Bethany Mandel, wife and Jewish mother of six, published a piece yesterday in the Spectator World on the importance of taking seriously how one chooses a spouse:
A lot of things are important in a marriage: love, respect, trust, laughter. But perhaps most important is to remember that it’s a partnership for life; and as such, dating should not be considered fun, but instead like a job interview for the most important role you’ll ever have, that of a spouse.
If you were interviewing for a job, would you allow the process to drag on, long after you know it’s the right fit (or not)? Would you take the job (AKA get married) if you weren’t in agreement about what you both wanted out of the partnership?
If, after graduating medical school, you were offered a job and your future employer said they were “open” to you perhaps becoming a physician, would you accept? Or if your potential employer said they could pay you to do something, but that actually practicing medicine was off the table? How many people would set aside their hard work and dreams and accept such offers?
Mandel makes the argument for pickiness, one young women should note. Input on the subject comes at us from every direction: If you’re not married by 30, you’re likely too ambitious, but if you marry younger, you’ve sacrificed individuality for a man. There is little advice for women who might want to get married young, but just haven’t found the right person. A professor gave me the only advice I think women need to hear on such a subjective topic: “This is the most important decision you’ll make in your life. It’s okay to be picky.”
Christian influencers don’t represent a large portion of the population, but they certainly dominate the narrative on Christian marriage culture. Influencers encourage followers to get married young, to which I’ve no objection, but fail to acknowledge that young men and women today are more divided on issues than ever. It’s difficult to find someone with whom you’re compatible. Social media amplifies stories of successful young marriages, which are beautiful, but not actually that common.
It might’ve been easier decades ago, when families were closer and churches more active. Granted, it happens for some young people; many of my 20-something-year-old friends are engaged to wonderful men, but many more are discouraged by singleness well into their 30s. Men or women shouldn’t settle for “good enough,” nor should they feel doomed if a once-serious relationship doesn’t work out — young relationships often don’t thrive when challenged by adulthood, which can be awful if individuals opt to stick it out for a spouse who, it may turn out, wants fundamentally different things out of life:
It doesn’t mean that their spouses were wrong; just wrong for them. I don’t know, though, maybe they were also wrong. It’s cruel and unethical to waste someone’s precious time if you know that you won’t want the same thing; you don’t get [your] years of fertility back.
That’s the danger in romanticizing young marriage, without also mentioning its rarity. If Christian influencers — especially the group of “trad-Caths” circulating the Twitter-sphere — emphatically tell women to marry young, we might wander into a situation in which we’ve not only settled, but we’ve compromised life itself. Mandel is right to point out the glaring issue of fertility: We only get so many years of fertility, and to use them wisely is to consider both their expiration date and to whom you entrust them.
Such a decision should be made with a fair amount of scrutiny. Emotion only gets you so far and, as Mandel points out, a serious relationship deserves consideration of serious things — dealbreakers including children, lifestyle, or religion. How awful would it be to marry someone who disagrees with you on the issue of children?
The “date to marry” discourse has many false extremes that deserve rebuttal: Standards are good, but unwillingness to bend preferences is not; serious dating isn’t void of fun; differences of opinion are not always reasons to end a relationship. Emotion, however, shouldn’t get in the way of pickiness. If that sounds selfish, good. Marriage, in the Christian faith, is a partnership devoted to glorifying God and helping your spouse (and, God-willing, children) achieve eternity. You must be confident that such aspirations are not one-sided.