Popular in Sociology

Social Identities and Divisions

A new explanation of antisemitism: Jew hatred as a civilisational phenomenon

Boston University Liah Greenfeld

Culture and Society

The City as a Growth Machine: Toward a Political Economy of Place

New York University Harvey Moltoch

Culture and Society

Carceral Entrapments: Views from the Prison/Street Interface in India

Indian Institute of Technology Delhi Mahuya Bandyopadhya

Culture and Society

Pre-problem families: predictive analytics and the future as the present

University of Southampton Rosalind Edwards

Ethnicity and Racism

Were Muslim Barbarians Really Knocking On the Gates of Ontario?

University of Ottawa Natasha Bakht

Culture and Society

Poor People’s Survival Strategies

The University of Texas at Austin Javier Auyero

Ethnicity and Racism

Sociology of Whiteness

Arizona State University Monica McDermott

Guiding God’s Marriage

View more insights in Books - Social Sciences - Sociology - Culture and Society

View more figures from Illinois Wesleyan University

View the page of Courtney Ann Irby

Read the Study

Next in Books

Queer Lasting: Ecologies of Care for a Dying World

Sarah Ensor | University of Wisconsin Madison

The First Black Archaeologist: A Life of John Wesley Gilbert

John W.I. Lee | University of California Santa Barbara

Courtney Ann Irby offers an examination of Christian marriage preparation programs, exploring their efforts to stabilize the institution of marriage and highlighting the tension between individualism and community in people’s relational lives.

Image courtesy of interviewee. March 8, 2024

Log-in or Sign-up to Faculti
Currently viewing this subject insight as a guest. You have insight(s) remaining for this month. Login to view 8000+ figures on the platform.

Generating Workspace...

Export as PDF

This video video discusses a research project focused on premarital counseling, emerging from an earlier study on Christian dating on evangelical college campuses. It highlights a young woman's hesitation to address certain relationship topics until premarital counseling. Intrigued by this, the researcher examined the historical and contemporary practices of premarital counseling among evangelicals and marriage preparation programs among Catholics.

The researcher conducted observations and interviews, noting that evangelicals refer to this as premarital counseling, while Catholics call it marriage preparation. The study revealed how both traditions approach similar themes—communication, conflict management, and gender roles—despite their different terminologies. The researcher found that while these counseling programs aimed to provide essential tools for successful marriages, they often overlooked the external societal pressures affecting relationships.

Furthermore, the text highlights the evolution of marriage concepts and counseling practices from the 1940s to the present, indicating a shift from conformity to more individualistic and therapeutic approaches. In particular, it emphasizes the importance of understanding how religious institutions interpret and communicate shifts in marriage norms.

The analysis points out a tension between promoting a covenantal view of marriage (selfless and God-centric) versus a contractual view (transactional). The researcher also critiques the pressure placed on young couples to maintain a good marriage, often attributing issues to personal failings rather than recognizing external factors.

Ultimately, the discussion underscores the necessity of re-evaluating what constitutes a "good marriage," suggesting that societal and emotional pressures often inform this narrative in ways that can be harmful. This video video concludes by stressing the importance of recognizing and addressing these broader societal influences rather than attributing marital challenges solely to individual deficiencies.

Language:

Export as PDF

X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

00:00.035 --> 00:02.285
This project actually came out of an earlier study

00:02.285 --> 00:06.725
that I did on the topic of Christian dating on,

00:07.075 --> 00:08.605
evangelical college campuses.

00:08.745 --> 00:10.805
And so I can remember when I was doing that project,

00:11.045 --> 00:12.325
I was interviewing a young woman

00:12.825 --> 00:14.445
and she, mentioned to me

00:14.445 --> 00:16.565
that there was various things in her relationship

00:16.875 --> 00:19.085
that she didn't wanna talk to her partner about

00:19.295 --> 00:21.965
until they started premarital counseling, just things

00:21.965 --> 00:23.885
that were too intimate or things that they wanted

00:23.885 --> 00:25.085
to sort of wait to discuss.

00:25.585 --> 00:28.085
And so I was really intrigued by this idea that

00:28.785 --> 00:30.285
one would wait to talk about things

00:30.545 --> 00:31.565
and sort of wondered

00:31.565 --> 00:33.445
what this premarital counseling concept was.

00:33.865 --> 00:35.285
And so I finished up that study

00:35.345 --> 00:37.845
and I had sort of kept this in my back, the background

00:37.865 --> 00:39.765
of my head as I sort of went on

00:39.765 --> 00:41.205
to do another research project.

00:42.025 --> 00:46.125
And then I stumbled across, in the archives a collection

00:46.265 --> 00:49.045
of documents from Catholic premarital counseling

00:49.045 --> 00:51.365
or what they would call marriage preparation programs in

00:51.365 --> 00:52.485
the 1940s and fifties.

00:52.985 --> 00:55.725
And so, as I had originally thought that this idea

00:55.725 --> 00:58.885
of premarital counseling sort of emerged as a result of kind

00:58.885 --> 01:00.965
of contemporary tensions in relationships

01:01.105 --> 01:02.645
and sort of questions around divorce

01:02.705 --> 01:04.485
and these things, I actually found

01:04.485 --> 01:07.205
that those similar ideas had motivated it much earlier.

01:07.905 --> 01:10.525
And so I proceeded to conduct a study

01:10.525 --> 01:11.925
that looked both at the history

01:12.025 --> 01:15.005
and sort of contemporary practices of premarital counseling

01:15.135 --> 01:16.205
among evangelicals

01:16.545 --> 01:19.645
and what, Catholics call marriage preparation programs.

01:20.465 --> 01:23.405
And so more broadly, my work has always focused on sort

01:23.405 --> 01:25.965
of this question of how religion shapes meaning making

01:26.305 --> 01:28.005
and how people form intimacy.

01:28.025 --> 01:30.565
So there's a lot of research on religion and politics

01:30.865 --> 01:31.885
and all these other spaces,

01:32.145 --> 01:35.525
but I was interested in how religion shapes people's sort

01:35.525 --> 01:38.205
of everyday life and their most important institutions like

01:38.205 --> 01:39.485
their intimate relationships.

01:39.905 --> 01:42.965
And it's also the space which is often hotly contested,

01:43.385 --> 01:44.565
but also sometimes the space

01:44.565 --> 01:46.045
where there's less clarity in terms

01:46.045 --> 01:47.605
of religious traditions always.

01:47.635 --> 01:50.525
There's not anything on dating right in the Bible

01:51.095 --> 01:53.405
where there, various things like that where people have

01:53.405 --> 01:55.445
to make decisions about how you live your life in a

01:55.445 --> 01:58.285
contemporary manner that is consistent with one's faith.

01:58.725 --> 02:01.205
I started initially with a pilot study project

02:01.455 --> 02:04.725
where I observed a, premarital counseling weekend.

02:04.945 --> 02:06.925
It was a retreat that drew from congregations

02:06.925 --> 02:08.005
sort of around the area.

02:08.945 --> 02:12.045
And I conducted observations in and participated

02:12.345 --> 02:13.565
and talked to the faculty

02:13.945 --> 02:15.885
or the leaders of it as well

02:15.885 --> 02:17.445
as the couples that went through it.

02:17.825 --> 02:21.085
And so this con or this peer minister organization,

02:21.405 --> 02:22.805
probably more accurately, it wasn't tied

02:22.805 --> 02:25.205
to any specific congregation,

02:25.205 --> 02:27.805
would pull from different churches around the area, both

02:27.805 --> 02:28.965
for couples who were engaged

02:29.265 --> 02:31.125
or even just contemplating engagement.

02:31.145 --> 02:33.165
So what they sometimes call preen engaged.

02:33.785 --> 02:35.645
And so from this initial study, I sort

02:35.645 --> 02:37.325
of developed the questions

02:37.385 --> 02:40.125
and sort of a strategy of how to approach the, project.

02:40.825 --> 02:42.245
And then I eventually added on

02:42.245 --> 02:43.845
historical archival components.

02:43.905 --> 02:47.125
So I flew across the United States to go visit archives

02:47.125 --> 02:49.765
of very, mostly Catholic archives,

02:49.785 --> 02:52.805
and then looked at different documents of meeting minutes

02:52.905 --> 02:54.045
and newsletters

02:54.145 --> 02:56.925
and sort of, internal memos of how this

02:57.565 --> 02:59.605
practice was being, organized

02:59.605 --> 03:01.885
and sort of transmitted within the Catholic church.

03:02.525 --> 03:05.725
I then also looked at documents in terms of like written

03:05.785 --> 03:08.765
for pastors or written for couples starting in sort

03:08.765 --> 03:10.165
of the 1940s onward.

03:10.905 --> 03:14.565
So eventually I ended up having, a wide selection

03:14.565 --> 03:16.085
of historical background,

03:16.505 --> 03:19.005
and then also I did contemporary observations.

03:19.505 --> 03:21.525
And so I contacted anyone sort

03:21.525 --> 03:24.885
of within a region I was lo located in at the time.

03:25.325 --> 03:27.045
I ended up speaking to 15 different,

03:27.145 --> 03:30.005
or representatives from 15 different religious communities.

03:30.425 --> 03:33.205
And then I interviewed 'em as well as couples that went

03:33.205 --> 03:36.365
through premal counseling in a total of 70 interviews,

03:36.625 --> 03:38.085
as well as then participated

03:38.145 --> 03:40.125
and observed four different,

03:40.365 --> 03:41.565
marriage preparation programs.

03:41.985 --> 03:45.005
So two Catholic and two evangelical in each case.

03:45.225 --> 03:47.125
One was located in an urban setting

03:47.265 --> 03:49.365
and one was located in a non-urban setting.

03:49.905 --> 03:51.445
One of the things I found early on is

03:51.445 --> 03:54.445
that while evangelicals prefer the terminology

03:54.545 --> 03:57.325
of premarital counseling, they sort of use it

03:57.385 --> 03:58.605
as a discernment tool.

03:58.945 --> 04:01.845
And so, Catholics often prefer the framework

04:01.845 --> 04:02.965
of marriage preparation.

04:03.025 --> 04:06.045
And so I often use the terms interchangeably to just sort

04:06.045 --> 04:07.165
of capture both ideas.

04:07.625 --> 04:10.485
But the sort of two different religious traditions kind

04:10.485 --> 04:12.965
of have a slightly different interpretation of it.

04:13.865 --> 04:16.045
On the one hand, they use ver they talk about very similar

04:16.445 --> 04:19.565
practices or sort of, address very similar tensions in,

04:19.665 --> 04:20.685
in marriage.

04:21.425 --> 04:24.365
And so these are always short-term ministries.

04:24.465 --> 04:26.205
So they're often a weekend

04:26.705 --> 04:28.605
or every week for a couple months.

04:29.145 --> 04:32.085
Um, they're either individualized with one person

04:32.185 --> 04:34.845
and a therapist or one person or the couple

04:34.905 --> 04:37.245
and a therapist, the couple in a clergy,

04:37.245 --> 04:39.085
couple in a married, another lady,

04:39.085 --> 04:40.565
married couple, something like that.

04:40.905 --> 04:42.605
Or they're done in more collective groups,

04:42.605 --> 04:43.725
which is what I observed.

04:43.825 --> 04:46.165
And so that they might have like parish programs

04:46.305 --> 04:48.205
or, sort

04:48.205 --> 04:50.605
of classes in the evenings and things like that.

04:51.265 --> 04:52.925
And so across these programs,

04:53.065 --> 04:55.885
the leaders have this very short period of time to try

04:55.885 --> 04:59.805
to figure out how do we intervene in young couples lives

04:59.945 --> 05:02.685
and provide them with the tools to have what they think of

05:02.685 --> 05:04.725
as an effective marriage and as a Christian marriage.

05:05.185 --> 05:06.925
And so because of that, it

05:07.115 --> 05:10.445
that limited time means they actually articulate things

05:10.445 --> 05:12.525
that sometimes are a little more ephemeral, right?

05:12.625 --> 05:15.325
So things that perhaps are in the background,

05:15.355 --> 05:16.685
that are sort of being modeled,

05:16.685 --> 05:18.725
but maybe not always explicitly stated.

05:19.145 --> 05:20.365
And so this is an opportunity

05:20.365 --> 05:22.605
where these leaders really have to select what they see

05:22.605 --> 05:24.565
as the most important dimensions of marriage

05:25.025 --> 05:27.085
and the most important tools to transmit.

05:27.825 --> 05:30.845
And so for that vantage point, it allows us to see what is,

05:30.845 --> 05:33.365
sometimes it crystallizes what is sometimes much more sort

05:33.365 --> 05:35.765
of opaque or sort of ephemeral in the background.

05:37.025 --> 05:39.925
So topics have included things like communication,

05:40.505 --> 05:43.325
active listening, conflict management, gender roles,

05:43.725 --> 05:47.325
finances, sex, parenting,

05:47.465 --> 05:49.805
all these different various strategies.

05:49.905 --> 05:51.965
And so oftentimes they'll pick a topic,

05:52.095 --> 05:54.965
share their personal experiences on it, as well

05:54.965 --> 05:56.925
as then provide insights into

05:56.925 --> 05:58.885
Some sort of social scientific background

05:59.065 --> 06:01.085
and what they see as most healthy

06:01.265 --> 06:03.085
or sort of, as evidence

06:03.085 --> 06:04.805
that is most consistent with God's vision.

06:05.805 --> 06:08.685
Interestingly enough, despite being Christian, this sort

06:08.685 --> 06:11.805
of subject matter of a religious instruction was not

06:11.805 --> 06:15.285
as prioritized as a broader sort of relationship education.

06:15.775 --> 06:17.525
There. There's a couple important themes here.

06:17.905 --> 06:19.925
One is that the institution of marriage

06:20.145 --> 06:22.885
and sort of the context of families has dramatically changed

06:22.885 --> 06:25.485
over the 20th century and the 21st century.

06:26.025 --> 06:28.765
And so there's been significant, transitions

06:28.825 --> 06:31.765
and when people get married, why they get married,

06:31.915 --> 06:33.565
what they want out of marriage

06:33.565 --> 06:35.925
and sort of what a successful marriage looks like.

06:36.625 --> 06:39.405
And so by looking at premarital counseling programs starting

06:39.585 --> 06:42.725
in the 1940s all the way to contemporary moments, I've sort

06:42.725 --> 06:44.565
of been able to trace these different changes.

06:45.225 --> 06:48.125
And so early eras had this vision of marriage,

06:48.315 --> 06:50.845
marital advice, really being about conformity, right?

06:50.985 --> 06:54.925
So the lessons and the advice were about how to act in a way

06:54.925 --> 06:57.285
that was consistent with authority structures.

06:57.745 --> 06:59.765
So, prescribing roles

06:59.865 --> 07:02.005
and things like that, especially related to gender.

07:02.705 --> 07:05.165
Uh, and then over time, the interesting thing

07:05.165 --> 07:06.325
that happened was a lot of the ways

07:06.325 --> 07:09.205
that they prescribed these kind of authoritative roles

07:09.985 --> 07:12.925
was instead to help people understand their sense of self,

07:13.055 --> 07:15.205
their what they wanted out of a relationship.

07:15.745 --> 07:19.405
And so even though these, programs sort

07:19.405 --> 07:21.565
of ostensibly were having this conformity

07:21.565 --> 07:24.605
to roles perspective, it quickly became apparent that a lot

07:24.605 --> 07:27.925
of what they were advising was helping couples to find time

07:27.945 --> 07:31.485
to communicate or helping to bridge what felt like this gulf

07:31.485 --> 07:33.965
between men and women's lives of the post-war era.

07:34.505 --> 07:37.125
And so it sort of set the stage that,

07:37.205 --> 07:40.125
scholars in other areas have followed a therapeutic culture.

07:40.505 --> 07:42.525
And so whereas lots of other people have highlighted

07:42.585 --> 07:44.685
how this therapeutic culture started to spread,

07:44.835 --> 07:47.685
this individualization relationships, this individualization

07:47.685 --> 07:50.605
of faith, the assumption has been

07:50.605 --> 07:52.365
that this has been at the cost of religion.

07:52.425 --> 07:54.085
And so that religions have fought this.

07:54.505 --> 07:56.565
And what I actually found was that religions really helped

07:56.565 --> 07:58.885
to transmit this therapeutic ethos

07:59.105 --> 08:00.925
to their parishioners and their congregants.

08:01.425 --> 08:03.605
And so rather than being against this,

08:03.605 --> 08:05.445
they actually become an important mechanism

08:05.445 --> 08:07.525
by which it spreads across the United States.

08:08.305 --> 08:11.285
So at the time, marriage counseling was pretty small,

08:11.595 --> 08:13.045
very few people would attend it.

08:13.385 --> 08:15.565
Um, and that was a major way that this sort

08:15.565 --> 08:17.365
of therapeutic ethos was transmitted.

08:17.745 --> 08:20.045
And yet congregations were offering these

08:20.045 --> 08:21.445
programs in the thousands.

08:21.865 --> 08:25.085
And so even in 1950, there was 20 thou,

08:25.285 --> 08:28.965
27,500 participants across the United States

08:28.965 --> 08:30.285
that participated in one

08:30.285 --> 08:32.725
of these marriage preparation programs for Catholics alone.

08:33.245 --> 08:34.805
Evangelicals were a little slower

08:34.865 --> 08:36.565
to adopt this practice in part

08:36.565 --> 08:38.965
because of sort of, attention

08:38.995 --> 08:40.525
with psychology as a science.

08:40.945 --> 08:44.125
Um, but eventually they also adopted this practice in sort

08:44.125 --> 08:45.325
of widely spread it.

08:45.665 --> 08:48.765
And so this, one of the key insights is just

08:49.025 --> 08:52.445
how religion has per not resisted change,

08:52.785 --> 08:55.645
but actually actively participated in some of the changes

08:55.675 --> 08:57.525
that we associate with the 20th century.

08:58.465 --> 09:01.325
And so those changes are in the backdrop of sort

09:01.325 --> 09:02.565
of contemporary eras.

09:02.565 --> 09:06.005
So young couples today, have faced this sort of tension

09:06.345 --> 09:09.285
and, ambiguity of what they want in relationships.

09:09.385 --> 09:10.765
And so a lot of research highlights.

09:11.265 --> 09:14.405
On the one hand, we have this big social structural

09:14.405 --> 09:15.485
changes to marriage.

09:15.865 --> 09:17.605
And then on the other hand, we have this ways

09:17.605 --> 09:20.045
that young couples are sort of trying to figure out how

09:20.045 --> 09:22.805
to form their own relationships with uncertainty about

09:22.805 --> 09:24.245
what the role should be

09:24.265 --> 09:25.285
or the script should be

09:25.285 --> 09:27.285
as those things are less stable than they used to be.

09:27.985 --> 09:29.085
And so a lot

09:29.085 --> 09:31.125
of times we talk about these things at the macro level

09:31.125 --> 09:32.565
and sort of at the micro level.

09:32.825 --> 09:35.325
And so one of the things that I contribute is this ability

09:35.425 --> 09:38.525
to look at the organizational level in the local context

09:38.675 --> 09:40.605
that shape people's understandings.

09:41.145 --> 09:42.885
So a lot of what I examine is

09:42.985 --> 09:45.125
how religious leaders ultimately package

09:45.305 --> 09:48.285
and interpret these larger cultural changes for people

09:49.025 --> 09:52.485
and create ways for them to obtain meaning in them

09:52.865 --> 09:55.685
and how to interpret what they do in the backdrop

09:55.785 --> 09:58.005
of these sort of larger structural changes.

09:59.065 --> 10:01.845
And so one of the things I found pervasive is

10:01.875 --> 10:05.205
what they teach about marriage is this sort of bifurcation

10:05.345 --> 10:07.765
of a Christian marriage versus a secular marriage.

10:08.305 --> 10:10.485
So they argue that a Christian marriage is a covenant

10:10.805 --> 10:12.085
marriage is the language that they use,

10:12.085 --> 10:15.325
whereas they conceptualize a secular marriage

10:15.345 --> 10:16.565
as a contract marriage.

10:16.945 --> 10:19.045
And so a Christian marriage from their point

10:19.045 --> 10:21.645
of view is a covenant between the spouses and with God,

10:21.905 --> 10:23.285
and it's supposed to be other centric

10:23.305 --> 10:25.365
and sort of oriented towards filling the needs

10:25.365 --> 10:26.445
of someone else first.

10:27.065 --> 10:30.525
And they see this as, critical to successful marriages.

10:30.905 --> 10:33.285
And they instead contrast that with the, what they see

10:33.285 --> 10:35.445
as a secular marriage as being contractual.

10:35.585 --> 10:38.365
So you do something only as long as you get something out

10:38.365 --> 10:39.805
of it and that you limit

10:39.915 --> 10:42.165
what you give based on what you get, right?

10:42.165 --> 10:43.965
Sort of a quid pro quo part.

10:44.705 --> 10:48.005
So on the one hand, this is an overly simplistic view of

10:48.005 --> 10:50.325
what Carla Hacks staff has called the divorce culture,

10:50.505 --> 10:53.085
but this idea that marriage is increasingly contingent

10:53.385 --> 10:54.565
and less predictable.

10:54.985 --> 10:57.365
Um, on the other hand, it does provide a framework

10:57.425 --> 11:00.445
by which these couples understand how to act in marriage

11:00.945 --> 11:04.045
as well as to motivate their turning to the community

11:04.185 --> 11:07.765
for advice and is to motivate the type of marital work ethic

11:07.765 --> 11:10.045
that has increasingly dominated in marriage

11:10.045 --> 11:11.645
discourse in the United States.

11:12.145 --> 11:14.685
So it synchronizes this marital work ethic

11:14.685 --> 11:15.925
that other people have highlighted

11:16.305 --> 11:17.605
and instead highlights the

11:17.605 --> 11:19.365
how it becomes part of sanctification.

11:19.865 --> 11:20.965
So it becomes part of the way

11:20.965 --> 11:23.365
that people live their spiritual lives is

11:23.525 --> 11:24.805
by doing it through this way.

11:25.585 --> 11:29.005
It is a sort of false distinction, interest, right, in terms

11:29.005 --> 11:30.405
of the secular versus Christian.

11:30.425 --> 11:32.645
And yet it creates a meaning discursive,

11:32.645 --> 11:34.925
meaningful discursive boundary in terms of

11:35.105 --> 11:36.765
who we are and how we do things.

11:37.145 --> 11:39.405
And in the other hand, what's interesting is the

11:39.405 --> 11:40.805
tension of the self in this.

11:41.225 --> 11:44.725
And so while they are ostensibly opposed to sort

11:44.725 --> 11:47.845
of this self-centered contract marriage, the way they say

11:47.845 --> 11:50.045
that you have to accomplish a covenant marriage is

11:50.105 --> 11:52.765
by focusing on the self and learning to

11:52.845 --> 11:54.125
Articulate the self's needs,

11:54.145 --> 11:56.085
the self's wants to one's partner.

11:56.625 --> 11:59.165
And so in this way, it again highlights the sort

11:59.165 --> 12:02.405
of therapeutic ethos being used towards Christian sort of,

12:02.505 --> 12:06.085
conceptions and the ways that the self is sort

12:06.085 --> 12:07.525
of malleable in this capacity

12:07.525 --> 12:09.005
that the self work becomes part

12:09.005 --> 12:11.925
of interaction work becomes part of community building.

12:12.585 --> 12:15.005
One of the things I think I would love for readers

12:15.005 --> 12:18.245
to take up from this work is to really critically examine

12:18.275 --> 12:20.045
what we consider a good marriage.

12:20.605 --> 12:23.525
I think we tend to use that term a lot about a good marriage

12:23.865 --> 12:26.565
and, and obviously everyone wants a good marriage if

12:26.565 --> 12:27.605
they want to be married.

12:27.945 --> 12:31.765
Um, and yet on the other hand, the way we use it often sort

12:31.765 --> 12:34.885
of becomes, in a ian sense sort of disciplinary.

12:35.465 --> 12:38.325
And so it gets used in the variety of field work

12:38.465 --> 12:40.685
and sort of documents that I looked at.

12:40.985 --> 12:44.165
It can be used to sort of structure who is within,

12:44.545 --> 12:46.005
to sort of draw these boundaries

12:46.005 --> 12:47.485
that I think might be problematic.

12:48.385 --> 12:50.965
And it also individualizes a lot of these problems.

12:51.025 --> 12:53.725
And so a lot of the ways that good marriage was constructed

12:53.865 --> 12:57.125
was this very sort of neoliberal meritocratic sort

12:57.125 --> 12:58.765
of con connotations.

12:59.225 --> 13:01.445
So a good marriage is a marriage one works not,

13:01.745 --> 13:03.445
and as a result, it sort of doesn't allow

13:03.445 --> 13:04.805
for the possibility that a good,

13:04.805 --> 13:07.805
that not all marriages should stay together

13:08.025 --> 13:11.005
or that there's perhaps good reasons to leave a marriage

13:11.305 --> 13:13.485
or that a good a good marriage might not be

13:13.485 --> 13:14.685
good all the time, right?

13:14.785 --> 13:15.925
So it placed a lot

13:15.925 --> 13:18.085
of anxiety on the young people that I studied.

13:18.585 --> 13:20.885
And so I think looking, thinking about

13:21.155 --> 13:23.845
what do we mean when we say a good marriage is a really

13:23.845 --> 13:25.005
important question here.

13:25.905 --> 13:28.485
Um, and so in terms of thinking about people

13:28.505 --> 13:30.645
who participate in these programs

13:30.645 --> 13:32.365
or lead these programs, one of the things

13:32.365 --> 13:34.525
that I think would be important to take away

13:35.305 --> 13:39.285
is an understanding that the, a lot of problems

13:39.285 --> 13:42.085
that couples will face will not be from internal,

13:42.625 --> 13:43.885
but instead external.

13:43.985 --> 13:46.725
So a lot of the advice was about a good marriage was the

13:46.725 --> 13:49.845
ways that one turns inward to work on oneself,

13:50.185 --> 13:51.445
to articulate oneself

13:51.785 --> 13:54.685
and sort of to, bracket out the world

13:54.685 --> 13:55.725
that the people live in.

13:56.145 --> 13:59.045
And yet it is often the finances outside of it.

13:59.105 --> 14:02.005
It is often the gender pressures outside of a marriage

14:02.275 --> 14:04.605
that produce those conflicts inside of it.

14:04.945 --> 14:06.765
And so I think that that bracketing off

14:06.865 --> 14:09.485
and that treating marriage as an individualistic thing

14:09.485 --> 14:12.765
that people can work on independently of their sort

14:12.765 --> 14:16.325
of social surroundings doesn't actually help them prepare

14:16.385 --> 14:18.085
for many of the tensions and contradictions

14:18.085 --> 14:19.805
that they might face in future.

14:20.545 --> 14:23.845
And so it, it again puts this sort of, pressure

14:24.065 --> 14:26.645
to have a good marriage is to work really hard.

14:26.705 --> 14:28.365
And then if you, if you don't,

14:28.435 --> 14:30.005
then you're not working hard enough.

14:30.585 --> 14:32.565
And so I think this is not a particularly

14:32.565 --> 14:33.885
healthy framework, actually.

14:34.665 --> 14:37.805
And so ultimately, one of the things that really stood out

14:37.805 --> 14:40.685
to me in this work is sort of the power of emotions

14:40.785 --> 14:44.005
and how emotions are tied, to these bigger questions

14:44.005 --> 14:45.645
of status and authority in our culture.

14:46.025 --> 14:49.605
So this question of who can feel, what you can feel,

14:49.605 --> 14:50.725
where you can feel things,

14:51.155 --> 14:52.765
what you should be feeling about things.

14:53.225 --> 14:55.965
And so a lot of my work ended up really examining the ways

14:56.035 --> 14:59.605
that, lessons on something good become moralized

14:59.705 --> 15:01.285
and emotional, and

15:01.285 --> 15:03.725
that this creates various pressures on people.

Exploring Premarital Counseling Across Religions

00:00:00 - This project actually came out of an earlier study that I did on the topic of Christian dating on, evangelical college campuses. And so I can remember when I was doing that project, I was interviewing a young woman and she, mentioned to me that there was various things in her relationship that she didn't wanna talk to her partner about until they started premarital counseling, just things that were too intimate or things that they wanted to sort of wait to discuss. And so I was really intrigued by this idea that one would wait to talk about things
00:00:31 - what this premarital counseling concept was. And so I finished up that study and I had sort of kept this in my back, the background of my head as I sort of went on to do another research project. And then I stumbled across, in the archives a collection of documents from Catholic premarital counseling or what they would call marriage preparation programs in the 1940s and fifties. And so, as I had originally thought that this idea of premarital counseling sort of emerged as a result of kind of contemporary tensions in relationships
00:01:02 - and these things, I actually found that those similar ideas had motivated it much earlier. And so I proceeded to conduct a study that looked both at the history and sort of contemporary practices of premarital counseling among evangelicals and what, Catholics call marriage preparation programs. And so more broadly, my work has always focused on sort of this question of how religion shapes meaning making and how people form intimacy. So there's a lot of research on religion and politics and all these other spaces,
00:01:35 - of everyday life and their most important institutions like their intimate relationships. And it's also the space which is often hotly contested, but also sometimes the space where there's less clarity in terms of religious traditions always. There's not anything on dating right in the Bible where there, various things like that where people have to make decisions about how you live your life in a contemporary manner that is consistent with one's faith. I started initially with a pilot study project where I observed a, premarital counseling weekend.
00:02:06 - sort of around the area. And I conducted observations in and participated and talked to the faculty or the leaders of it as well as the couples that went through it. And so this con or this peer minister organization, probably more accurately, it wasn't tied to any specific congregation, would pull from different churches around the area, both for couples who were engaged or even just contemplating engagement. So what they sometimes call preen engaged. And so from this initial study, I sort
00:02:37 - and sort of a strategy of how to approach the, project. And then I eventually added on historical archival components. So I flew across the United States to go visit archives of very, mostly Catholic archives, and then looked at different documents of meeting minutes and newsletters and sort of, internal memos of how this practice was being, organized and sort of transmitted within the Catholic church. I then also looked at documents in terms of like written

Historical Insights on Marriage Preparation Programs

00:03:08 - of the 1940s onward. So eventually I ended up having, a wide selection of historical background, and then also I did contemporary observations. And so I contacted anyone sort of within a region I was lo located in at the time. I ended up speaking to 15 different, or representatives from 15 different religious communities. And then I interviewed 'em as well as couples that went through premal counseling in a total of 70 interviews,
00:03:38 - and observed four different, marriage preparation programs. So two Catholic and two evangelical in each case. One was located in an urban setting and one was located in a non-urban setting. One of the things I found early on is that while evangelicals prefer the terminology of premarital counseling, they sort of use it as a discernment tool. And so, Catholics often prefer the framework of marriage preparation. And so I often use the terms interchangeably to just sort of capture both ideas.
00:04:10 - of have a slightly different interpretation of it. On the one hand, they use ver they talk about very similar practices or sort of, address very similar tensions in, in marriage. And so these are always short-term ministries. So they're often a weekend or every week for a couple months. they're either individualized with one person and a therapist or one person or the couple and a therapist, the couple in a clergy, couple in a married, another lady,
00:04:40 - Or they're done in more collective groups, which is what I observed. And so that they might have like parish programs or, sort of classes in the evenings and things like that. And so across these programs, the leaders have this very short period of time to try to figure out how do we intervene in young couples lives and provide them with the tools to have what they think of as an effective marriage and as a Christian marriage. And so because of that, it that limited time means they actually articulate things
00:05:12 - So things that perhaps are in the background, that are sort of being modeled, but maybe not always explicitly stated. And so this is an opportunity where these leaders really have to select what they see as the most important dimensions of marriage and the most important tools to transmit. And so for that vantage point, it allows us to see what is, sometimes it crystallizes what is sometimes much more sort of opaque or sort of ephemeral in the background. So topics have included things like communication,
00:05:43 - finances, sex, parenting, all these different various strategies. And so oftentimes they'll pick a topic, share their personal experiences on it, as well as then provide insights into Some sort of social scientific background and what they see as most healthy or sort of, as evidence that is most consistent with God's vision. Interestingly enough, despite being Christian, this sort of subject matter of a religious instruction was not

Evolving Dynamics of Marriage and Counseling

00:06:15 - There. There's a couple important themes here. One is that the institution of marriage and sort of the context of families has dramatically changed over the 20th century and the 21st century. And so there's been significant, transitions and when people get married, why they get married, what they want out of marriage and sort of what a successful marriage looks like. And so by looking at premarital counseling programs starting in the 1940s all the way to contemporary moments, I've sort
00:06:45 - And so early eras had this vision of marriage, marital advice, really being about conformity, right? So the lessons and the advice were about how to act in a way that was consistent with authority structures. So, prescribing roles and things like that, especially related to gender. and then over time, the interesting thing that happened was a lot of the ways that they prescribed these kind of authoritative roles was instead to help people understand their sense of self,
00:07:15 - And so even though these, programs sort of ostensibly were having this conformity to roles perspective, it quickly became apparent that a lot of what they were advising was helping couples to find time to communicate or helping to bridge what felt like this gulf between men and women's lives of the post-war era. And so it sort of set the stage that, scholars in other areas have followed a therapeutic culture. And so whereas lots of other people have highlighted how this therapeutic culture started to spread,
00:07:47 - of faith, the assumption has been that this has been at the cost of religion. And so that religions have fought this. And what I actually found was that religions really helped to transmit this therapeutic ethos to their parishioners and their congregants. And so rather than being against this, they actually become an important mechanism by which it spreads across the United States. So at the time, marriage counseling was pretty small, very few people would attend it. and that was a major way that this sort
00:08:17 - And yet congregations were offering these programs in the thousands. And so even in 1950, there was 20 thou, 27,500 participants across the United States that participated in one of these marriage preparation programs for Catholics alone. Evangelicals were a little slower to adopt this practice in part because of sort of, attention with psychology as a science. but eventually they also adopted this practice in sort of widely spread it.
00:08:49 - how religion has per not resisted change, but actually actively participated in some of the changes that we associate with the 20th century. And so those changes are in the backdrop of sort of contemporary eras. So young couples today, have faced this sort of tension and, ambiguity of what they want in relationships. And so a lot of research highlights. On the one hand, we have this big social structural changes to marriage.

Navigating Marriage: Christian vs. Secular Perspectives

00:09:17 - that young couples are sort of trying to figure out how to form their own relationships with uncertainty about what the role should be or the script should be as those things are less stable than they used to be. And so a lot of times we talk about these things at the macro level and sort of at the micro level. And so one of the things that I contribute is this ability to look at the organizational level in the local context that shape people's understandings. So a lot of what I examine is how religious leaders ultimately package and interpret these larger cultural changes for people
00:09:52 - and how to interpret what they do in the backdrop of these sort of larger structural changes. And so one of the things I found pervasive is what they teach about marriage is this sort of bifurcation of a Christian marriage versus a secular marriage. So they argue that a Christian marriage is a covenant marriage is the language that they use, whereas they conceptualize a secular marriage as a contract marriage. And so a Christian marriage from their point
00:10:21 - and it's supposed to be other centric and sort of oriented towards filling the needs of someone else first. And they see this as, critical to successful marriages. And they instead contrast that with the, what they see as a secular marriage as being contractual. So you do something only as long as you get something out of it and that you limit what you give based on what you get, right? Sort of a quid pro quo part. So on the one hand, this is an overly simplistic view of what Carla Hacks staff has called the divorce culture,
00:10:53 - and less predictable. on the other hand, it does provide a framework by which these couples understand how to act in marriage as well as to motivate their turning to the community for advice and is to motivate the type of marital work ethic that has increasingly dominated in marriage discourse in the United States. So it synchronizes this marital work ethic that other people have highlighted and instead highlights the how it becomes part of sanctification. So it becomes part of the way
00:11:23 - by doing it through this way. It is a sort of false distinction, interest, right, in terms of the secular versus Christian. And yet it creates a meaning discursive, meaningful discursive boundary in terms of who we are and how we do things. And in the other hand, what's interesting is the tension of the self in this. And so while they are ostensibly opposed to sort of this self-centered contract marriage, the way they say that you have to accomplish a covenant marriage is by focusing on the self and learning to
00:11:54 - the self's wants to one's partner. And so in this way, it again highlights the sort of therapeutic ethos being used towards Christian sort of, conceptions and the ways that the self is sort of malleable in this capacity that the self work becomes part of interaction work becomes part of community building. One of the things I think I would love for readers to take up from this work is to really critically examine what we consider a good marriage. I think we tend to use that term a lot about a good marriage

Challenges in Defining a Good Marriage

00:12:26 - they want to be married. and yet on the other hand, the way we use it often sort of becomes, in a ian sense sort of disciplinary. And so it gets used in the variety of field work and sort of documents that I looked at. It can be used to sort of structure who is within, to sort of draw these boundaries that I think might be problematic. And it also individualizes a lot of these problems. And so a lot of the ways that good marriage was constructed
00:12:57 - of con connotations. So a good marriage is a marriage one works not, and as a result, it sort of doesn't allow for the possibility that a good, that not all marriages should stay together or that there's perhaps good reasons to leave a marriage or that a good a good marriage might not be good all the time, right? So it placed a lot of anxiety on the young people that I studied. And so I think looking, thinking about what do we mean when we say a good marriage is a really important question here.
00:13:28 - who participate in these programs or lead these programs, one of the things that I think would be important to take away is an understanding that the, a lot of problems that couples will face will not be from internal, but instead external. So a lot of the advice was about a good marriage was the ways that one turns inward to work on oneself, to articulate oneself and sort of to, bracket out the world that the people live in.
00:13:59 - It is often the gender pressures outside of a marriage that produce those conflicts inside of it. And so I think that that bracketing off and that treating marriage as an individualistic thing that people can work on independently of their sort of social surroundings doesn't actually help them prepare for many of the tensions and contradictions that they might face in future. And so it, it again puts this sort of, pressure to have a good marriage is to work really hard.
00:14:28 - then you're not working hard enough. And so I think this is not a particularly healthy framework, actually. And so ultimately, one of the things that really stood out to me in this work is sort of the power of emotions and how emotions are tied, to these bigger questions of status and authority in our culture. So this question of who can feel, what you can feel, where you can feel things, what you should be feeling about things. And so a lot of my work ended up really examining the ways that, lessons on something good become moralized
00:15:01 - that this creates various pressures on people.

Faculti AI can make mistakes

Faculti

Popular in Sociology

The City as a Growth Machine: Toward a Political Economy of Place

Carceral Entrapments: Views from the Prison/Street Interface in India

Pre-problem families: predictive analytics and the future as the present

Were Muslim Barbarians Really Knocking On the Gates of Ontario?

Poor People’s Survival Strategies

Guiding God’s Marriage

Next in Books

Guide

Platform and Category Pages

Contact Us

FAQs

What is Faculti?

How do you select interviews?

Interview Process

Page Structure

Popular in Sociology

Guide

Platform and Category Pages

Contact Us

FAQs

What is Faculti?

How do you select interviews?

Interview Process

Accessibility Options

Contrast Adjustment

Text Size Adjustment

Text Spacing Adjustment

Line Height Adjustment

Cursor Size Adjustment

Page Structure Options

Page Structure