The divorce rate for couples who live together before
marriage is no big secret. Study after study released during
the last two decades, including one from the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), have pronounced
doomsday for couples who cohabitate prior to their big day.
A recent CDC report, which defines cohabitation as “a man and
woman living together in a sexual relationship without being
married,” shows that “first marriages that were preceded by
cohabitation are more likely to disrupt than those that were
not preceded by cohabitation.” Specifically, 40 percent of
couples who cohabitate before tying the knot are likely to
get a divorce after 10 years of marriage as opposed to 31
percent who don’t. The number increases to 51 percent after
15 years, as opposed to 39 percent.
If those numbers don’t scare you enough, a five-minute talk
with Mike and Harriet McManus, co-founders of Marriage Savers
and authors of Living Together: Myths, Risks and Answers,
might. According to the McManuses, cohabitation is “one of
the stealth causes of marriage deterioration in America.”
Couples living together before marriage fear commitment, show
less respect for one another and, perhaps worst of all, might
be waiting for someone better to come along, they said.
So, given the numbers and the negative findings of the
McManus’ research, why do so many couples choose to move in
together before they get married? What does the Church have
to say and why? And how do pastors and Church officials work
with cohabitating couples as they prepare them for the
transition into married life?
For couples, the ‘why?’
According to the CDC, close to half of all women live with a
partner before marriage. The reasons, from trial marriage to
convenience, are numerous and varied. Sitcoms to celebrities
decree it to be the norm. In day-to-day life, according to
the McManuses, couples “drift into cohabitation” just by
spending every weekend together. Because of this, living
together becomes a minor decision, something like “extended
dating.”
Some couples, though, especially those who are engaged, fit a
slightly different profile. Often they move in together prior
to their wedding because of practical reasons, such as
logistics or finances. Michael and Barbara Smith (names have
been changed), a Catholic couple living in the Arlington
Diocese who married in 2006, lived together for a year
following their engagement. The couple moved to a city where
they didn’t know anyone and where the cost of living was
high. After much thought and discussion with their parents,
they decided sharing a home made more sense financially.
“I would have married her on the spot,” Michael said. “But
the reality is that to plan a wedding takes time.”
The decision was not one they took lightly.
“The statistics did scare us. We heard them from (our
priest). We heard them at the marriage prep classes. We heard
them from our families (and) friends,” Michael said. “But all
that aside, Barbara and I knew what we felt in our hearts –
that we were going to get married and spend the rest of our
lives together.”
Another engaged couple, Karla and Josh Johnson (names have
been changed), decided to move in together four months before
their summer wedding because of logistics. With their work
schedules, a move right after the wedding would have been
difficult. It also helped ease a time-consuming commute for
Josh.
Moving in together coincided with the beginning of their
marriage preparation.
“It was a time when we’re really reflecting on ourselves and
who we are and what our quirks are as far as living
together,” Karla said. “I think it made our reflection time
more intense.”
So, even if you’re already engaged, and it’s only a matter of
a few months, of logistics or of practicality, why does the
Catholic Church, even then, stick so strongly to its
no-cohabitation guns?
For the Church, the ‘why?’
According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, “Human
love does not tolerate ‘trial marriage.’ It demands a total
and definitive gift of persons to one another.”
In non-Catechism terms, “something different happens to a
couple when you’re married,” said Thérèse
Bermpohl, director of the Office for Family Life. When a
couple decides to live together without getting married,
“nothing will have changed from a spiritual standpoint.”
When Bermpohl speaks to men and women preparing for marriage,
she tries to help them understand that their marriage is
sacred, and that it begins with the vows of commitment. She
tries to hone in on the facts that: “God loves you (and) He’s
got a plan for you. He wants you to live marriage as it’s
intended and cohabitation just mimics it.”
The graces from God that come with the sacrament of marriage
are not present before the sacrament takes place, she said.
But, while Bermpohl’s message is important, her reach is
small-scale, usually at engagement weekends or over the
phone. Instead, cohabitation is a subject usually left to the
pastor to broach with a couple during their pre-Cana
conversations.
Father David Sharland, campus minister of Marymount
University in Arlington, said when mentoring cohabitating
couples during marriage preparation, he tries to get to the
bottom of where they’re coming from and why they’ve made the
decision to live together. Like the Smiths and the Johnsons,
sometimes it’s logistics, sometimes it’s finances and
sometimes “that’s just what they want to be doing,” he said.
But, echoing the Catechism and Bermpohl, Father Sharland said
pretending to be married when you’re not is not a good
solution, regardless of the reasons. When preparing
cohabitating couples for marriage, he tries to help them
“look at this in long-term effects and what the costs are
after their married life together.”
Living together before marriage – or “playing house,” Father
Sharland called it – is akin to living a double life.
“You’re pretending that you’re committed, but you haven’t
made the ultimate commitment,” he said. “You live with false
expectations because you haven’t said ‘I do’ yet.”
The lack of commitment makes it an “open-ended relationship,”
he said. “They can walk out the door at any time. You can
carry that into the married relationships.”
When counseling cohabitating couples, Father Sharland
encourages them to “take a break” from living together before
marriage. He challenges them to separate for a month or more
“so on the day they get married they have made a clear choice
about how they are living” – one that is “different from the
way they’re interacting in the past.”
He, like Bermpohl, tries to emphasize the “beauty of the
marriage relationship.”
“Part of it is reorienting their relationship from being
about themselves to being about their relationship with God,”
he said, specifically “how their relationship as a married
couple is about bringing their spouse to salvation.”
While Father Sharland has never refused to witness a couple’s
wedding because of their cohabitation status, he will,
however, suggest that cohabitating couples take extra time to
prepare for their sacrament.
“I probably have more formation work to do with them to help
them get prepared for marriage because they in some ways
haven’t had the formation,” he said.
Father Jerome W. Fasano, pastor of St. John the Baptist
Church in Front Royal, said that while cohabitating couples
preparing for marriage still have a “natural right to marry,”
at his parish the decision comes with a consequence that make
couples think twice.
“Our policy is that cohabitating couples can only be married
at a private ceremony with only their immediate family
present,” Father Fasano said. “To make a mockery of marriage
would only complicate the situation.”
Living together in a sexual relationship before marriage is a
three-fold lie of unity, life and love, Father Fasano said.
It says the couples’ lives are one when they are not; it says
they are ready for children when they are not; and it says
they love one another, even while the couple is “destroying
(one another’s) relationship with God.”
“That sounds more like hatred to me,” he said. “The last
thing in the world I would ever do is take somebody I love
out of the grace of God.”
Even two people living together in a chaste relationship, and
who might not be guilty of impurity, may be guilty of scandal
should others jump to the wrong conclusion, he said.
‘Something actually changed’
For Stacy and Will Skelly, choosing not to move in together
before their wedding was a decision that was based on their
mutual Catholic faith and on what Stacy called the “societal
right thing to do.”
Nearly three years after their wedding, Stacy said she and
her husband think the decision had a positive impact on their
marriage.
“We got the thrill of truly starting our lives together after
the ceremony and honeymoon,” she said. “It felt very
definitive and concrete. When we returned from Mexico, it
wasn’t just another day. It was the first day living
together. It wasn’t something that happened months before the
wedding, but rather as a part of it.”
The couple had a firm belief that marriage is “something that
changes you – in a good way – and makes you a part of a new
family unit,” she said. “We very much felt moving in together
would be a great catalyst for our new lives, making it feel
‘different’ than just another day following a big party and a
long Mass.”
Ultimately, Bermpohl said, helping couples understand why the
Church teaches what it does is essential to curbing the tide
of cohabitation.
“When you start to talk to people it resonates and it speaks
to the natural law,” she said, adding that it’s important to
catechize lovingly during what can be a sensitive
conversation.
Father Sharland agreed – stressing that he doesn’t want to
drive people away from the Church, but rather help them
understand that living together should be a consequence of
marriage, which is a “gift from God.”
“In the end we want to keep them in the Church where we can
continue to minister to them and help them find the depth of
their relationship with Christ,” he said. “I’m going to do
everything I can to help them to see the beauty of the truth
of the Church.”
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