You know what I fear that society is teaching our young people today? That marriage just doesn’t work. Statistics have shown that marriages are on the decline. More and more people are choosing to live together.
Now my point isn’t to say whether or not living together is right. What I want to focus on is the negative portrayal that marriages have been given. All you have to do is flip on the television and you are bound to come across a sitcom where marriage is poorly portrayed.
You don’t see very many “happy” marriages displayed across our television screens anymore. Gone are the days of the Huxtable’s who managed to work through problems very well on “The Cosby Show.”
And don’t even get me started on reality television. These crazy shows really paint marriage in a bad light. Now we have the “Housewives of…Beverly Hills, Atlanta, DC, New Jersey,” you get the picture.
It’s frustrating to me as a wife who has been married for 20 years and knows that you can work through your difficulties and differences. No marriage is a rose garden but you can tend and cultivate it in such a way that it produces something quite beautiful.
But what is society telling our young people? Why bother, since it hardly ever works? You can’t trust in no one else…look out for yourself, number one. Don’t give your heart away; it will just be stomped on. These are just some of the negative attitudes poured out on the young.
I wish we would bring back programming that illustrates how marriages can withstand the test of time. I wish our young people would feel more confident that their marriage can work.
But it starts with us. We have to be willing to sacrifice, to share, to be a good example. We have to be the ones who stand out and make young people think, “I wish I could have a marriage like that.”
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