On Christian Marriage

Alright. Apologies Professor Young (and all readership), but this is going to be one of those posts that's required to meet my 2 week quota. Posting twice on the same night? Yes, indeed I am. But I had written the other stuff a while back, so really, it's alright.

In all honesty, Lewis' fiction is not doing as much for me as the apologist stuff. I loved Perelandra...but thus far have not super connected with the Narnia series. SO! I'm going to jump back into Old Faithful territory: Mere Christianity and the chapter on Christian Marriage. (:D)

I love this chapter. Whenever I get distressed about romantic things, how things are imbalanced or not working out, I can read this and feel a little better about what marriage is supposed to look like, and what I'm shooting for. Here's a bit of a lengthy quote:

"The Christian idea of marriage is based on Christ's teaching that a man and wife are to be regarded as a single organism...He was not expressing a sentiment but stating a fact--just as one is stating a fact when one says that a lock and it's key are one mechanism, or that a violin and a bow are one musical instrument. The inventor of the human machine was telling us that its two halves, the male and female, were made to be combined together in pairs, not simply on the sexual level, but totally combined."

Pretty romantic for a guy who had yet to be married, right? :) But my response to this quickly (before I sleep) : I think this is beautiful. What Lewis is describing here is unity; one-ness in being as well as in purpose. A solidarity in goals I think is especially important; the desire for similar things, from where to spend the money to your levels of activity in church. Now certainly, I would guess that this kind of unity is not something you stumble upon. It's something you build. I think the best promise of this type of unity is a degree of shared goals before you start dating, and then a willingness to compromise, to follow the spirit, and eventual love for your spouse that will allow you to admit you're wrong after the fact. I know, highly idealistic...but a dream nontheless. Alright--sleep. :)