, argues Germany’s most glamorous politician, could be cured by making marriage vows valid for only seven years, thus legislating away what is regarded as the most unstable phase of a relationship.
Interestingly, Pauli is someone who left her first marriage at the seven year mark.
The article about this in The Times also mentions other difficult seasons of marriage, such as:
... the Two Year Bloat (when complacent husbands start to put on weight), the Fourth Year Slip (when office co-workers start to look more attractive than one’s partner) and any year after the birth of a child as being as perilous to marriage as the seven-year restlessness.
Look, marriage has more challenges than this. You could come up with creative names for all kinds of seasons of marital disappointment. But it's in those seasons that committed marriages develop depth.
Our consumer-driven culture has little appetite for vows that include better and worse, sickness and health, etc. Only an arrangement committed to those promises, however, can push through to the kind of peace, security and hope that most people marry to find in the first place.
The individual who will commit to marriage only while the skies are blue will never experience the rewards of enduring commitment.
1. Jen B had the following to say on Sep 21 at 12:08 PM:
"If love is a feeling, we are all in trouble."
-Charles Stanley
How sad that our culture defines love as a fleeting emotion, rather than a commitment.
2. Brennan had the following to say on Sep 21 at 12:41 PM:
It will be interesting to see if Christian organizations jump on Pauli for this. Like the idea of gay marriage, I'm not sure if Christians have a real high moral leg to stand on when divorce rates of Christian mirror, or even exceed, those of non-Christians. Maybe we're the ones we need a lesson on sanctity of marriage!
3. Frank Hsueh had the following to say on Sep 21 at 2:29 PM:
For those who are interested: Detailed Tables - Number, Timing and Duration of Marriages and Divorces: 2004 [census.gov].
4. Chris had the following to say on Sep 21 at 8:41 PM:
I've heard (no proof, of course) that happiness in marriage tends to be high until about 5 years into the marriage, drops significantly, and then rises around 20 years. It seems to track having children and then children leaving the house.
Again, just what I heard. Completely unscientific.
That said, I'm curious as to what readers here have experienced. I'm a gen Xer. We're supposed to be cynical about everything. Yet my experience is that all my friends (who married) are still married. Many of us are approaching or past the 10 year point for marriages. This includes people from stable families and those whose parents had messy, messy divorces. This is regardless of religious or family upbringing. Is this a trend or just the fact that I hang out with people are more committed than others?
5. Nelson had the following to say on Sep 21 at 10:20 PM:
There are certain conditions where a divorce is warranted. God even uses that concept in his relationship with Israel.
Jeremiah 3:8
"I gave faithless Israel her certificate of divorce and sent her away because of all her adulteries. Yet I saw that her unfaithful sister Judah had no fear; she also went out and committed adultery."
Do not think of treating homosexuality on the same level as divorce. That is not what God does. That is not what the Bible does.
6. J had the following to say on Sep 22 at 11:14 AM:
Something about the divorce rates Brennan mentioned. While, no, we shouldn't have excuses for having divorce rates the same as the rest of the world, we also have to realize that this statistic doesn't factor in such break-ups as happen in common-law relationships. If that were factored in, perhaps the divorce rate for the rest of the world would be higher.
7. Justice had the following to say on Sep 22 at 11:54 AM:
Brennan, whatever you're quoting about Christian marriages might be a bit off. Barna's surveys on marriage are flawed.
But then again, if Christians actually lived more of a real Christian life, perhaps they would learn to die to themselves and save their marriages
8. Kathryn had the following to say on Sep 22 at 9:10 PM:
if it's only going to last for 7 years, then why get married at all?? Why not just live de-facto until you get bored and then go live with someone else?
For Christians though, wouldn't it be obvious that you'd need to renew these marriages every 7 years because in God's eyes, they last a bit longer than that regardless of the law in your country.
9. Niki Schroeder had the following to say on Sep 23 at 10:33 AM:
Without these vows there IS no point to marriage at all. Why bother with a ceremony pledging life together with no intention of following through past the rough points? It is time for godly marriages to set the example for a world that desperately needs some direction.
10. Anastasia had the following to say on Sep 25 at 10:55 AM:
My husband and I just celebrated 29 years of marriage.
I think we've experienced just about everything good and bad, and every emotion - positive to really really negative.
The thing that held us together was that we made a promise to GOD in front of family and friends in church to hold it together. We have had to learn a lot of really really painful lessons about dying to self, serving, allocating time and resources, honesty, respect and the whole rest of the gamut.
Has it been worth it? Unequivocally yes.
I'm privileged to live with a person who has known me now for most of my life - good, bad, ugly, etc. - and still loves me. And it's not a feeeeeeeeling. I can trust his love and he can trust mine.