By Lindsay Hinmon
There seems to be a great sense of concern over my demographic in the church of 18-30 and unmarried, and rightly so. We are tragically turning away from God at an alarming rate. Somewhere along the line, however, someone decided the way to fix this issue is to get us all married off. I can say without hesitation, I believe in marriage. I believe it's Godly, I believe it's necessary and I believe it would help our inactivity rates in many instances. The doctrine of marriage and I are cool, but if one more person “helpfully” insinuates that I might do well to “think about finding that certain someone”, I’m going to lose it. Speaking generally for the body of LDS young single adults today, there are a couple things you should know...
There seems to be a great sense of concern over my demographic in the church of 18-30 and unmarried, and rightly so. We are tragically turning away from God at an alarming rate. Somewhere along the line, however, someone decided the way to fix this issue is to get us all married off. I can say without hesitation, I believe in marriage. I believe it's Godly, I believe it's necessary and I believe it would help our inactivity rates in many instances. The doctrine of marriage and I are cool, but if one more person “helpfully” insinuates that I might do well to “think about finding that certain someone”, I’m going to lose it. Speaking generally for the body of LDS young single adults today, there are a couple things you should know...
1. Most of us want to get married not because of, but in spite of the pressure put on us.
The idea that my generation would rather play video games, travel or buy something shiny than get married seems popular amongst leadership. We may enjoy video games, travel, or be pursuing school or career, but this is not why we aren't married. The majority of us want to be married because it's natural to seek companionship. Also, we know it's one of God's greatest tools for cultivating divinity. If we're attending church in this day and age as full grown adults, we have our hearts set on Godly things. Give us a little credit. The pressure you're adding is doing nothing for us
Between the God given, biological drive for sex and the nearly palpable social pressure to take the plunge, not one of us will ever benefit from your, "Cowboy up and get 'er done" rhetoric. As for those of us who aren't interested in marriage, no public pep talk is going to change that, and the reasons we have are pretty much never as shallow as you seem to think.
2. There was a caveat in that infamous Kimball quote.
It was 1976 when President Kimball said, "...it is certain that almost any good man and any good woman can have happiness and a successful marriage if both are willing to pay the price." (Ensign, March 1977, First Presidency Message.) This got a lot of play wherein it was paraphrased as, "You can be happily married to anyone, so stop being so picky." That's exactly the opposite of what he was saying. The full quote talks about being willing to, "pay the price", and my generation is too familiar with the price of a poorly chosen mate, which brings me to my next point.
3. We are traumatized by divorce.
Our parents are divorced, our siblings are divorced, our friends are divorced, and some of us are divorced, so you can't tell us, "Marriage is the most beautiful, celestial, Godly blessing," without reviving many of our own sharp-edged memories that fly in the face of that statement, even if it is true in some cases. Even if we desperately want it to be true for us.
4. You're giving us all a complex.
"Are you dating anyone? Why not?" is a direct quote from my bishop's counselor in a private interview when I was 19. There are two possible reactions to this kind of intrusion. We either walk away thinking, "That was rude," or "He's right. What's wrong with me?" Either way the thought is certainly not, "Oh yeah, I hadn't thought of that!" I don't know how things are on the male end of this, but I have extensive experience as to what this kind of overt pressure is doing for LDS single women. It's making us doubt ourselves, dis ourselves and decrease our lists of marital "must haves" 'till we settle for subpar. We need the refuge of church. Singles wards are especially designed to be families. When three hours set apart for God are riddled with comments like, "Make sure you've got your priorities straight, " we start thinking about our hair instead of our neighbor. It's as helpful as a glass of water for a man who is drowning. Please, please, please, stop it.
In keeping with Abraham Lincoln's counsel, "He has a right to criticize who has a heart to help," I have some suggestions to help this problem straight from that massively misinterpreted talk from the 70s. President Kimball would counsel:
Teach us to be unselfish, to forget ourselves, and to focus on the good of the family, our ward family.
What we, the endangered demographic have been taught is to take care of ourselves. We need to be taught to receive kindness graciously and look out for our brother. We've been conditioned to approach church as a soiree. We need to be taught to commune with God intimately for three sacred hours and then spend our week days with those who uplift us. We've been taught that we need to be sexy or rich to be worth anything. We need to be taught how to find the beauty and value in every person we interact with. This does not happen when we are perpetually being counseled, "Don't forget to look for your eternal companion."
What if every Sunday instead of, "Get married" we heard our ward father say, "In this ward, we're a family, and in this family we don't leave anyone out." What if, instead of wondering how we look in our jeans and if he will notice, we were taught to pick up the ward list and call every name on it to make sure they'd gotten the invitation to FHE. What if we were encouraged to see each other as sources of support instead of someone who will ultimately accept or reject us for the remainder of mortal existence and beyond?
Help us. Teach us. Show us the way to break free from the vicious voices of the world that relentlessly, infectiously declare, "You are not good enough. You are not strong enough. You are alone." Show us how to love ourselves for who we are. Then, teach us to love something and someone more than we love ourselves, because I want to be someone who loves selflessly, and I want to marry someone who lives in selfless love.
The idea that my generation would rather play video games, travel or buy something shiny than get married seems popular amongst leadership. We may enjoy video games, travel, or be pursuing school or career, but this is not why we aren't married. The majority of us want to be married because it's natural to seek companionship. Also, we know it's one of God's greatest tools for cultivating divinity. If we're attending church in this day and age as full grown adults, we have our hearts set on Godly things. Give us a little credit. The pressure you're adding is doing nothing for us
Between the God given, biological drive for sex and the nearly palpable social pressure to take the plunge, not one of us will ever benefit from your, "Cowboy up and get 'er done" rhetoric. As for those of us who aren't interested in marriage, no public pep talk is going to change that, and the reasons we have are pretty much never as shallow as you seem to think.
2. There was a caveat in that infamous Kimball quote.
It was 1976 when President Kimball said, "...it is certain that almost any good man and any good woman can have happiness and a successful marriage if both are willing to pay the price." (Ensign, March 1977, First Presidency Message.) This got a lot of play wherein it was paraphrased as, "You can be happily married to anyone, so stop being so picky." That's exactly the opposite of what he was saying. The full quote talks about being willing to, "pay the price", and my generation is too familiar with the price of a poorly chosen mate, which brings me to my next point.
3. We are traumatized by divorce.
Our parents are divorced, our siblings are divorced, our friends are divorced, and some of us are divorced, so you can't tell us, "Marriage is the most beautiful, celestial, Godly blessing," without reviving many of our own sharp-edged memories that fly in the face of that statement, even if it is true in some cases. Even if we desperately want it to be true for us.
4. You're giving us all a complex.
"Are you dating anyone? Why not?" is a direct quote from my bishop's counselor in a private interview when I was 19. There are two possible reactions to this kind of intrusion. We either walk away thinking, "That was rude," or "He's right. What's wrong with me?" Either way the thought is certainly not, "Oh yeah, I hadn't thought of that!" I don't know how things are on the male end of this, but I have extensive experience as to what this kind of overt pressure is doing for LDS single women. It's making us doubt ourselves, dis ourselves and decrease our lists of marital "must haves" 'till we settle for subpar. We need the refuge of church. Singles wards are especially designed to be families. When three hours set apart for God are riddled with comments like, "Make sure you've got your priorities straight, " we start thinking about our hair instead of our neighbor. It's as helpful as a glass of water for a man who is drowning. Please, please, please, stop it.
In keeping with Abraham Lincoln's counsel, "He has a right to criticize who has a heart to help," I have some suggestions to help this problem straight from that massively misinterpreted talk from the 70s. President Kimball would counsel:
Teach us to be unselfish, to forget ourselves, and to focus on the good of the family, our ward family.
What we, the endangered demographic have been taught is to take care of ourselves. We need to be taught to receive kindness graciously and look out for our brother. We've been conditioned to approach church as a soiree. We need to be taught to commune with God intimately for three sacred hours and then spend our week days with those who uplift us. We've been taught that we need to be sexy or rich to be worth anything. We need to be taught how to find the beauty and value in every person we interact with. This does not happen when we are perpetually being counseled, "Don't forget to look for your eternal companion."
What if every Sunday instead of, "Get married" we heard our ward father say, "In this ward, we're a family, and in this family we don't leave anyone out." What if, instead of wondering how we look in our jeans and if he will notice, we were taught to pick up the ward list and call every name on it to make sure they'd gotten the invitation to FHE. What if we were encouraged to see each other as sources of support instead of someone who will ultimately accept or reject us for the remainder of mortal existence and beyond?
Help us. Teach us. Show us the way to break free from the vicious voices of the world that relentlessly, infectiously declare, "You are not good enough. You are not strong enough. You are alone." Show us how to love ourselves for who we are. Then, teach us to love something and someone more than we love ourselves, because I want to be someone who loves selflessly, and I want to marry someone who lives in selfless love.