marriage

I’ve been reading a lot of articles on marriage lately and, all of a sudden, more articles start showing up in my news feeds.  A little creepy, to be honest.

Lately, Tim and I have been taking out our stress on each other more than usual.  Chalk it up to the five kids and their activities and needs, the sleep deprivation having teenagers and toddlers affords and the demands of work and heavy-duty church assignments. There’s no excuse for it, but there’s no shortage of things to which nurturing our marriage sometimes takes a back seat.

Last week we had a full-blown tizzy, ahem, minor disagreement.  As is often the case when Tim and I don’t see eye to eye, I start hunting for any and all marital advice, searching the scriptures, reading counsel from church leaders, and yes, scouring the internet for related content.  Hence the uptick in marriage articles on my newsfeed.

So today I stumbled across an article with this title: Scarlett Johannsen says “marriage a lot of work, monogamy unnatural.”  I clicked on it, despite my usual distaste for celebrity opinion.  It was disappointing, as one would expect, to hear a high-profile individual simultaneously state the obvious and then pooh-pooh the greater good.

Yes, marriage can be a lot of work.  And sure, monogamy is unnatural if you want to lump ourselves in with the rest of the animal kingdom and ignore the fact that we were endowed with complex brains and the ability to make moral decisions.  (Incidentally, several animal species employ monogamy, perhaps with more consistency than humans.)

In any case, why is it that we’re so quick to absolve ourselves of moral character?  Why do we assume that when the going gets tough, the tough get going?  As in going, going, gone.  What makes us think that we should do what comes naturally instead of what is right?

“For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam and will be forever and ever unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Ghost, and putteth off the natural man, and becometh a saint through the Atonement of Jesus Christ”.

I believe we are so much more than what the world would have us believe.  We are sons and daughters of God, created in His likeness, and endowed with potential to become like Him and inherit all that He has.  And I believe that marriage, with all its “work”and “monogamy”, is the perfect training ground in which to do so.

Everything of value in my life has required work.  What a convoluted view to suggest that marriage would be any different.  Monogamy provides stability and satisfaction to a relationship, and, by extension, to a family.  How ridiculous to think that we can experience any real measure of joy by doing what comes naturally!  What comes naturally to me is sleeping in every day and eating chips and chocolate around the clock but, last I checked, that isn’t exactly a recipe for a life full of meaning.

So eat your heart out, ScarJo, and set that bar low for yourself and humankind.  Me?  I’ll take work and monogamy with a huge helping of joy and happiness on the side.