How do you solve a problem like this?

[rusmeister]

I read this article the other day: Why young Christians aren't waiting anymore – CNN Belief Blog - CNN.com Blogs

It jives with what I've been hearing for years. I was active in some Evangelical youth groups in high school, and I've seen the whole "chastity pledge" thing, then some young couple held up on a pillar for all to see and emulate, and then everyone hears in hushed whispers, "Oops...they did it."

Frederica Mathews-Green wrote an article some time ago that I just also read recently: Frederica Mathewes-Green on Teen Pregnancy on National Review Online

Seems she's identifying a systemic problem that is making it ever harder to mesh traditional Christian morality with the modern patterns of culture...not just that we're bombarded with sex every minute of every day, but that young people are basically extending their childhoods by a decade or more. After high school comes college...then if you really want to be marketable, better sink another 2-3 years into a Master's degree...then you'd better break off family ties and relationships (if you haven't already) and move to wherever you can get a job that you really want, then you'd better get all your ducks in a row...then maybe it's time to settle down. I have some old college pals who I occasionally talk to, and a few are still living like they're 20...but they're 35.

Really, the entire pattern of life is based around money and consumerism. Don't get married early, or you won't be able to pick up and move across the country when that next job opens up! Don't have kids, or you won't be able to spend all your nights and weekends working your way up the ladder, or taking extra classes to get more degrees to get even more money!

So...are we all kidding ourselves in thinking that we can teach young people to both live on their own, out in "the world" for 6-10 years, and be chaste until marriage...when they have their own dorm rooms or apartments with nobody to hold them accountable and nobody to help them when they get too close to the fire?

Is Frederica right? Should we roll back the clock and encourage young people to get married in their late teens or early 20's? Have we gone too far down the wrong path that it's just too late and we should be pragmatic in telling them "try to wait, but if you can't, for God's sake don't get pregnant?"

(For those who live outside the U.S., is this any different elsewhere? From what I've heard from people who've lived in Western Europe, America is actually pretty tame by comparison).

I highlighted what I see to be one of the problems - out attitude toward people getting married when they are 18-24 - the metaphor for "turning the clock back" is perpetual - and false. (My thanks to GK Chesterton for pointing that one out)

There is one metaphor of which the moderns are very fond; they are always saying, "You can't put the clock back." The simple and obvious answer is "You can." A clock, being a piece of human construction, can be restored by the human finger to any figure or hour. In the same way society, being a piece of human construction, can be reconstructed upon any plan that has ever existed. There is another proverb, "As you have made your bed, so you must lie on it"; which again is simply a lie. If I have made my bed uncomfortable, please God I will make it again. We could restore the Heptarchy or the stage coaches if we chose. It might take some time to do, and it might be very inadvisable to do it; but certainly it is not impossible as bringing back last Friday is impossible. This is, as I say, the first freedom that I claim: the freedom to restore. I claim a right to propose as a solution the old patriarchal system of a Highland clan, if that should seem to eliminate the largest number of evils. It certainly would eliminate some evils; for instance, the unnatural sense of obeying cold and harsh strangers, mere bureaucrats and policemen. I claim the right to propose the complete independence of the small Greek or Italian towns, a sovereign city of Brixton or Brompton, if that seems the best way out of our troubles. It would be a way out of some of our troubles; we could not have in a small state, for instance, those enormous illusions about men or measures which are nourished by the great national or international newspapers. You could not persuade a city state that Mr. Beit was an Englishman, or Mr. Dillon a desperado, any more than you could persuade a Hampshire Village that the village drunkard was a teetotaller or the village idiot a statesman. Nevertheless, I do not as a fact propose that the Browns and the Smiths should be collected under separate tartans. Nor do I even propose that Clapham should declare its independence. I merely declare my independence. I merely claim my choice of all the tools in the universe; and I shall not admit that any of them are blunted merely because they have been used.

Since we have definitely gone down the wrong path, the right thing to do is to go back to where we made the wrong turn.

I strongly encourage intelligent folk here to read "What's Wrong With the World by G.K. Chesterton. It is one of his greatest books - both entertaining and enlightening:
To read online:
G K Chesterton's Essays: What's Wrong With The World [Read online]

R.O. or copy (relax, GKC is in the public domain!):

What's Wrong with the World

 

[Lirenel]

While everything people have been saying is true, I would like to put out there that there are some of us who want to get married and have kids (and yes, stay home and actually raise the kids), but can't find anyone to marry. And though I would like to go on dates, I don't want to date anyone who I wouldn't consider marrying - that is, someone who is Orthodox in belief and practice. That's a very small pool where I am (plus I'm naturally shy and don't put myself forward/flirt overly much). So it's not so much that I, and others like me, are being overly pressured by society - we want to marry and raise kids, but the option is just not possible.

 

[rusmeister]

Well, I think it's generally realistic to graduate at 22-23, work three or four years to kind of establish a career, and then have kids. 26 is a great age. But you have to plan well to be at a point where the makes sense.

I would say - in reference to my last post - that even this general idea is merely going along with what IS, and does not seek to identify or work towards the ideal.
I say 19-20 is a great age to have kids.

Only you're envisioning that in an environment where the kid goes to a public school, follows the usual paths of the modern industrial world, etc. I envision one where people take education into their own hands, raise children to be largely independent and self-educating at 16 and ready for complete marriage and adulthood, waiting for nothing, at 18. Children bring on maturity, not the other way around.

I have learned that much of what colleges and universities purport to teach is false, based on false philosophy (worldview), certainly regarding the humanities, and so is worse than a mere waste of time. We want to learn - let's eliminate the middleman (the univer$ity $y$tem) and take the learning more directly. Pull the kids out of public school. Homeschool, or start a home- or private school cooperative. I look at what Dale Ahlquist and his community have done in creating the Chesterton Academy and I am green with envy. In my time, my mother pulled us out of public school, put us in a small Baptist school with no teachers - self-teaching from the 4th grade on up and worked there as a monitor to defray tuition - we were about as poor as church mice - and I graduated from that little school and went on to ace the South Carolina GED, high scores on the SATs and max credit on ETS's CLEP tests - saved me from a year of "general education requirements" at the State University. I got married within a year of meeting the woman I am still married to 20 years later, and I only regret that it happened at 26 and not at 20. (We were undergrads at marriage and our first son was born two years later when we were grads.) Now I am an old parent, pushing 50 with a two-year old, and wish my kids had all been born ten years prior. Ten wasted years. And I wonder how long I'll be around for my kids - especially the youngest.

 

[Knee V]

While everything people have been saying is true, I would like to put out there that there are some of us who want to get married and have kids (and yes, stay home and actually raise the kids), but can't find anyone to marry. And though I would like to go on dates, I don't want to date anyone who I wouldn't consider marrying - that is, someone who is Orthodox in belief and practice. That's a very small pool where I am (plus I'm naturally shy and don't put myself forward/flirt overly much). So it's not so much that I, and others like me, are being overly pressured by society - we want to marry and raise kids, but the option is just not possible.

I can't speak for the others, but I was certainly not trying to insinuate that if one is not married one is part of the problem. Rather, the general mindset of "you have to wait until you're older to marry and have kids, and doing that earlier is irresponsible" is false. There is not set time frame for marriage and children, but we shouldn't discourage a young couple from marrying and raising children.

 

[Unshaven]

I wonder (partly in jest) whether part of the problem is in leniency towards transgression, that bit on 'turning back the clock' did make me wonder how far one dares to go in that respect. I have a copy of a letter from Gregory of Nyssa which recommends up to nine years of penance and exclusion from the eucharist (3 years indeed, not even able to stand with the congregation, that is some serious naming and shaming right there) and in fact, he considers that actually 18 years is more appropriate, the same amount of time ascribed for those who have homosexual, bestial or adulterous sex, because he says, there is only one proper union, that of man and wife.

I'm not sure just how good this approach is for one's psychiatric health or in getting people to really search their feelings and find their desire for such an exacting God and to put the passions, the sicknesses behind them.

Still just a thought.

More seriously though, and I cannot speak for contemporary Orthodox practice here, but in the western Churches there's a very bizarre approach to the subject of sex when it's brought to teenagers:

On the one hand there is this 'no sex before marriage' line, purity for God's sake etc. but it actually is usually presented in an authoritarian negative way: What I mean is, whilst they talk about the good stuff in virginity, they ultimately present it not as an opportunity but a prohibition and restriction, a denial of self, rather than a chance to find one's true self in God, if that makes any sense.

The problem is they then line this up side by side, with this absolutely eye-watering presentation of Sex; perhaps prompted by such views as Gregory of Nyssa's the western Church is engaged in a pathetic attempt to dispel its 'anti-sex' image, no really, we think sex is awesome, it's SOO Good, it's a gift of God. It would not be too much to say that as I remember it, one could almost consider [bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse][bless and do not curse] a sacred experience the way some of them talk.

In essence they talk of it in a way that makes it sound fulfilling. To rooms full of kids who haven't had it. Who probably get enough bombardment from other sources about how great it is.

There's also this tendency, particularly with protestants to see sex, family, marriage as part of the 'ultimate fulfillment' in life which necessitates going out and meeting potential partners; it's almost pushing them into a hormonally charged scene where there will be quite a lot of pressure.

To me this all seems quite the wrong way round...unfortunately I think part of the solution includes recovering the 'erotic' as being a legitimate way of perceiving our relationship with the divine, something that a lot of western men, who of course, predominate a lot of churches find perhaps uncomfortable...but we do have to be 'hot' not 'lukewarm' and are not some, many, of the most passionate earthly encounters often romantic for us?

I think it's worth stressing the role of desiring God, passionately, longingly, achingly desiring the divine, that is perhaps the essence of monastic, chaste calling, because they fell in love. With love. There is also the political, anti-social aspect of celibacy too, I don't know why the Church doesn't revel in being so oddly counter-cultural, why it doesn't celebrate its virgins more rather than assume they're sort of defective by not being married, and possibly a slightly more sane approach to sex: one that keeps in mind that one day we shall be like angels, that remembers that Eunuchs for the Kingdom are highly honoured, and that it is better not to marry...but also notes the frustration, boredom and dissatisfaction generated by sex, that sees it in its place as a natural, and in comparison of God, ultimately unfulfilling.

Maybe a recovery of emphasis on ascetic practice in general? Apart from giving the celibate teen something to focus their energy on, perhaps it would stop presenting Marriage as the bridge that leads from the barren, frigid tundra to the garden of sensual delight when periods of chosen celibacy for God (not those merely brought on by nature) is part and parcel of the devoted married life. Just makes it feel less like they're missing out on something HUGE you know?

Just a few thoughts thrown out there.

 

[Dorothea]

While everything people have been saying is true, I would like to put out there that there are some of us who want to get married and have kids (and yes, stay home and actually raise the kids), but can't find anyone to marry. And though I would like to go on dates, I don't want to date anyone who I wouldn't consider marrying - that is, someone who is Orthodox in belief and practice. That's a very small pool where I am (plus I'm naturally shy and don't put myself forward/flirt overly much). So it's not so much that I, and others like me, are being overly pressured by society - we want to marry and raise kids, but the option is just not possible.

Understand completely. I knew I wanted to marry and have children in my early to mid teens. It didn't change when I was in my 20's, and yes, I had a hard time finding somebody to marry for a long time, and when I was 26, I lived in the South, and I felt like an old maid because everyone else seemed to be married already (they married younger at that time,....I don't know if that's still the case in the 2000s....it was in the mid 1990s). Anyhow, my difference from your story is that I was just coming back to my church in my mid 20s. It'll happen when it does.

 

[gracefullamb]

nm.

 

[Antony in Tx]

It's not any better for us single guys...

 

[Walter Kovacs]

Interesting how simply keeping it in your pants is such a crazy concept for kids these days...god forbid people (myself 100% included here) simply not act on their animal instincts. Uhg.

 

[gzt]

I also definitely think you have to be careful, because it almost seems, with some Protestants I knew, that sex was the one unforgiveable sin, and so if they made a mistake and had sex, well, it's over, there was no going back to church, no going back to being a Christian. You're done. This was one of the factors that led to people just disappearing in college (one of many).

 

[Luther073082]

I also definitely think you have to be careful, because it almost seems, with some Protestants I knew, that sex was the one unforgiveable sin, and so if they made a mistake and had sex, well, it's over, there was no going back to church, no going back to being a Christian. You're done. This was one of the factors that led to people just disappearing in college (one of many).

Thats because they have made virginity into their God. . . As I said its been about "keeping your virginity" or maintaining your "purity" and not just about avoiding sex.

It makes it about the virginity about the so called "purity" and not about the obedience to God. Make it about the obedience to God, you make a mistake you can get up, repent, and do better. Because its about heavenly things.

But you make it about the virginity or the so called "purity" . . . these earthly things once lost can not be re-obtained.

Add in the purity pledges and purity rings and all of that jazz that people make when they are 14 years old and it really just twists the knife of sin and guilt even more.

 

[Dorothea]

I also definitely think you have to be careful, because it almost seems, with some Protestants I knew, that sex was the one unforgiveable sin, and so if they made a mistake and had sex, well, it's over, there was no going back to church, no going back to being a Christian. You're done. This was one of the factors that led to people just disappearing in college (one of many).

Very true. That is a concern and something to be careful of. We can't expect no mistakes to be made, as it's unrealistic and does put our children in a bind. My son has gone to confession and will continue to, and he knows if he slips up, to talk with our priest. It's a fine line, really.

 

[Dorothea]

Thats because they have made virginity into their God. . . As I said its been about "keeping your virginity" or maintaining your "purity" and not just about avoiding sex.

It makes it about the virginity about the so called "purity" and not about the obedience to God. Make it about the obedience to God, you make a mistake you can get up, repent, and do better. Because its about heavenly things.

But you make it about the virginity or the so called "purity" . . . these earthly things once lost can not be re-obtained.

Add in the purity pledges and purity rings and all of that jazz that people make when they are 14 years old and it really just twists the knife of sin and guilt even more.

Yes, good points. It is about obedience to God.

 

[NyssaTheHobbit]

In terms of younger marriages. . . I don't know that is the answer.. . sure you might have more people waiting for marriage, but you pay for that with an increasing number of divorces. You are simpily going to move the sins. Some younger people will do ok, but a lot won't.

Yeah....When I turned 18, I hadn't really dated before, so had no guy, no established relationship to turn into marriage. But I saw dating as what you do to find a husband, not just having fun for a while. Soon I found a boyfriend who I thought I would marry, but it turned out he was about to turn atheist, then Pagan, and start doing all sorts of things (smoking pot, drinking, smoking, etc.) that I didn't want my husband doing. Then I went on through college, trying to find guys who were out for more than just a good time. Dating guys who claimed to be Christians, but kept pushing the envelope of whatever they could get out of me. One ended up being abusive as well. Even for those of us who want to get married early, it can be hard to find a decent mate. At that age, so many people are still too immature to form a lasting, healthy union, and so many guys are scared off by girls who want to get married. I don't think early marriage is the answer, not like in the olden days.

 

[Merlinius]

Parents, speak to your children about chastity in the Lord.

That is all we can do.

The rest is up to them.

 

[MKJ]

I think FMG is on the right track. But I think it is impossible to encourage kids to marry young and then expect the kind of total independence many North American families tend to. Twenty year olds that marry are going to need help from parents, family, and the community to get settled and get whatever qualifications they need. Whereas many seem to expect them to be out at 18.

Or if they do stay home longer, they are pretty much treated like children and the parents impose rules that are not really appropriate for another adult who is living with you.

 

[E.C.]

While everything people have been saying is true, I would like to put out there that there are some of us who want to get married and have kids (and yes, stay home and actually raise the kids), but can't find anyone to marry. And though I would like to go on dates, I don't want to date anyone who I wouldn't consider marrying - that is, someone who is Orthodox in belief and practice. That's a very small pool where I am (plus I'm naturally shy and don't put myself forward/flirt overly much). So it's not so much that I, and others like me, are being overly pressured by society - we want to marry and raise kids, but the option is just not possible.

Ya know, you could just camp outside of one of the seminaries for a while

Kidding.

On the serious side, one very simple idea is this: go to where the Orthodox are. Maybe even consider a move.

It's not any better for us single guys...

No kidding...

Interesting how simply keeping it in your pants is such a crazy concept for kids these days...god forbid people (myself 100% included here) simply not act on their animal instincts. Uhg.

We have a winner!


It is quite simple: teach your children some restraint, discipline and responsibility. Begin by having them mow my acre of lawn that hasn't been down in months since our lawnmower broke last year. This generation of parents spoils their kids and doesn't make them shut up when they're screaming at my restaurant! Parents do not make their kids actually do things around the house. Want the lawn mowed? Rather than pay a group of Mexicans to do it, have your kid do it for free! Kid just turned sixteen and wants a car? Make him pay at least half of it. When kids learn what such crazy things as "responsibility", "discipline" and "restraint" are at a young age, than they are less likely to do idiotic things when they get older.

I've worked at the same restaurant for four years now. As every year has gone by I worry more and more about what idiots will be taking care of me in the hospital because the great majority of parents, especially the stay at home moms that come in, spoil their kids like princes. I know this because I overhear a great deal of conversation that goes on and those parents should be smacked upside the head with a 2x4 for making spoiled brats of their own kids.
(this is not meant as being anti-stay at home mom, but I'm simply disgusted at how spoiled children are these days).

 

[Ignatius21]

I think FMG is on the right track. But I think it is impossible to encourage kids to marry young and then expect the kind of total independence many North American families tend to. Twenty year olds that marry are going to need help from parents, family, and the community to get settled and get whatever qualifications they need. Whereas many seem to expect them to be out at 18.
.

Excellent point! Many of my friends in high school had very little real relationship with their parents, for all sorts of reasons...their parents were divorced and remarried twice over, or the kid spent all their time in school sports and the parents spent all their time working or doing their own hobbies, or whatever. It was a rare family that was in the same house at dinner time, much less the same table. Many just grabbed whatever they wanted to eat and hung out in their own rooms watching their own TVs.

Then in college I met hundreds of people who were thrilled to be away from their parents, and whose parents were thrilled to have the kids out of the house. "You're 18, we've done our part, now please get out of our nest." So it's little wonder that there's so little support to young families from parents or others. We're a transient, individualized society ready to break all bonds and move away for the next pay raise.

This exacerbates the problem, and yet is itself a symptom of the problem we're discussing. It's kind of a rat's nest.

It is quite simple: teach your children some restraint, discipline and responsibility. Begin by having them mow my acre of lawn that hasn't been down in months since our lawnmower broke last year. This generation of parents spoils their kids and doesn't make them shut up when they're screaming at my restaurant! Parents do not make their kids actually do things around the house. Want the lawn mowed? Rather than pay a group of Mexicans to do it, have your kid do it for free! Kid just turned sixteen and wants a car? Make him pay at least half of it. When kids learn what such crazy things as "responsibility", "discipline" and "restraint" are at a young age, than they are less likely to do idiotic things when they get older.

Also true. If we let our kids grow up just being used to having everything they want, whenever they want it, then self-gratification is the norm. Then toss them out into the world and tell them to grab life by the horns and make their own way...oh, and don't have sex. You can have instant gratification everywhere else, but don't do that, cuz God doesn't like it.

I see the wisdom in things like fasting and keeping vigil. Train yourself in the little things so you can stand firm when the stakes are high. Self-destruction probably won't come from a slice of ham, but if you can't say no to even that much, how will you say no to real temptation?

 

[rusmeister]

American Orthodox men in Russia have it made in the shade. The number of available practicing women exceeds men by probably up to 50%. an American man involved in a local parish here would probably be married within a year or so... Even American women have an advantage, simply by being American. Just go and do some obedience at Sergiev (kind of like the Orthodox Vatican in Russia) for 6 months and some man preparing for the priesthood will probably pick you up - if you're OK with being a matushka with 3-6 kids...

 

[Ignatius21]

American Orthodox men in Russia have it made in the shade. The number of available practicing women exceeds men by probably up to 50%. an American man involved in a local parish here would probably be married within a year or so... Even American women have an advantage, simply by being American. Just go and do some obedience at Sergiev (kind of like the Orthodox Vatican in Russia) for 6 months and some man preparing for the priesthood will probably pick you up - if you're OK with being a matushka with 3-6 kids...

A Russian woman at our parish has informed me that all Russian women are at least partially crazy, so we should all beware before heading over to find brides