At this point, it’s already well-known that marriage rates are declining around the world. However, the developed world may be reaching a point where marriage is effectively extinct.
As English Bishop Mark Davies told his congregation in a sermon late last week, “most recent statistics show a 61% decrease of marriages in our land, the lowest number of couples entering marriage for almost two centuries.”
“Headlines do not seem to exaggerate when they speak not merely of a cataclysmic decline but of marriage disappearing in Britain,” he added.
Marriage was once the norm that grounded society by providing not just a stable environment for raising children, but also an important domestic model for adults. Having a job and a place to live was not enough — people wanted to find their soulmate and start a family with them.
What is the goal for adults now?
As it stands, there doesn’t seem to be any goal, at least on the domestic front. Relationships are secondary to other concerns, more often serving the demands of utility and sexual appetite rather than submitting to a higher calling of meaning and purpose. In practice, this means that people cohabitate in ever greater numbers, and could even switch out partners as seen fit. Unlike marriage, which binds two souls together in a mutually sacrificial union, couples who cohabitate are generally in it for themselves (to split living costs, mitigate loneliness, take care of any “fur babies,” etc.).
The best way to restore a marriage culture
