A man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh. This is how the Scriptures say that two people are married. Many think that there is much more involved or that you have to buy into what the culture says about how to get married but the Scriptures are clear from the beginning and never waiver from this. When a man and women are joined together, they become one flesh (which is the Scriptures way of saying that you are married). This joining together happens through the sexual union of a man and a women and in this way only. It does not matter if the man and woman intend for this to be the result of their union. We are told in the New Testament that if a man has sex with a prostitute that he is one with her. This shows that sex is how the marriage union is created and how it is kept together. This is to say that the common idea of “premarital sex” is really a fabrication. The typical term for this is “fornication” but biblical scholars already have started translating this term as “sexual immorality” because they know that where it appears in Scripture, it does not refer to premarital sex but of immoral sex. There really is no such thing as premarital sex. When a man has sex with a women, the two are made one flesh whether this was their intention or not. Many are truly married who think of themselves as “dating” or “living together”. The church should always treat these people according to biblical wisdom and not let them cop-out of the relationship that they have created. We should consider these people married regardless of the lack of a governmental marriage contract. The government does not get to decide who is married. God alone binds people together; we cannot change this.

We also know that God only binds together men with women and does not bind men with men or women with women. People who participate in same-sex sexual acts are not bound together and this is immoral. It does not, however, matter much whether the government allows them to make contracts (although I think it would be better if they didn’t call these contracts “marriages” because that would be a lie). If the government wants to allow same-sex couples to be legally considered one, it shouldn’t matter much to the church because we know that same-sex couples are not actually one and that the government is wrong is about considering them one when it just isn’t true. We should not fight the government on this because it just isn’t worth it and we shouldn’t be afraid to call the government wrong. We know what marriage truly is and should teach that whenever possible, that is enough.

South Korea

Story from LifeSiteNews. (H/T Andrew)

Excerpt:

The Republic of Korea has signaled its willingness to work to reverse a heavily pro-abortion culture through various measures, including beginning to enforce an abortion ban that has technically existed in the country for decades, in order to address the severe demographic implosion that threatens the country’s economic stability, Korean sources report.

[...]Official data from the Ministry of Health indicates that doctors perform 350,000 abortions per year, while they deliver on average just 450,000 babies, meaning 43.7 percent of pregnancies end in abortion.

However, the actual number of abortions may be at least five times the official estimate. According to the Korea Times, Rep. Chang Yoon-seok of the ruling Grand National Party said that a National Assembly inspection in October found that the number of illegal abortions in Korea exceeds 1.5 million a year or roughly 4,000 babies aborted per day.

If the National Assembly’s estimate is correct, the nation of 48 million commits approximately the same number of abortions as the United States, which has 300 million residents. Presuming the numbers of births recorded by the Health Ministry remains the same, that would mean approximately three out of four pregnancies in South Korea end in abortion.

Perhaps we need to undo anti-family policies like legalized abortion, unilateral divorce, high tax rates and a massive social programs. These policies discourage marrying and child-bearing, which prevent the creation of the next generation of taxpayers who must pay for these expensive welfare-state programs.

Canada

New research paper from the center-right C.D. Howe Institute. (H/T Andrew)

Excerpt:

The twin demographic challenges of an aging population and slow workforce growth will affect Canada’s Atlantic provinces more acutely than other regions of the country, according to a study released today by the C.D. Howe Institute. In “Stress Test: Demographic Pressures and Policy Options in Atlantic Canada,” authors Colin Busby, William B.P. Robson and Pierre-Marcel Desjardins warn that many years of low birthrates and youth outmigration mean that the Atlantic region faces diminished workforce growth and a fiscal squeeze as fewer taxpayers support a growing bill for public programs.

Massive numbers of elderly people retiring and very few young workers available to pay the taxes for their health care and retirement entitlements. Something has to give.

In an article posted today at CatholicExchange.com, How Co-habitation is a Sin Against Social Justice, Dr. Jennifer Robuck points to co-habitation as one of the greatest dangers to the physical and spiritual well-being of children, particularly when children unrelated to the partner are living under the same roof. Morse writes:

“…we know that a cohabiting boyfriend is the person most likely to abuse a child. From British child-abuse registries, we learn that a child living with his or her mother and a live-in boyfriend is 33 times more likely to be abused than a child living with his or her biological married parents. From a study of inflicted injury deaths in Missouri, we learn that children living in households with unrelated adults were 50 times more likely to die of inflicted injuries than households with both biological parents present. In 82% of the cases, the ‘unrelated adult’ was the mother’s cohabiting boyfriend.”

The issue is not primarily the fact that the man is biologically unrelated (as is clearly demonstrated by the fact that so many couples choose to expand their families through adoption). But when a couple lives together without the sacrament of marriage, the instability of the partnership has a profound affect of the children living within the home.

I would add a caveat to Dr. Morse’s observations, however.  A single mother must consider carefully — and as objectively as possible — the type of man she is dating long before the question of marriage (or co-habitation) is raised. The sacrament of matrimony is not a magical panacea.  An immature, selfish wolf won’t turn “sheepish” just because you put a wedding band on the fourth finger of his left hand.

In my article “Marriage and the Single Mom,” I address some of the red flags that can creep into a relationship, signaling that the man in question is not a suitable spouse.

I don’t need to look any farther than my own family circle to show what can happen to children when their mothers make an ill-advised match. (Thankfully, my sister and her daughter managed to escape her abuser, and she chose much more wisely the second time around.)

The mutual self-donation that is part-and-parcel of a sacramental union is made by the husband and wife for the benefit of their children — whether or not those children have a biological connection to their parents.  If the woman’s future husband is willing to love her children without reservation, out of love for Christ, well and good.

If their mother has any doubts about this, however, she is wise not to risk the wellbeing of her children by tying her future to a man she cannot trust to love her children as his own.  Her highest responsibility is her children, and her happiness is inextricably tied to theirs.

This doesn’t mean, of course, that you will be alone for the rest of your life. Every life has its chapters and seasons, and the time may come when God brings the man who is worthy of your family into your life. Or, if you ask Him, He may also bring other people into your life who can give you the kind of encouragement and support you need right now. 

Have you asked Him? Today?

Last night I met up with two of the women that were on my abroad program with me – the same program where I allegedly went home with a street performer (see previous entry). We all happen to be living in various parts of the Bay Area which offers us the opportunity to get together once in a while, catch up, and most importantly reminisce about a (life-changing, gag) experience we all happen to share. Aside from studying together, the three of us also traveled together and during our multi-week break from classes, we shared an apartment in Barcelona with two other classmates of ours. It’s easy enough to describe our time together as ‘fun,’ which it definitely was, and it’s equally easy to offer up a few stories as to why; but, given that two years has gone by in which we’ve all wrapped up educations and dabbled in starting our post-grad lives, it’s also easy enough to forget the little things that made our vacation so great.

Auspiciously, when you’re reconnected with some of the same faces, smaller, seemingly forgotten memories begin to float to the surface – some of these for better and some of them for worse. A ‘new’ memory that walks the middle ground of this statement involves the first, last, and only time that I (now consciously) remember roofie-ing someone. Oops.

Barcelona, in a single word, is brilliant. It’s friendly, colorful, and extremely relaxed. People who live there say ‘hello’ to strangers, take naps in the late afternoon, and don’t start partying until two in the morning. Put simply, they’re my kind of people and the city easily ranks as one of my favorite places that I’ve ever been. After three months of classes looking at beautiful though often creatively stifling Renaissance frescoes and dealing with an especially nightmarish depiction of a professor in Florence, the five of us were ready to embrace the Barcelona lifestyle. No schedules, contemporary art, homemade meals and an endless flow of sangria we would make ourselves in large water jugs – we were living the easy life and doing it on the cheap thanks to a pre-peak season spring break (so we couldn’t go to the beach, we could still drink pints in plazas surrounded by people far more attractive than any American).

One night towards the beginning of our stay, we were still adjusting to the night schedule of the city and finding it difficult to keep our “oomph” going until the ‘appropriate’ hour to go out. Still, my friend Deb, who would sleep until 4PM everyday and therefore had no problem with the Barcelona party itinerary, and I were determined to get everybody out for a night of fun. Oh, the enthusiasm of a 20 year old American in Europe. When Lor, one of the women currently living in the Bay Area and one of the more responsible people on our little vacation, vocally decided to stay in for the night, claiming she was too tired to go out, Deb and I tried endlessly to change her mind. When she wouldn’t budge, we knew drastic steps needed to be taken.

“Let’s give her a ritalin,” I slurred in private to Deb. I knew she was packing a small pharmacy and if there was ever a chance to act like a medicine man, it was now.

“How?” She smiled, clearly loving the idea. Sure we were both drunk, but we were also rascals at heart and got off on a bit of mischief so we could at least try to pull ourselves together to get away with it.

“Let’s crush it up and put it in her drink!” I could barely contain my laughter and Deb definitely couldn’t contain hers.

We went back to the table and I’m sure everyone knew we were up to something. I sat next to Lor and during whatever conversation was going on, I elbowed her water glass so it knocked over and spilled all over the table.

“Oops,” I said, probably smiling like an idiot, “Let me refill that for you. Deb, I need your help… getting… that… glass of water.”

In the kitchen Deb pulled out a pill and I started to crush it with a knife. It was half powder, half chunks of pill when I scooped it into a new glass of water. The powder stuck to the rim, the water turned cloudy, and small bits of the pill floated to the top. We were officially the worst date rapists in Barcelona.

Probably the best (or worst? once again, blurred line) part of this is that Lor drank the glass of water the two of us idiots handed her. Needless to say, moments later, she perked up, and she ended up coming out with us that night.

Life lesson learned: if someone’s not giving you your way, drug them.

I’m really glad that we can all get together, look back, and laugh at this moment. I’m also relieved that nobody is pressing charges. All I can say is, “prove it happened,” because this blog is obviously a piece of fiction and not a legitimate piece of evidence.

Story from LifeSiteNews.

Excerpt:

According to the report by Norway’s Institute for Family Policies abortion rates in Britain have leaped by a third among unmarried teenage girls and abortion is helping to age the population of Europe. Without a massive shift to family-friendly policies, the pattern of increased abortion and increasingly aging population will inevitably lead to the collapse of social welfare benefits, and, ultimately, to the bankruptcy of Europe’s cradle-to-grave socialist welfare state.

Presented to the European Parliament on Wednesday, the report said that the situation of the family in Europe is “a desolate panorama.”

“Europe is plunged in an unprecedented demographic winter and has become an elderly continent, with a large birth deficit, fewer marriages and more of them broken, homes emptying.”

“The aging population, critical birth-rate, escalating abortions, the collapse of marriage, the explosion in family breakups and the emptying of homes are the main problems of Europeans,” the 2009 Report on the Evolution of the Family in Europe said.

[...]The dropping European birth rate, the report says, with its concomitant increasing health and pension costs, will lead to increases in public expenditure to care for the aging population and the eventual collapse of public revenues, leading finally to the bankruptcy of the welfare state. The average birth rate of EU countries is now 1.38 per woman, well below the replacement rate of 2.1 births per woman, even in relatively fertile countries like France.

Without a significant shift in family policies in all EU countries, the report predicts the result will be “catastrophic.” Starting in 2010, the population of Europe overall will begin to fall from 499 million to 472 million by 2050 and every third inhabitant will be over 65.

[...]Other indicators show the number of marriages, especially first marriages, is down and divorce rates are up. There are 1 in 4 fewer marriages than in 1980 and the marriage rate has fallen in 9 out 10 countries. One out of every 3 children (36.5 per cent) is born outside marriage. In some countries the fall in marriage rate has been around 50 per cent since 1983 and there are over one million divorces a year, the equivalent to one marital breakdown every 30 seconds.

You can take a look at the actual numbers here. It’s a mess. This should convince fiscal conservatives to support social conservatism. Abortion and the destruction of two-parent families imposes massive social costs on society, and it grows government to deal with the fallout. Government pay for all the social programs, welfare, police, jails, etc. But it also has to regulate broken families via the courts. It makes no sense to abandon morality and expect government to stay the same – it will have to grow.

Maybe we shouldn’t have let the secular socialist elites run things? Could it be that believers in traditional morality and small government were in the right? Could it be that there is a price to pay for believing in materialism and naturalism, and jettisoning morality for hedonism?

A significant element of the recently-launched consultation by the Law Commission will be whether cohabitants should be included in intestacy laws.  Current intestacy laws do not make any provision for cohabitees so, if an unmarried couple are living together, the surviving partner will not get anything unless they make a claim under the Inheritance Act. 

It can also create problems if the surviving partner has children from a previous relationship or marriage who were also living with the deceased partner as a family.  These children will not be allowed for under intestacy laws.  Although the surviving partner may be able to make claims on the children’s behalf under the Inheritance Act, such claims can be time consuming and costly.  It can also cause friction if the deceased had children as these children are recognised under the intestacy laws.  So potentially a household could be divided with some children inheriting and others not, despite being treated as equals by an unmarried couple, simply because a will was not made.

Other areas for consideration for reform include:-

• entitlement of a surviving spouse where the deceased also had children or other relatives;
• trusts for children on intestacy and the effect of adoption on any child’s entitlement;
• Inheritance Act claims by adult children and criteria to be met by any dependants making Inheritance Act claims;
• rules for full siblings and half siblings and whether any distinction should be made.

Lawson-West would strongly recommend anyone living together but not married makes a will, especially if there are children from the current relationship and/or children from previous relationships.  However, studies show that a half to two thirds of the population do not have a will, so the Law Commission review is welcomed.

Lawson-West especially welcome the review of cohabitants under the intestacy laws, particularly now the marriage rate is still falling and the Cohabitation Bill, which would have given cohabitees more rights on separation, was timed out so is now not proceeding.

A few weeks ago, I did a post about my Boy Person’s impending move-in date, and how, while I was excited, I was also weighing in my mind the ways in which I view this new definition of commitment as a limitation of opportunity.  How very funny, in retrospect.  This week is my first week as a cohabitant, and the challenges thus far are a little different that the ones I was expecting.

I planned to do my second post on the division of housework and personal time – you know, the standard day-to-day things that keep us all ticking along, and seek input on how you divvy up your own allotments of chores and space as cohabitants.  While space is something the Boy and I are still working on, all of that has come secondary to The Most Important Thing in My Life:  My Job.

As seems to be the nature of my job, things lurch along without much of a problem until, all of a sudden!, we enter a solid week or two of panic mode, wherein I am at the office 11 hours a day, perpetually stressed and wiped out and completely incapable of carrying on functional relationships with the people in my Real-Life, to the point where I am too exhausted and irritable to even make a phone call when I drag my ass home.  I get so physically and emotionally tired that I am a fount of irritability.  I am crabby.  I am short-tempered.  I am brittle.  I am the worst version of myself and I have no time for anyone else.  I never meet friends during the week and I don’t even like to call my mom, because when I get home I just want to inhale the little bubble of solitude I have for three hours until I collapse into bed to have anxiety-dreams and wake up dehydrated and achey at 4:00 am.  It is melodramatic, completely self-centered, and I feel helpless to do anything about it.  

The last burst of work catastrophe happened only two short weeks ago, so I sort of thought I was on solid ground for the next month.  No such luck.  In the space of a week, I have been assigned five new projects, four of which I will project manage with a team in Australia and America, one of which I will support from the UK.  Handling five projects at one time is a struggle in the best of circumstances, but handling five all at the same initial stage of development is a recipe for a nervous breakdown.  Worse, I have been angling for the opportunity to project manage for years – it means more client exposure, bigger bonuses, and a higher-profile.  What I didn’t expect is that, rather than being eased into it with one or two projects at a time, I would be handed four with a five-week deadline, covering West Africa, North Africa, and Russia.  If I had a panic room, I would be locked in it, sobbing and subsisting on Saltines.

Additionally, I won my first client assignment last week.  I am the originator of the business, thanks to good networking and client management, and was really, really proud of myself.  But that project was pushed aside for four days while I dealt with these new, high-pressure assignments and I got my proposal out late.  Now, the client is avoiding me and while I was already concerned I would lose the project, I fucked up monumentally at the very end of the day. 

I wrote a long email setting out objectives to my two teammates in Australia and the States about the West Africa and Russia projects.  It was 6:30, I hadn’t finished the one piece of internal paperwork I really needed to get done today (the bit of paperwork I told my boss would be done yesterday, about which he pulled me into his office this morning and went nuclear on my ass, leading me to cry at work for the first time in a year), and my vision was blurring.  I hit send, noticing in the actual blink of an eye that one of the addresses at the top of the email was not to my colleague, but rather to the client I am courting (my Outlook had helpfully moved the client email to the top of the queue for the initials shared by the client and my colleague).  Too late.  I recalled the message right away, but that doesn’t work anymore, it just sends an email to the recipient notifying them the original email has been recalled and please don’t read it even though it’s sitting in your inbox like a candy-filled pinata (and if you are anything like me, you read that “recalled” email extra carefully to see what the big deal was).

So I have essentially sent this new client details on a project we are working on for another client.  While not strictly confidential, it is a stupid, stupid, unprofessional thing.  I would be hesitant to hire me after that.  Fucking fantastic, and radio silence from the client in question.  With that, I decided I was done for the day, best leave before I accidentally set the office on fire or trip on an extension cord and land on a pair of scissors (although, if I was in the hospital… No, never mind).

The thing with my office is, if you are under intense pressure, you are not allowed to buckle.  I have to sack up, be cheerful, and be Superwoman, or this will be a black mark on my record for the next five years (‘Tailfeather, you know, she can’t handle pressure.  She’s weak and hysterical, god knows we can’t put her in front of a client, she might cry.”).  So I do my best, with varying results, to hold it together at the office and exude a calm, capable demeanor, despite the gaping cracks in my armor.

Our first official week as cohabitants, and the Boy and I have not been playfully squabbling over where to hang his ties, or having intimate dinners, or cuddling up in bed to read.  Sex (HA!) is a distant thought, the last thing I would want to do – don’t you know I am trying to cram in 7.5 hours of uneasy sleep so I can get up and have a terrible day again tomorrow?  In short, if we do get to have a honeymoon period, it ain’t happening until mid-January because the next six weeks are going to be a living nightmare.  

In contrast, the Boy has been something of a saint.  I set out a list of projects for him to do around the house, as he is unemployed and we – yes, we, it’s been discussed – don’t want him to fall into an idle routine.  He’s walked me to work twice this week, and every day he’s taken on an assortment of assignments.  He’s scouring the bathroom (the best it’s looked in years, I’m certain – I am taking photos for the landlord, because it’s hours of elbow-grease to get the grout clean); he set us up with wireless internet; he cleaned the microwave, oven, stove, and is going to revarnish the counters; he vacuumed the floors; he took about 40 of his LPs to the charity shop; he has cooked me dinner every single night, and then taken care of the dishes.  He’s also scouting out locations to buy a cafe, and we’re going to work on his CV this weekend.

I’ve come home every night, tired and bitchy.  He’s made a real effort to give me my space, so while I glare at my laptop and chainsmoke and mutter obscenities to myself, institutionalized-style, he will quietly play online chess in the corner and do his best not to provoke me.  The only time he lost patience with me was last night, when we were eating the red-wine chicken and vegetables he’d made, and I spent half the dinner pounding out an angry email on my Blackberry.  I didn’t even realize what I was doing, to be honest – under normal circumstances, I would never even answer my phone, much less an email, over dinner, but I am consumed by stress.  It was so rude and insensitive, and I know exactly how I would feel were the situation reversed.  It was lousy of me. 

As much as I don’t want to talk about work to him - I just want to come home and try to forget for a while – I give him enough information that he understands the stress I’m under, and why I’m having a very hard time being a civil, fun person.  I feel so guilty, because I didn’t want it to be like this.  Obviously, there will be periods where it will be like this, but god, I wanted a little breathing room for us to adjust to one another.  I have to break the routines I’ve been in for ten years of living alone, and this is just a total shit start.       

He knows this is not me; we’ve dated for long enough, and there’s a reason he fell for me in the first place.  I’m just so angry right now.  If I were an investment banker, or a baby lawyer, high-pressure workloads and extra hours would just be a part of the job, and I’d be paid damn well for the sacrifice.  But I am neither of those things, because I am simply not a person who can work like that and function with any kind of humanity.  One day at a time, I tell myself, while my Blackberry buzzes at me with more bad news and the knot of dread in my stomach twists itself into glorious origami.  I am an in-betweener.  I want to make more money that I could at a straight-forward, relaxed 9-5 job (if those even exist anymore), but I don’t want to be some high-powered executive either.  I just want a nice life and some savings so I can buy a house and send any future children to college.  I want my creature comforts and a good night’s sleep.

I guess, since my last post, my question is less how-can-I-live-with-him than how-can-he-live-with me.  I know things will settle down and we just need to grin and bear it for the next few weeks.  But my stress becomes his stress, and I want to be a better partner than I am right now – I’m just too tired to deal with it, although I have made sure to praise him for his accomplishments around the house and explain that what’s going on with me has nothing to do with him.  How do other people handle their work/life balance?  Because mine is in seriously unstable.

So I haven’t posted in a LONG time.  If anyone has missed me updating the blog, I’m sorry.  School has been really busy, but I’m hoping to begin posting regularly again.  So I figured I’d re-start my blog with a light, easy topic…HA right.

This is an article from Relevant Magazine written by Ed Gungor.

Is Living Together Really a Big Deal?

We say yes, here’s why:

Everyone wants to love and to be loved—they are the echoes that still reverberate in us from the Creator. But for whatever reason, it seems like it is getting more and more difficult to find and keep love. Some think it’s because we hardly talk anymore. With the advent of texting, twittering and Facebooking, it seems we’ve lost the art of holding in-depth, substantive conversations essential for long-term, loving relationships. Instead we have become masters of the pithy, witty, short blurb—the communication of a throwaway world. We throw away everything in our culture—even the things that should never be thrown away, things that are designed to last for a lifetime—like marriages.

Most Christ-followers I know don’t want to buy into the friends-with-benefits casualness about sex. They still believe that the biblical prohibition for fornication (sex outside of marriage) is valid on some level. But they are also afraid of getting married.

And rightly so.

In a culture of disposable love, it seems perfectly natural to try to find ways to beat the odds and make sure you are picking the right person you plan to spend the rest of your life with. Is experimenting to see if you are compatible by living together for a couple of years really such a bad idea? When we buy new cars, we always test-drive them. It certainly seems reasonable to want to take a relationship on a “test-drive.” It’s called cohabitation.

The Test-Drive

Most of us know people who are in love, plan to marry and currently live together. It’s sort of the new premarital counseling program. I visited a church out West that had a “pre-marriage” ceremony for a couple living together. No license. No wedding dress. Just a prayer of blessing to hold them over until the couple walked down the aisle—a kind of marital “appetizer,” I guess. I asked the pastor why they did it. He said, “The couple believes they are married in the eyes of the Lord, and we just wanted them to feel affirmation in our community.”

What did I think about it? I was bummed about it. I actually believe that marriage needs to be public and people need to vow into it in front of those who matter to them—it’s not just a private matter in front of the Lord. Truth is, those who declare they are married “in God’s eyes” seem to reframe their claim when they break up with their live-in partner. Then they claim they were never “really married.” This makes me very dubious about the “married in the eyes of the Lord” doctrine.

The reason we don’t want to admit

And we have to be honest about the sex here. We live in a sex-crazed culture. And we live in a culture that has a difficult time with communication. This combo platter makes sex the Grand Central Station of most couples who claim to be in love. Sex is a power that seems to “weld” two souls together as one. When a couple engages in physical love, they go out of themselves in a trajectory of ecstasy—to a place where they are no longer in control of themselves. In this act, a couple becomes completely vulnerable, open and yielded to each other. In this act of ecstasy, they lose themselves in each other in a way they would never dare to do in any other setting. And it culminates in an experience that the Bible says is “as strong as death” (Song of Songs 8:6). Theologians have said the sexual act is a kind of little death—it is that powerful. So how could something that feels so right be wrong?

Continue reading the article here

We are delighted to feature this guest contribution from Andrew Hayward of Durham University Law School. You can find out more about Andrew on the Guest Contributors page. Unfortunately we do not have a photograph of Andrew but he has supplied us with the photograph on the left of an unhappy–presumably cohabiting–couple.

For family lawyers in England and Wales, cohabitation has long been the hot topic for debate. Various reform proposals have been produced here that, if implemented, could have provided some amelioration to the current legal provision offered to cohabitants on relationship breakdown. Optimists were hoping that the proposals in the Law Commission’s Report Cohabitation: Financial Consequences of Relationship Breakdown in 2007 would have been introduced to remedy the current unsatisfactory position by providing qualifying cohabitants an array of remedies on the breakdown of their relationship. No draft bill was inserted and due to the politically contentious nature of the provisions it was unsurprising that the Government chose to await findings from a similar scheme in Scotland by way of the Family Law (Scotland) Act 2006 (see the ministerial statement here). Since then two Private Members bills have been introduced, both with unlikely chances of success. So after reading the thought provoking posts from Fiona and Mairead on the cohabitation aspects of the Irish Civil Partnership Bill 2009, it appears that, yet again, England and Wales will be lagging behind.

As Mairead has outlined a central feature of the Irish cohabitation provisions is the concept of ‘qualified cohabitant’. This concept focuses on living together as a couple in an intimate relationship and utilises a statutory checklist to help determine this status. Once satisfied, the Irish provisions require three years cohabitation without a child or two years with a child to open up a broad discretionary system of financial relief orders such as property adjustment, pension sharing and compensatory maintenance. However, it must be shown that it would be ‘just and equitable’ to grant relief and again another broad discretionary checklist is employed focussing extensively, although not exclusively, on economic dependency.

The approach of the stalled Law Commission Report in England and Wales was to recognise (as eligible for financial relief) cohabitants living as a couple in a joint household but with no statutory checklist for defining them. Once ‘cohabitant’ status was satisfied, the parties needed to have had a child together with no restriction as to time or show that they had cohabited for a period of two to five years. The cohabitation duration provision proved particularly controversial with the media often misconstruing it to mean that after two years a cohabitant would automatically open up an ancillary relief jurisdiction normally reserved for married couples or civil partners. Likewise the fact that the presence of a child rendered eligibility from day one was tempered by the need to show a joint household, thus transient and non-cohabiting relationships would fall at the first hurdle. The applicant would then need to prove economic disadvantage based on their qualifying contributions (both financial and non-financial sufficed) which has in turn generated for the respondent a retained benefit. Ultimately when deciding whether to make property adjustment orders, lump sum payments or pension sharing the court would have regard to discretionary factors in order to remedy this imbalance. Periodical payments are not available under this scheme.

This brief comparison indicates that the Irish scheme arguably has more of a typical ancillary relief discretion about it, particularly through the use of the rather nebulous ‘just and equitable’ terminology. However it was not intended to create a new status for cohabitants in Ireland or seek to undermine the constitutionally privileged status of marriage. The Law Commission for England and Wales also explicitly stated that no attempt would be made to simply transpose the discretionary, yet structured, ancillary relief provisions under the Matrimonial Causes Act 1973 onto cohabitants. That said, it can be questioned how far the traditional concepts of need, compensation and equal sharing would have informed the adjudication of these cohabitation claims. Cross fertilisation of ideas between married or civil partner claims and cohabitants would be inevitable, particularly owing to the intrinsic nature of disputes on the breakdown of intimate relationships. As there has been some criticism of the overly structured, mathematical nature of the Law Commission scheme, it’s quite illustrative to note that subsequent Private Members bills have leaned towards the conferral of more discretion akin to current ancillary relief provisions.

Both schemes involve default coverage and thus legally aware cohabitants can opt-out thereby disapplying the provisions. Echoing the points made by Fiona and Mairead on this, it is unlikely that large swathes of cohabitants would do this in the same way that it is unlikely many would seek to private order through cohabitation contracts. The latter has been endorsed as a possible mechanism in both jurisdictions but their execution is fundamentally linked to the need for cohabitants to understand their current legal position in comparison to married couples. This may be improving with various information campaigns being introduced highlighting the pervasive myths and discrepancies (see the Living Together and OnePlusOne Campaigns). For England and Wales a glimmer of hope for private ordering and its effect on party autonomy, may reside in the Law Commission’s new project on Marital Property Agreements.  If the Law Commission proposes binding prenuptial agreements, which is personally highly likely, it may instigate greater contractualisation within the domestic arena.

Although redress for cohabitants is imminent in Ireland and may be on the horizon for England and Wales, some thought needs to be given to those that fail the eligibility requirements. Interestingly those that would have fallen outside of the scheme in England and Wales would have relied on the relatively restrictive Common Intention Constructive Trust that is used to demarcate beneficial ownership rather that than Presumed Intention Resulting Trust more prevalent in Ireland. Whilst these implied trusts have different idiosyncratic twists depending on the jurisdiction, resort to them is unfortunate owing to their failure to effectively recognise non-financial contributions. The eligibility qualifications in both schemes are thus an important gateway into remedies. What is most intriguing is that we can legitimately question the political and societal views towards relationships that fall outside the cohabitation provisions such as platonic home-sharers, carers or those that are excluded by virtue of prohibited degrees i.e. two siblings prohibited from marrying or registering a civil partnership. These relationships will certainly become the next hot topic for family lawyers.

With the recent legislative developments, it is certainly an exciting moment for cohabitation research. Naturally time is required for the Irish provisions to come into force but comparative research certainly will be highly informative. Through the findings of a similar scheme in Scotland, coupled with the introduction of the Irish Civil Partnership Bill provisions, it is hoped that England and Wales will gain valuable insight into the operational impact of cohabitation provisions and this may help place cohabitation firmly back onto the political agenda.

Rachel Wagley in the Harvard Crimson discussing the sexualization of the college student, lack of commitment, and abstinence.

Something More

Published On Monday, November 02, 2009  10:18 PM
By RACHEL L. WAGLEY

Our school plays porn to students. To my knowledge, it’s pseudo-porn and only in “English 154: Literature and Sexuality” during shopping period, but it’s alluring enough to induce 481 Harvard undergraduates into enrolling in the class, despite liberals, conservatives, and faculty alike decrying sexual objectification. Our school delights in humanism—reason! Intellect! Achievement! But when it comes to sex, the pursuit of physical pleasure—as long as you’ve got a condom—transcends reason. Self-control is prudish, unenlightened restraint—down with the patriarchy! Away with gender roles! My body is my play toy.

We have descended into a paradox. Sex gives us meaning—but is a meaningless end in itself. Our very identities are sexualized. As illustrated by “Harvard FML,” our newest and most embarrassing confessional outlet, hookups are messy, and college romance is messier. One cyber-girl moans, “All the guys I like always stop talking to me after we hook up. I feel like a classic ‘wham bam, thank you ma’am.’” If we are perplexed with organic chemistry and philosophy, then we are bewildered by sex, lust, love, and the specter of marriage.

We wildly seek answers. By trial, by error, by reading, by debating, by daydreaming, by flirting, by midnight talks lounging on roommate’s beds, by dining -hall conversations leaving us wondering where all the good men or women have gone: Is there truth? Will it set us free?

It is in this whirlwind that True Love Revolution connects the fragments of our culture. The nature of the 21st-century academic relegates us to later marriages. We are destined to fall in and out of love—or something—again and again before we seal the deal. This open time window encourages sexual activity—with or without commitment. “Gossip Girl” features high-school students losing both their virginity and dignity, Cosmopolitan flouts sex tips, movies mock men who wait for marriage, and intellectuals call casual sex empowering. It’s difficult to describe the plot of a contemporary TV show without relating who slept with whom. If cultures speak, then our culture screams: “It’s normal, OK?”

But if casual sex is normal, why do culture and academia need to remind us? Better yet, why do some radical feminists save their virginity? Why do at least 42 percent of Harvard students not have sex? Some declare that we just can’t get any sex, but if a larger percentage of the student body wanted the hookup culture, odds would be pretty good that more students could find it.

Without declaring war, True Love Revolution draws a conclusion. Culture reduces us to the sexual, but being human promises so much more. The sexualization of people and relationships hinders our development as human beings. When we embrace the sexual culture that stretches its logic to render us servile, we find ourselves unfulfilled. Abstinence resists cultural messages about human worth. Unlike casual sex, abstinence is empowering because, instead of making sex and uncontrolled lust an end, it makes people the end.

English 154 grapples with this same idea. “Sexuality” has gradually displaced “soul,” “mind,” and “character” as the most essential and salient ingredient in modern subjectivity, as the “truth of the self,” reads the course description. Temporary physical pleasure now outwits the soul, reason, and virtue. Gone are the days when we place value on condemning its consequences, though many conspicuously refuse to participate.

The vast majority of college students seek marriage one day, but our perspectives on relationships do not always reflect this. It is as if commitment is a character trait developed instantly at the altar—once the ring is on the finger. But those of us addicted to endorphins, prone to procrastination, or disposed to overspending recognize that traits cannot apparate; they must be habituated. By trial and error, society found that cohabitation and increased number of sexual partners lead to higher divorce rates.

In this commitment-less environment, social connections wither away, as evidenced in Professor Robert Putnam’s sobering book, “Bowling Alone.” On our fast-paced campus, a dating-culture return may be distant, but a return to commitment habituated through abstinence to a future partner will both galvanize the dating scene and make people more deeply known—a longing so prevalent it is heartbreaking.

We are lackluster students—we believe what we learn. We willingly objectify ourselves, and our best foot forward is our sexuality, not our soul. When we embrace the sexualized college student role, we surrender our identities: The vibrant, beautiful, curious, winsome, self-controlled men and women that we are. Will we be slaves to sexuality, or seek out something more?

Closing my eyes is like shutting the door, though in the dark my roommate always forgets to use the lock. She speaks in clotted tongues to her kin, like last year, and I sit and wait for someone who was at the very least born in the continental states. It’s terrible to be so xenophobic, but pardon me for being proud of my sleeping schedules.

Your playful boasting about how good you’re doing is old and worn like my red sweater, and just like that sweater you’re tucked away in a drawer I tell myself never to open but do anyway. I wonder how you’re doing, how he’s doing, and what consequential nothingness you’re filling yourself up on today. We have the same shirt now, but you wouldn’t know. It has a painted sparrow on it, and I look terrible while wearing it. Revenge comes in the form of ill-fitting clothes, God’s little joke at the expense of our fragile vanities.

I didn’t get dressed up for Halloween this year. With a hastily made toga to beat and no desire to change, I wore a jersey and jeans. It’s as fancy as I’m going to get, I’m afraid. Maybe next year I’ll go as someone tolerant.

I just wanted to follow up on Máiréad’s excellent post here on the cohabition provisions of the Civil Partnership Bill 2009. As Máiréad notes the inclusion of some (albeit very limited) protections for people within cohabiting relationships that are not either marriage or civil partnerships is symbolically at least an important step forward. Essentially, these protections are applicable at the point at which the relationship breaks down, and they are useful from a property law perspective. In essence, these are rights to apply for various orders such as property adjustment orders to recognise the various contributions of parties within the relationship to the welfare of that relationship. However, I would have some concerns about the scope of these protections.

As Máiréad notes, these protections are available only to “qualifying cohabitants”, i.e. people who have cohabited for 3 years or, where there are children being parented by the cohabitants, for 2 years. Where a couple falls outside of these qualifications then these provisions will not apply to that relationship. This would leave unmarried and un-civilly-partnered couples who want to make some kind of a claim relating to their shared homes in a position of having to rely on the Presumed Resulting Trust (also known as a Purchase Money Resulting Trust). This kind of a trust recognises only financial contributions to the purchase of the property as giving rise to ownership rights in equity. Thus, other forms of contribution (such as, for example, work within the home) would not give rise to these kinds of equitable rights and people who had contributed in that way towards the relationship and the home shared by the couple with have little or no meaningful recourse.

The Bill will also allow for cohabitation agreements to have a legal status and, of course, couples who might not be ‘qualifying’ within the definition of the Bill could have a cohabitation agreement drawn up that would be binding. This is certainly a welcome development and ought to be recommended to parties entering into a cohabiting agreement where the property to be shared is not in their shared ownership. Whether or not people will, realistically, avail themselves of such an opportunity is another question. This is particularly so given the pervasiveness of the myth of ‘common law marriage’, which does not exist in law but appears to have a prominent status in the popular imagination. It will, therefore, be important for people to take legal advice in order to protect themselves where they want to enter into a cohabiting arrangement and do not want to (or can not, for whatever reason) become married or enter into a civil partnership. I must admit that I am not convinced that people are likely to enter into such an agreement in most cases, especially where the individual partners may not have substantial assets to protect. However, we will have to wait and see.

As a supplement to Fiona’s timely post on the Civil Partnership Bill 2009 and its implications for same-sex couples, I wanted to expand on the Bill’s undernourished second child; its cohabitation provisions. These are of relevance both to same-sex and opposite-sex couples.  The most important element of the  Bill is Part 15;  a hybrid redress-contract ancillary relief regime which will apply to the breakdown of relationships between ’qualified cohabitants’ (those who have been living together for 3 years; 2 where they have a child together).  The legislation takes its cue, by and large, from the Law Reform Commission’s Report The  Rights and Duties of Cohabitees. The contract element concerns the proposed statutory recognition of property agreements between cohabitants. The cohabitation agreement provisions represent an important move towards recognition of ’private ordering’ in Irish family law. Cohabitation agreements will be enforceable subject to certain limited formalities.  The court may set aside a provision in an agreement only in exceptional circumstances where its enforceability would cause serious injustice. There is, as yet, no comparable provision for a married couple to order their financial and property affairs before or in the course of marriage: The Report of the Study Group on Pre-nuptial Agreements is instructive here. It would be very interesting to see how the courts – which have by and large jealously guarded their wide powers to redistribute assets and income upon divorce or judicial separation  – would respond to cohabitation agreements.  However, the primary aim of the cohabitants’ scheme is to recognise the financial interdependence of partners in a non-marital couple by empowering a court, in the exercise of its discretion, to make any of a range of  orders to provide for a financially vulnerable ex-partner when a relationship ends.  This is the redress element.

The human rights implications are set out in the IHRC’s excellent 2006 Report; The Rights of De Facto Couples and many were also raised in the All Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution Hearings on Family Issues in 2005. In short, this legislation represents a significant expansion of the boundaries of  ‘legitimate family forms’ at Irish law beyond that founded on marriage and brings  our law much closer to the hospitable vision of respect for private and family life embodied in the ECtHR Article 8 jurisprudence.  Of course, it falls far short of the constitutional reform - recommended by the IHRC - which would place unmarried couples on firmer ground at the basic level of Irish law. Insofar as it represents a move towards recognition of the non-marital family, the Bill has attracted criticism from the Catholic Church, which sees it as establishing parity between unmarried and married  heterosexual couples.

There are some points of difficulty with the Bill. I blogged on some of the deficiencies from a children’s rights perspective here earlier this year.  Prof. John Mee of the Law School at University College Cork  has criticised the redress aspects of Part 15 for giving an inadequate account of parties’ intentions.  At a Law Society conference in September he said that:

it was possible for a person to become a cohabitee without realising it. The Bill did not state how it would be established when the cohabitation started. Further, to have a valid cohabitation agreement, the couple must each have received independent legal advice…It is very unlikely that many people will make [cohabitation agreements].

A central question here seems to be whether the new legislative scheme is extending recognition to cohabitants in acknowledgment of the private autonomy-based function of relationship formation or  is adopting a more paternalist approach; a protective stance in respect of the distributive function of  de facto relationships. The latter would seem to be the better view.

A key point of interest emerges along the autonomy/protection dichotomy if we approach the regime from a ‘cultural difference’ perspective. What might be the potential interactions between the new legislation and marriages and partnerships between immigrants to Ireland. Parties to customary marriages which are not recognised in Irish law, and people who - for religious or other reasons - undergo a marriage ceremony which does not comply with the requirements of the Civil Registration Act, 2004 will, in many circumstances, fall within the ambit of the new cohabitation regime. On the Second Reading of the UK’s Cohabitation Bill (which, in this respect, is very close in substance to the proposed Irish scheme) in the House of Lords earlier this year, Lord Lester of Herne Hill QC said:

I also greatly welcome the support of the Southall Black Sisters. They believe that the Bill will have particularly important implications for women of ethnic minorities, especially Muslim women. It will address the problem of those women who, having been party to a religious wedding ceremony, believe that they have the civil rights of a married person. It is only when their relationship breaks up that they find that their marriage was never registered and that they have no rights. The Bill would also deter men from having polygamous marriages, which are illegal under English law.

 In related news, I having been finishing off a working paper on the possible interactions between Muslim divorce practices and Irish family law over the weekend, and will post an executive summary here for your information – and comments -  soon.

I am a single man that believes that my vocation is that for marriage.  So when I came across this article I thought it prudent to read it since I have much, much to learn about marriage.  Me being the type that I would like to prepare for it the best I can rather than “learn on the job”.

Regardless, this struck home, not because of any past sin, but because it is rare to see a good priest speak truth to power.  Once cloning technology gets perfected I plan on mass-producing this priest.  Yeah, I know, cloning destroys the dignity of man so I was only speaking rhetorically.

So here is a warning for you all before you read the article.  Of course the author issues his own warning, but it is best to be safe than sorry!

Warning: This article may be offensive to poorly catechized Catholics, dissident Catholics, left-wing extremists, Pescetarians, men-hating feminists, dog-and-cat-hating John Bircher types, Freemasons, the Reformed Royal Order of Water Buffalo’s and the city of San Francisco.

Here is the original article:

A rant on weddings…

Warning:  This episode of the  Rev. Know-it-all is extremely offensive.  It is not about you or anyone you know.  Please read the whole article.  The  Rev. Know-it-all is not opposed to all wedding celebrations.  he is not talking about your wedding which was a triumph of personal sanctity and good taste.  He is probably just having a bad day.

Dear Rev. Know it all,

I visited your church once and am thinking about having my wedding there. How long is your main aisle?

Mary O’Burne

Dear Mary,

I am often asked that question, and never quite understand it. Are brides curious about the length of the aisle because they think a longer aisle may give them a few more minutes to back out of the whole thing? Or, as I suspect, does a long aisle prolong the glorious promenade of which a young girl dreams as she thumbs through bridal magazine as she contemplates her special day, when all eyes focus on her as she approaches her enchanted prince and all the world thinks she’s gorgeous and knows that she has bagged her man just as surely as a Wisconsin bricklayer bags a deer and ties it onto the roof of his pick up truck? I have certainly seen a few grooms who look like a frightened deer caught in the headlights of an oncoming truck.

Why is it that weddings cause people to spend so much time, energy and money? And more money. The average American wedding costs almost $29,000, according to “The Wedding Report”, a market research publication. $29,000!” Oh, by the by, the usual donation to the church is about $200.00. That $200 goes to the church, not to the priest. The usual gift to the priest is a hearty handclasp. The usual cost of the photographer is $2,000.00. All this tells me that the photographs are over one hundred times more important than the grace of the sacrament, in most peoples’ estimation. The usual fee for the DJ is $1,500.00. I am consoled by this. It means that painful, occasionally obscene music loud enough to cause brain damage is only 7.5 times more important than the grace of the sacrament.

You must be thinking why is this guy so down on weddings? I am down on some weddings because I am very “up” on the sacrament of matrimony and really in favor of marriage. That’s why the modern method of marrying and the wedding industry make me crazy. They militate against marriage. Here is the heart of my complaint.  It is stupid to spend more time and money preparing for the wedding than you do preparing for the marriage!  I have known people who are still paying the credit card bills generated by the wedding years after the marriage is over.

The Modern Method of Marriage, a Reprise. The following is taken from my own experiences and things people have told me (outside of confession, you’ll be glad to know.) Here goes.

A young man and a young woman meet and have a few dates. They go for a weekend at a bed and breakfast where they bed one another, and then have breakfast. If he isn’t too much of a jerk and she isn’t too picky, they are then an item. She goes to the doctor gets a prescription and goes on to a more permanent form of birth control. At some time during this stage, the uncomfortable meeting with the parents happens. Everyone is polite and “supportive.” Secretly the father of the young woman who knows exactly what’s going on, contemplates buying a gun and the mother of the young man begins gossiping with whomever will listen about how her little boy could do better. After a while, if things hold up, they begin to have the conversation about taking their relationship to the “next level” by which they mean shacking up, as we used to call it. Now, I think it’s called moving in together.

Mom and Dad buy housewarming gifts in an attempt to, once again, be supportive. They don’t want their little dears to hate them and besides, it’s what everyone is doing these days, so it can’t be wrong. They have vague thoughts about getting married at that point and mom explains to grandma and to friends at church that they are just doing it to save money for the wedding. At this stage an engagement ring may appear. At some point, when they think about getting the house and the kids, because that’s what you do, they decide to have the wedding.

They rent the hall and then go see the priest. He tells them there are four other weddings that day and they respond, “but we’ve rented the hall already.” Someone suggests a garden wedding if the church is occupied. The priest says we can’t do garden weddings. (More on this later.) The young couple begins to complain about how narrow-minded the Church is with all these rules and regulations. They eventually pick a date. Then the bottom drops out. It seems the groom is not Catholic. He was baptized in the First Reformed Church of the Druids, though he never practiced. This means there must be a dispensation for the marriage, another irritating Catholic invention, and the wedding date cannot be confirmed until the dispensation is received.

The bride goes back to her doctor, this time for a prescription for valium. Her mother joins her on this visit. Finally the dispensation is granted, The groom’s druid will do one of the readings at the wedding, the loans are taken out, the banns are published. Then there is the rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. The best man comes to the rehearsal drunk out of his mind, the groom only slightly tipsy. The bride is furious at everyone for some reason known to her alone. Probably because the groom is far more interested in drinking and watching the football game on his hand held computer thing than he is in gazing lovingly into her eyes in anticipation of the great day. In fact they haven’t been, well… friendly in weeks. It is, after all, football season.

The special day comes, the best man is still drunk, the groom is hung over, no one knew about that interesting tattoo that the maid of honor had way low on her back, now revealed by the plunging back of her dress that is held up only by wishful thinking. Grandma, upon reading the logo of the maid of honor’s tattoo, has fainted. Somewhere in all this the vows are exchanged, and quite a few of the wedding party receive their first Holy Communion that day, however one of the ushers puts the host in his suit pocket not having a clue what it is. (This actually has happened to me twice.)

The pictures have been taken. The noise level in the church reaches that of an English soccer match after the riot has broken out. The children are jumping off the altar and the priest is scowling at everyone. Now on to the pictures in the forest preserve, a “must” at every wedding. There the wedding party is attacked by mosquitoes, one of the children falls into the lagoon and the bride is having a hard time smiling for the photos. The best man passes out. On to the reception.

The bride loses it because the shade of fuchsia in the floral center pieces clashes with the shade of fuchsia in the wedding party’s outfit. The groom adjourns to the bar where the game is on the television. The wedding dinner is served as music is played at a mind numbing volume. Grandma is better now. She has turned off her hearing aid. The priest is seated with the pious relatives in plaid suit coats and leaves shortly after the grace before meals.

The best man makes the toast which drones on about how he loves the groom and one begins to wonder. The college roommate/maid of honor does the same for the bride, going on for fifteen minutes about how she knew the bride would find eternal marital bliss the moment she met her in the third grade and they have been like sisters ever since. Then at some point, there is a video presentation of embarrassing photos not unlike the ones that are now shown at wakes.

The bar opens up again. The music reaches levels that cause blood to drip from some peoples’ nose and ears. The joyous event ends with the bride and groom being the last to leave the hall. They are slow to go up to the room they have rented in the hotel because nothing new or beautiful awaits them there. The groom promptly falls asleep, being heavily sedated already, and, as he snores away, with his shoes still on, our blushing bride, having shed her dress of virginal white, thinks back on this day, her special day, the most important day in her life, the day she has dreamt of since she was a little girl.

They will stay an extra day at the hotel, but cannot afford the time or money to go on a honeymoon because on Monday they will both be back at work in order to pay off the colossal bill that their special day has incurred. For some reason, the bride is depressed. Perhaps she is realizing that the high point of her life is now past and the rest of it will be spent with the lump that is now snoring beside her with whom she has never really had a serious conversation, except about the proper shade of fuchsia for the floral centerpieces. So it is that we celebrate the marriage of Christ and His Church in these enlightened and tolerant times.

Remember, none of these things happened at your wedding, thank God and don’t think from reading this that I am down on marriage or even weddings. I love a wedding celebration when there is something to celebrate. Also, it is never too late to begin again by taking Christ and His gospel seriously.

Please spend more time and money preparing for the marriage than you do preparing for the wedding.

Yours,
Rev. Know-it-all

P.S. Garden weddings. They look good in all the bridal magazines but they are just opportunities to feed biting insects and suffer from sunburn. It is however amusing to watch the bridesmaids sinking in the mud as they try, after a few margaritas to maneuver the newly laid sod in spiked heals. The bride is generally exhausted from not having slept for three weeks as she worries about the weather reports which are promising a 50 percent chance of typhoons and earthquakes that day. And destination weddings. Don’t get me started on Destination Weddings! You want to be married with just your closest friends on a beach in Maui. That means that Grandma can’t go because she hasn’t flown since the Hindenburg Disaster, and is thinking of cutting you out of the will, and all the friends and relatives who aren’t with you on the beach in Maui realize they aren’t very close to you after all. And I haven’t a clue how long the aisle is here at St. Dymphna’s.

_._

I came across this great article from the Reverend Know It All blog, via the FUMARE blog by Columcille.  It is originally titled, A Rant On Weddings…

_._

The American Catholic articles on marriage and selfishness:

To read Sexual Selection and Modern Dating by DarwinCatholic click here.

To read Sex, the Fall, and the Resurrection by Ryan Harkins click here.

To read Dr. Patrick Lee on the Nature of Marriage by Chris Burgwald click here.

To read I’ll Take Her on a Test Drive by Ryan Harkins click here.

To read Inequality and the New Aristocracy by DarwinCatholic click here.

To read Dolan: Man-Woman Tradition Is In Our DNA by Tito Edwards click here.

To read Culture Crash by DarwinCatholic click here.

To read How to Live a Selfish Miserable Life-and Fail at It! by Donald R. McClarey click here.

Story from the Wall Street Journal. (H/T Andrew)

Excerpt:

Dr. Braun’s group found that at 21 days, the fatherless animals had less dense dendritic spines compared to animals raised by both parents, though they “caught up” by day 90. However, the length of some types of dendrites was significantly shorter in some parts of the brain, even in adulthood, in fatherless animals.

“It just shows that parents are leaving footprints on the brain of their kids,” says Dr. Braun, 54 years old.

The neuronal differences were observed in a part of the brain called the amygdala, which is related to emotional responses and fear, and the orbitofrontal cortex, or OFC, the brain’s decision-making center.

[...]The balance between these two brain parts is critical to normal emotional and cognitive functioning, according to Dr. Braun. If the OFC isn’t active, the amygdala “goes crazy, like a horse without a rider,” she says. In the case of the fatherless pups, there were fewer dendritic spines in the OFC, while the dendrite trees in the amygdala grew more and longer branches.

A preliminary analysis of the degus’ behavior showed that fatherless animals seemed to have a lack of impulse control, Dr. Braun says. And, when they played with siblings, they engaged in more play-fighting or aggressive behavior.

In a separate study in Dr. Braun’s lab conducted by post-doctoral researcher Joerg Bock, degu pups were removed from their caregivers for one hour a day. Just this small amount of stress leads the pups to exhibit more hyperactive behaviors and less focused attention, compared to those who aren’t separated, Dr. Braun says. They also exhibit changes in their brain.

The basic wiring between the brain regions in the degus is the same as in humans, and the nerve cells are identical in their function. “So on that level we can assume that what happens in the animal’s brain when it’s raised in an impoverished environment … should be very similar to what happens in our children’s brain,” Dr. Braun says.

Read the whole thing.

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Story from the UK Daily Mail. (H//T ECM)

Excerpt:

Scientists at Stanford University in California found the right cocktail of chemicals and vitamins to coax the cells into becoming eggs and sperm.

[...]It paves the way for a cure for infertility and could help those left sterile by cancer treatment to have children who are biologically their own.

But it raises a number of moral and ethical concerns. These include the possibility of children being born through entirely artificial means, and men and women being sidelined from the process of making babies.

Opponents argue that it is wrong to meddle with the building blocks of life and warn that the advances taking place to tackle infertility risk distorting and damaging relations between family members.

Children need a stable environment with both a mother and a father in order to be happy and well-adjusted. Right now we are already in the middle of a crisis such that newborn children are not being raised by their biological mothers and fathers. This is become worse as single motherhood, same-sex marriage, cohabitation and unilateral divorce become mainstream. Are children becoming nothing more than a consumer good?

The general trend is for the selfish needs of adults to trump the needs of the children. This is to say nothing of abortion and embryonic stem cell research, in which the selfish-needs of adults result in the actual murder of children so that the more powerful adults be happier. This is, I think, a consequence of the decline of the Christian worldview ( humans relating to a morally good God) and the ascension of materialism and hedonism.

I’ve often wondered why being single in our world in this day and age is associated with such a stigma. My first issue is the conclusion that if you aren’t married – you’re “single”. I have been in a committed relationship with my boyfriend for the last three years, we have been living together for a year and a half, and in fact, I don’t consider myself single by any means. However, Merriam-Webster lists the first definition of single as a) not married; b) of or relating to celibacy, and the second as unaccompanied by others; lone; sole. The clear contradiction in this is that most married people tend to prefer their “single” (as in lone, sole, etc.) time away from their spouses and kids rather than in the presence of each other, while the other problem is that being unmarried is listed as first meaning of the word. (Whatever happened to single meaning one or only?) I would consider a single person as one that is not committed to another in any capacity, and I do not think it is justifiable to categorize someone in a relationship this way. I am not married, not celibate, and am actively accompanied by another in my life… yet, I am generalized as being single.

If the burdens of being a loner ended with the label, it wouldn’t be so bad. But in addition to being stereotyped, we single people are on the short end of the stick in many aspects. Not only does our wonderful government fuck us on our taxes and our rights, the general public also assumes that we have no responsibilities or obligations to fulfill. Our work expects us to be at their beckon call because clearly, if you aren’t married (or you don’t have kids), the only priority you could possibly have in life is your job.

I know this rant may seem completely off the wall to you since I should be used to this by now, but after today’s events, I had to vent to someone (thanks readers!). By contract, exhibitors at this conference aren’t allowed to break down their booth until 2:30 PM today. I had arranged to catch a ride with one of them after my whole taxi fiasco on Tuesday, but he had a 4:00 PM flight and was hoping to get out early. Since we had been told that we wouldn’t be invited back if we tried to skip out, he wasn’t going to chance leaving early. However, it’s been raining all day here and traffic is going to be a bitch to get to the airport, so he didn’t think he was going to be able to make his flight if he couldn’t get out before then. He was in the same position as me – taking the last flight in to his destination – and if he missed it he wouldn’t be able to get in until tomorrow. My flight isn’t until a little after 5:00 PM, but I am desperate to make it home to see my boyfriend and dogs tonight… I think I will have a complete meltdown if I miss either of my planes. It’s our three year anniversary tomorrow, but we’re not going to be able to spend much time together for it as it is – so as you can imagine, I really want us to have the opportunity to see each other tonight. Anyway… my ride tells the woman overseeing the conference about the situation – that he wants to leave a little early and was going to give me a ride. Then he throws in the little tidbit that if he doesn’t make it home tonight, he won’t be able to see his 7-month old son and his wife that he hasn’t seen in five nights. Of course her heart just melts and she tells him that he’s free to go. Any time. But me, I have to stay.

My question is, while I know he wants to see his son, why is it more important for him to see his loved ones than for me? Why is his given yet another added priority because he made the choice to get married and have a child? Upon hearing how long my boyfriend and I have been together, people always ask me, “Why aren’t you married?” or “When are you getting married?” I realize that I have the same option to get married as everyone else, but we just haven’t taken that step yet. It’s not something pressing on the top of my priority list at this point. This is not to say that we don’t plan on getting married in the future, because we do, but the timing hasn’t been right so far in our relationship. I was still in college until May of 2008, and I am a firm believer in waiting to get engaged or married until both parties are living as adults, paying their own bills and working grown up jobs in the real world. While I was fortunate to be employed immediately after graduation, our lives have been insanely hectic ever since. With the amount of travel and long hours on both of our schedules, we have been busy living in the moment and haven’t had the time to define the future of our relationship yet. Not only that, but I am still young and haven’t been in a real rush to get to the altar. No question that I would marry him today if he asked, but we are both focused on getting our ducks in a row now so that we can get to the point where we can comfortably start our lives together as a married couple. We could rush out to the court house and get a marriage license tomorrow if it was a priority, but that’s not what either of us want.

So my question is… Why does society try to pressure people into getting married in order to legitimize a relationship? What’s the benefit for anyone when a couple is married too early, ends up having children too early, and living off the money they get from the state to support their family? Shouldn’t our society (and our government) reward people for waiting and trying to do their life in the right order at the right time? Sadly America, this is not the case. Let’s get out of the 1950s and start respecting the “single” men and women in our country. Geez.

The brain is odd, isn’t it? Or mine is, anyhoo. While working on this blog with TGOTS, I’ve been amazed at the musical associations that rush in for both of us — memories we didn’t even know we had, moments big and small. But today’s scan dredged up a moment positively microbial: As the thumping bass line of the White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” flew out of my car radio, I was suddenly in a line at a post office, six years ago.

It was a long line, shuffling slowly forward, made tolerable only by the catchiest of catchy bass lines quietly underlying the business at hand. The song was new enough then that I puzzled over it, trying to remember who it was by. The errand was one of my last in the old neighborhood before moving to a new neighborhood across town, and moving in with my fella for the first time.

I guess maybe that last fact is what made it significant enough for my brain to capture and tuck away. And Jack White’s bass line got tucked away with it, like a trigger placed by a devious hypnotist. Amazing.

by Jessica Bryan

Focus posted a link and a few excerpts from an article about cohabitation.

An email from the group discussed the petition by Focus Action asking lawmakers to “vote ‘no’ to public funding of abortion.” 

A second email from Focus discussed the “Focus on the Family Action news conference on Capitol Hill on Wednesday.”

Traditional family values are passe to my young hipster generation, but the culture of casual sexuality breaks down society. Far be it from me to call for a return to the courtship society (though my daddy would love that), but let me offer a glimpse of the current romance climate. Young marriage is socially frowned upon, so young adults naturally take sexual and emotional yearning into their own hands at great cost to future marital strength. Their inclination toward serial cohabitation breeds unhappiness and trains for divorce.

For those wary of moral statements, read on, for Michael Gerson speaks as the sociologist when he describes this rather inconspicuous but mainstream lifestyle fad (yes, just a fad, says the optimist). Gerson’s Washington Post article couldn’t be any more relevant to those in the Harvard community. Here’s a good summary (like usual, my summaries consist of most of the article):

“There is a segment of society for whom traditional family values are increasingly irrelevant, and for whom spring-break sexual liberationism is increasingly costly: men and women in their 20s.

This is the period of life in which society’s most important social commitments take shape — commitments that produce stability, happiness and children. But the facts of life for 20-somethings are challenging. Puberty — mainly because of improved health — comes steadily sooner. Sexual activity kicks off earlier. But the average age at which people marry has grown later; it is now about 26 for women, 28 for men.

This opens a hormone-filled gap — a decade and more of likely sexual activity before marriage. And for those in that gap, there is little helpful guidance from the broader culture. Brad Wilcox, director of the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia, argues that the “courtship narrative” in the past was clear: dating, engagement, marriage, children. This narrative has been disrupted without being replaced, leaving many 20-somethings in a “relational wasteland.”

The casual sex promoted in advertising and entertainment often leads, in the real world of fragile hearts and STDs, to emotional and physical wreckage…

In the absence of a courtship narrative, young people have evolved a casual, ad hoc version of their own: cohabitation. From 1960 to 2007, the number of Americans cohabiting increased fourteenfold. For some, it is a test-drive for marriage. For others, it is an easier, low-commitment alternative to marriage. About 40 percent of children will now spend some of their childhood in a cohabiting union.

How is this working out? Not very well. Relationships defined by lower levels of commitment are, not unexpectedly, more likely to break up. Three-quarters of children born to cohabiting parents will see their parents split up by the time they turn 16, compared with about one-third of children born to married parents. So apart from the counsel of cold showers or “let the good times roll,” is there any good advice for those traversing the relational wilderness? Religion and morality contribute ideals of character. But social science also indicates some rough, practical wisdom.

First, while it may not be realistic to maintain the connection between marriage and sex, it remains essential to maintain the connection between marriage and childbearing. Marriage is the most effective institution to bind two parents for a long period in the common enterprise of raising a child — particularly encouraging fathers to invest time and attention in the lives of their children. And the fatherless are some of the most disadvantaged, betrayed people in our society, prone to delinquency, poverty and academic failure. Cohabitation is no place for children.

Second, the age of first marriage is important to marital survival and happiness. Teen marriage is generally a bad idea, with much higher rates of divorce. Romeo and Juliet were, in fact, young fools. Later marriage has been one of the reasons for declining national divorce rates. But this does not mean the later the better. Divorce rates trend downward until leveling off in the early 20s. But people who marry after 27 tend to have less happy marriages — perhaps because partners are set in their ways or have unrealistically high standards. The marital sweet spot seems to be in the early to mid-20s.

Third, having a series of low-commitment relationships does not bode well for later marital commitment. Some of this expresses preexisting traits — people who already have a “nontraditional” view of commitment are less likely to be committed in marriage. But there is also evidence, according to Wilcox, that multiple failed relationships can “poison one’s view of the opposite sex.” Serial cohabitation trains people for divorce. In contrast, cohabitation by engaged couples seems to have no adverse effect on eventual marriage.

There is little use in preaching against a hurricane of social change. But delaying marriage creates moral, emotional and practical complications. The challenge, as always, is to humanize change. The answer, even in the relational wasteland, is responsibility, commitment and sacrifice for the sake of children.”

Here is an article on single mothermood. It is the first in a series by law professor Helen Alvaré.

First, she writes about the number of out-of-wedlock births, and the effects of single motherhood on children:

The recent news of the nearly 40% out of wedlock birth rate in the United States should pretty much rock our world as citizens and as Catholics. According to the Centers for Disease Control report, this means 1.7 million children were born to unmarried mothers in 2007, a figure 250% greater than the number reported in 1980. The implications for our society loom large. According to empirical data published over the last several decades in leading sociological journals, these children, on average, will suffer significant educational and emotional disadvantages compared to children reared by their married parents. They will be less able to shoulder the burdens that “next generations” traditionally assume for the benefit of their families, communities and their country. They are likely to repeat their parents’ behaviors. The boys are more likely to engage in criminal behavior and the girls to have nonmarital children.

And then she explains what causes women to do engage in this behavior:

First, the researchers concluded that the majority of children born to lone mothers could not correctly be deemed “unplanned.” Rather, many were planned or actively sought. And the majority were somewhere in the middle between planned and unplanned. In other words, many of these very young couples (it was not uncommon for the mothers to be 14 or 15 years old) explicitly or implicitly wanted a baby in their lives. Their reasons by and large would be familiar to anyone who has ever hoped for a child. They wanted someone who was an extension of their beloved, a piece of him or her.  They wanted to love another person deeply.

[...]What is different about very poor mothers’ desires for children seems to be related to their relationally, financially and educationally impoverished circumstances.  Relationally, the authors described these young mothers as existing in an environment without close, trusted ties.  In particular, the men in their lives were considered to be highly untrustworthy and worse.  Infidelity seemed almost a universal problem among the fathers. Drug and alcohol problems, criminal behavior, and domestic violence were extremely common.  Motherhood provided a chance for these women to “establish the primordial bonds of love and connection.”

So, these women are looking to children as a way to establish lasting relationships. They want to have children, and they don’t believe that they are hurting the child by having the child without a father.

You can read the rest here.

I think this is interesting because what it means is that young women are viewing children as means to their own happiness, regardless of the effects that single-motherhood, with all that it implies, has on the child. It strikes me as incredibly selfish. Just like when children demand pets and promise they will take care of them, but then the adults end up taking care of the pets because the children aren’t mature enough.

Maybe those antiquated moralistic prohibitions on pre-marital sex were there for a reason? Maybe morality should not have been shoved aside by the secular left so hastily?

anniebannie vous livre ce dossier tel quel

Le dossier du Soir

This is perhaps my favorite (I hope you sense the sarcasm) thing about my current living situation. As I mentioned before, I moved here to be with my boyfriend, not to be with my husband. We all know it’s almost 2010, but here it might as well be 1950. Cohabitation isn’t just frowned upon… we’re living in sin. I didn’t realize people still actually used that phrase, but rest assured that they do. I guess that’s to be expected in a place like this, but it still never ceases to amaze me how much it really bothers people. As a result, I’m extremely limited in functions that I’m able to attend with my boyfriend’s work, and I am absolutely never allowed to travel with him (this is a “spouses only” privilege). This really got under my skin at first, and it still does to some extent… but it gets worse. I’m not allowed to participate in any activity that I would like to be a part of, but I’m expected to be gung-ho at every opportunity that I can contribute something.

Take for instance, family night. “Family night” is the name given to the one night a week that I’m actually able to eat dinner with my boyfriend… and with all of his coworkers and their families. As you may have gathered from my previous posts, I don’t really mind kids, but I’m not exactly crazy about them either. It’s not that I don’t like to be around them, but I would love for that one meal a week to not feel like it was taking place at a day care center during recess. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. But, being the good girlfriend that I am, I put a smile on my face, play nice, and pretend like there’s no place else I would rather be. The perk, of course, is that I’m actually able to spend some quality time with my boyfriend. The downside is not only the effective method of birth control (which I guess I should try and look at as a plus), but also that I have to bring a dish to share with the group each week.

It’s not that I have a problem with cooking or anything (I actually really like to cook)… it’s the whole ordeal of being creative enough to come up with something easy to make for 30 people each week, then going to the grocery store and getting everything, etc. If this little get together was somewhat organized, which you would think it would be since it takes place every week, it might not be so bad either. You know, maybe it could be catered occasionally or wives (plus me of course) could take turns bringing food. Another thing that would really help the situation would be if specific food items were assigned to certain people each week, i.e., one person could be responsible for a pasta dish, salad, meat entree, dessert, etc. Instead, we usually end up with mostly pastas and desserts for the group, plus Skeletor’s bucket of chicken from KFC that she brings for her husband and the boss’ kids… heaven forbid she bring enough of anything for everyone to have some. But as long as her husband and her sucking up are taken care of, why would anything or anyone else matter?

Anyway, not only do we have a limited variety of food options, but these people really can’t cook. I may be a little biased since I don’t eat meat and therefore don’t usually have much to choose from (because doesn’t everything taste better with bacon?), but I do see everyone’s reactions when they eat this stuff. Unless someone has been kind enough to pick up something from a restaurant, the food looks inedible. It’s disgusting. So I’ve basically taken it upon myself to make the one dish that people will be happy to see on the table of food each week. Though everyone that has tried any of my food has raved about how good it was (foodnetwork.com baby), some people are still skeptical because my dishes are vegetarian – oh well, a girl’s gotta eat, right? And again, no one’s worried about me – they all know I don’t eat meat, yet none of them can bring even a single thing where they held the bacon – so I’m not too concerned.

Of course, this is something that I’m allowed to attend because I can bring something (food) that other people can benefit from. Last week, I got an email asking if I’d like to help with selling t-shirts this weekend. Usually, I would have obliged, but my mom and her boyfriend were coming in town so I had to opt out of it. Of course I sent an email reply saying that as much as I’d like to participate, I wasn’t going to be able to because my family was visiting and whatever. Did I receive any type of response or acknowledgement? Of course not. I’m not asking for a damn novel or something, but a mere “thanks anyway” would do the trick. I just find it amusing that if I can give/do/help with anything, these people have no problem coming to me, but the second that I’m not able to benefit their cause, I go right back to being the snubbed “sinner”. I know that I’m not in any position to help people climb the social ladder around here, but would it be that difficult to just extend some common courtesy every now and then? I think not…