Pseudogamy 101

     I've written in a post below that the real social problem we in America face is the number of people who are not married who behave as if they were.  I'd like to revise that claim.  Our problem is pseudogamy, false marriage, and it assumes many forms.  Same-sex pseudogamy is but the latest and most flagrantly absurd, but it is not the first.  We find the most fundamental form, from which other corruptions rise up like diseases, when a man and woman go through the ceremony and utter the traditional words "as long as you both shall live," while harboring the mental reservation, "as long, that is, as I am happy," or "as long as the marriage 'works,'" whatever that is supposed to mean.  In other words, in the fundamental form of pseudogamy, we don't have people who are not married behaving as if they were, but people who are married (or who present themselves as having been married) behaving as if they were not.

     Why should anyone care about the private mental reservations entertained by the couple next door?  The obvious answer is that those reservations are not really private.  They will inevitably be talked about, urged upon others, or acted upon, if not by the couple next door, then by the couple two doors down, and then their problems are also ours.  We must live with their divorce.  We must try to teach their addled children.  We must get along in neighborhoods blasted by the instability and the chaos.  We must help feed the sharks in the divorce industry.  We must suffer the now greater probability that other couples near us will follow their example.  A culture in which divorce is common is a different thing from one in which it stands under severe disapproval; and everyone, divorced or not, must breathe the same cultural air. 

     That's the obvious answer, but not the best one.  The best answer examines what we in our culture of divorce have nearly forgotten, namely the high and adventurous calling that marriage truly is.  "Should a man give the woman he is weary of a bill of divorce?" ask the scribes, and Jesus replies by reaching behind all human custom, and behind all of the Mosaic law's concessions to human weakness, by reminding us that it was not so from the beginning -- which is to say also that it is not so now, from the foundations of our beings. "What God has joined together," says Jesus, "let no man put asunder."

     I'll defer to a later post a discussion of what John Paul II called the "nuptial meaning" of our bodies, male and female, and how the phrase "what God has joined together" makes no sense if it does not at least refer to that wondrous created reality.  When does God "join together" man and woman?  What is the metaphysical status of that joining?  Jesus is not speaking of fornication, that other thing that mimics marriage, wherein man and woman become one flesh without intending to become one flesh.  Then it is not merely the joining of bodies male and female that matters (though that is a necessity).  Somehow God must effect the joining.  But the God we are talking about, the God of Israel revealed to us in the flesh by Jesus the Son, is one who is Love itself.  Love -- the love that moves the sun and the other stars, the love divine that came down from heaven in tongues of flame, the love that hung upon the cross -- is not a compromising neediness, as the Stoics thought, but the complete disposing of oneself to another, "being for," as the Boss Benedict puts it.  In love and only in love do we discover the beauty of another being, and only in love do we become ourselves, for he who would save his life will lose it, but he who would lose his live will save it, unto life everlasting.

     Christians should acknowledge the truth of this, but it is ready to be seen by anyone, regardless of faith.  Marriage -- marriage such as Jesus defined it -- is the foundation of society not simply because it is the best environment for raising children, though it is.  It is the foundation because in it man and woman commit themselves one to another, as if they were, so to speak, gods freely bestowing freedom upon what they create.  They are like God Himself in that free and freedom-making relinquishment of themselves, and they find themselves in that greater thing they create, the one flesh, the love that embraces them and that stands as an example to all others of the beauty and grandeur of that complete gift.

     I know full well that men and women are sinners.  I'm a sinner, after all.  But even a poor marriage, when husband and wife do their duty by one another, stands as an example of the ideal, and in one way a more powerful example of it than will the good marriage, just as the man who stands by his post in defeat is a greater hero than one who does so in victory.  And of course, just as the determination to stand by your post helps your comrades to victory even when all seems bleak, so the determination not to revoke your complete gift of self in a poor marriage may turn that marriage itself around and help others navigate through the storms.  But in a nation of pseudogamy, the only place to turn to for the noble call for complete gift of self will be the military -- a call which few of us will even hear.

     In other words, the mental reservation vitiates the marriage.  To the extent that we entertain it, we lie.  We say aloud, "I give myself to you," but whisper to ourselves, "I retain myself for me."  We say, to paraphrase Augustine, "Lord, marry me to this woman, but not quite."  We engage in a convoluted and expensive pretense, complete with band and wedding cake and ring and honeymoon in Cancun, when all along we are saying, in part, "I am for myself, and for this person here only insofar as this person is for me," rather than, "I now belong to my spouse, and in my belonging to my spouse I will become myself, because it is only in giving that we receive, and only in binding ourselves to the gift that we are set free."

     There is, then, no such thing as a "prenuptial agreement."  To the extent that such an agreement posits divorce as a future intention of one of the spouses (for divorces, unlike being struck by a piano falling from a great height, are not accidents but are the results of intentional acts), then to that same extent the spouses are not married.  The nuptials are corrupted in the seed itself.  The man and woman who bind themselves together with Elmer's glue do not really intend to bind themselves together.  Wedding ring or no, they are passing off as marriage what is, at least in part, a pseudogamous relationship.  And they are helping to build a pseudosocial culture, a culture of selfishness, division, chaos, and enmity.

Comments

[Truth Unites... and Divides]

I simply marvel in deep appreciation of this post. May the exhortation spread far and wide and be acted upon in an increasing rate. And may the seed of marital revival start and bloom in His Church.

Much deep thanks Tony!!

[Beth from TN]

Wow. I read this after making my comment on the awards post. It merely confirms what I said about my favorite contemporary author . . .

[Eutychus]

Amen and amen.

[Emil]

Well said.

Try as they do, gays did not initiate the damage to marriage. "Pseudogamous" hetrosexuals started the trouble.

People say that they marry for better or worse----they should also say "for keeps."

I hope every reader sends a contribution to Touchstone in its time of need.

[TimC]

Cyranorox,

And how does "proposing" that "divorce is an evil" differ in any substantial way from "severe disapproval"? Concrete examples would be appreciated.

[Nick]

I imagine Christ proposed that all of those folks get out of the temple? Come on. Christianity is muscular. It doesn't "propose" it, repeatedly might I add, "declares". Christianity hurts peoples feelings as John the Baptist did who gave far more than, "an icy stare." However, it also offers hope for those that whose conscience it pricks.

[Truth Unites... and Divides]

Cyranorox: "The best recent example I know of proposing Christ is St Herman of Alaska, who lived as a hermit among the native peoples. He is not recorded as condemning their practices, nor seeking to regulate their behavior; he simply presented the life in Christ."

The best example I know of proposing Christ is pointing folks to Holy Scripture. Scripture repeatedly records the condemnation of sinful practices, and such Biblical condemnation is not a despised method by the Author of Scripture for encouraging and producing *genuine* repentance, a repentance which is the fruit of an internal heart change resulting in sinful behavior that's been "regulated" to use your terminology.

The best Biblical example of pointing to Christ is John the Baptist. He repeatedly called on people to repent. His calls for repentance were seen as condemning of sin and regulating the behavior of sin. Look how he finished his life. And do you remember what Jesus said about John the Baptist?

I asked.

[Kamilla]

As a pastor friend of mine says from time to time - we must preach Christ's "No" as well as his "Yes". If there is no repentence, there is no need for Grace.

Kamilla

[Beth from TN]

One does not need to go about giving icy stares and despising people to "severely disapprove" of divorce. "Hate the sin, love the sinner," you know. One can severely disapprove of someone's actions without despising that person. Indeed, love shown despite hatred of the sin is tremendously effective. Living the way of Christ is a testimony, indeed. But part of living the way of Christ is saying "Divorce is sin and God hates it." Speaking the truth in love, desiring the person to come to the knowledge of the Truth: these are not antithetical to severe disapproval of sin. In fact, they are necessary, and lead us, walking in the Spirit, to discern what *this* person needs from us at *this* moment in speech and action.

My daughter who is pursuing a divorce stays in regular touch with me and I with her. She knows that I love her -- and she has declared this to me -- *because* I have made my "severe disapproval" of divorce clear to her (which I have done, as she well knows, because I care deeply about the state of her soul and of her life) *and* because at the same time I weep with her, pray with her, and let her know in a hundred ways that I love her despite disapproving this choice she has made. Even my decisions not to help her in certain ways that would be aiding her in that choice she understands as my love for her. And my love -- including both the truth and the affection -- has caused her to at least pause and think, to not make her situation worse than it is . . . and who knows where it will lead in the end? God willing, to her full embrace of His way, but that is also for her to choose.

To describe "severe disapproval" as sin -- despising and hating sinners instead of loving them in the hope of their repentance -- is to call God a sinner.

[Kamilla]

Beth,

This is so very right. These sorts of trials and disagreements deepen our relationships - a relationship that costs us nothing usually isn't worth very much.

Kamilla

[mcmoderator]

Comments deleted - ad hominem content

[Beth from TN]

C -- You described "severe disapproval" as I put it in the parenthesis. I meant that describing "disapproval" as hating and despising sinners (icy stares, etc.) -- which is obviously sin -- is to call God a sinner: because He "severely disapproves" of sin. Sorry for the lack of clarity.

[Rob G]

It is wrong to separate Christ's "I do not condemn you" from his "Go and sin no more." If in the past some Christians were wont to proclaim more of part B than of part A, modern Christians err if they think that they can fix things by proclaiming A without the B.

[Nick]

No. You destroy St. Herman's legacy. Didn't he rebuke the authorities? Didn't he adjudicate disputes? In this he followed the examples of both Saint John the Forerunner and Jesus. Jesus came with peace and to bring a sword. You are ignoring the dynamic tension in order to create a Ken Doll Jesus.

[Micha Elyi]

"[I]n the fundamental form of pseudogamy, we don't have people who are not married behaving as if they were, but people who are married (or who present themselves as having been married) behaving as if they were not."
-- Anthony Esolen

Since the day that laws in U.S. states added the option of unilateral divorce to all marital agreementsm, including all existing ones whether or not the marriage partners both agreed to this alteration, marriage ceased to exist in America.

Yes, as Anthony Esolen notes, people still use the word marriage but the state now described by that word is largely indistinguishable from co-habitation but for a few partner benefits, additional legal hassles upon departure from the co-habitation arrangement, and for men a risk of years of wage-slavery to benefit often hostile women all in the name of children those men are no longer permitted to father (or, too often, even see).

Thus people who are unmarried in fact are legally able to carry on as if they are married. This sort of charade - often unwitting on the part of the players - is so commonplace and so infrequently noticed that many people, even presumably knowledgeable social observersm are gulled into making useless, usually counterproductive, and often socially damaging policy prescriptions.

Further adding to the confusion is the use of biblical language such as "Should a man give the woman he is weary of a bill of divorce?" and "What God has joined together let no man put asunder." Such language mask the reality that today (and throughout the millenia of our human heritage, except in times and places when women were specifically barred from initiating divorce proceedings) the cause of divorce is overwhelmingly women. I repeat, women. (This is admitted by women themselves, see the survey and interview results of ASU's Dr. Sanford Braver in his 1998 book Divorced Dads.) The most common reasons women admit are their motivations for wrecking their marriages are not desperate, dire reasons at all but casually self-absorbed and frivolous ones such as "I don't want to be married anymore" or "I want to find myself."

If the rate at which women wreck marriages and families through divorce fell to the rate at which men do, the marital failure rate would fall by at least one-half.

[Truth Unites... and Divides]

Tony Esolen: "A culture in which divorce is common is a different thing from one in which it stands under severe disapproval; and everyone, divorced or not, must breathe the same cultural air."

Cyranorox: "Not bad, until we get to 'severe disapproval'.... How to apply the 'severe disapproval'? Another time to propose, not impose, Christ. Stern glances at erring neighbours, icy disdain in the grocery line, etc., simply render one ridiculous."

How about citing God's 'severe disapproval' by pointing folks to the Scriptures in Malachi 2:16 which states "'For I hate divorce,' says the LORD, the God of Israel"? Or does applying Scripture to morality simply render one ridiculous?

[Micha Elyi]

"How to apply the 'severe disapproval'? Another time to propose, not impose, Christ. Stern glances at erring neighbours, icy disdain in the grocery line, etc., simply render one ridiculous."
--CyranoRox, commenting earlier

In the typical case of divorce, I tell the woman that I am sad that she made such a unilateral choice but I'm praying for her soul. I tell the now-bereft man of my sorrow for his loss, let him know that I'm available to give him what help I can, and assure him that I'm praying for God to aid him and his children through the tough times ahead.

[Truth Unites... and Divides]

Tony Esolen: "A culture in which divorce is common is a different thing from one in which it stands under severe disapproval; and everyone, divorced or not, must breathe the same cultural air."

Cyranorox: "Shaming the failures, though, is low; too much emphasis on the burdens imposed on the writer by divorced people has a ring of "My daughter, my ducats!""

"The writer" to which you refer is, I assume, Tony Esolen?

[Beth from TN]

"I have chosen the angle of his chivalry, courtesy, and irony, not forgetting his thunders, because I see a more extreme opposite, an allegiance to his wrath that is felt to relieve the writers of any obligation to imitate his chivalry."

I consider this to be slander of the writers here. The site moderator may or may not agree with me on that, but no one who has read here for any length of time would accuse the writers of Mere Comments posts of seeking to avoid responsibility for imitating any virtue of their Lord.

[Rob G]

"Rob, I agree. But sequence counts; it is to the healed and forgiven that he gives the command to sin no more."

True enough. But note that the command follows immediately upon the declaration of forgiveness. Christ doesn't say something like, "Neither do I condemn you. Now go, and perhaps you might want to think about how a promiscuous lifestyle might be damaging to yourself and others."

"This sequence is not observed or proposed often enough, imho, in these pages."

That, of course, is a matter of opinion. But if it has a grain of truth in it, it is precisely because we conservatives and traditionalists have tired of liberal Christianity's perpetual unwillingness to speak of sin at all, except regarding its pet "social justice" issues.

[TimC]

Cyranorox, I suspect that you simply enjoy stirring the pot. Your objections are exactly the thing that was taken up in the bulk of the original post. Your single straw man, "severe disapproval," was explicitly aimed in the original post at the culture, not at individual Christians. Certainly you would not want a culture permeated with approval or even indifference toward divorce? If not, then what is your complaint? This was obviously the thrust of the sentence to which you are giving so much weight.

As for "proposing Christ" being substantially different than "proposing that divorce is evil," you cannot differentiate the Person from the Logos. If it is true that "divorce is evil", then it is proposing Christ to propose this. It is not all of Christ, obviously, and as others have pointed out, this must be done with the Agape that is also Christ. But all of Christ must be given. God's Word is not a *thing* that can be cut and delivered piecemeal. His Word is a *person* and so must be received as one.