Spring Marriage Supplement

Archdiocese participates in national survey on marriage

By Daniel Sarell

Last year, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) initiated an extensive consultation on marriage in the Catholic Church.

The archdiocesan Office of Family Ministries has been coordinating focus groups with various parishes, which were selected for their diversity.

Our initial plan was to cover a broad range of married couples, divorced individuals, Spanish-speaking couples, interchurch couples and single young adults.

At this time, we have completed interviews with married couples, whose marriages have ranged from under five years to nearly 25 years, and one group of divorced or separated Catholics.

Once the interviews were conducted, we found that all the participants indicated that the experience was mutually enriching.

We have already sent our initial report to the USCCB, but we hope to continue interviewing more groups.

The feedback we received will be invaluable to future pastoral planning as well as to the U.S. bishops, who will be writing a new pastoral letter during the next few years.

All the couples we interviewed emphasized children as the primary blessing in their marriages. Honesty, growing together (especially in parenthood), communication, and shared faith and values were also prominent answers.

A couple married for four years with two children told us that starting their family early was very helpful to their marital relationship because parenthood helped solidify and mature their personal relationship. Another couple, however, noted that they benefited most by being friends before marriage and waiting to marry until both were in their 30s.

Issues related to time management, dual careers and other parenting topics, like discipline, were identified by the participants as the greatest challenges they face today. Disciplinary issues with children were emphasized by parents with school-age children, while younger parents especially noted the pressures of not having enough time as their greatest struggle.

Regarding the resources that the couples reported utilizing to deal with these challenges, faith (including prayer, the support of their pastor and regular participation in the Eucharist), good couple communication (especially problem-solving) and the support of family were most commonly mentioned.

When asked what areas of Church teachings have helped to strengthen their marriages, the themes emphasized included 1) the sacramentality and sacredness of marriage and 2) their sense of commitment—how they feel accountable to God, their spouse, their families and their faith tradition to honor their vows.

The married couples stressed that the need to “stay together,” or the permanence in marriage despite the pressures they feel from peers and society, is especially vital. Setting an example for their children and believing that marriage is a vocation were also mentioned as was one man’s stated belief that the “totality” of the Catholic faith strengthened his commitment to marriage.

From the focus group of divorced or separated Catholics, the commonly shared positive aspects of their lives since their separations related to the benefits they experienced from leaving their contentious marriages. Growing in faith, social opportunities and self-esteem were also mentioned as post-divorce “positives.”

In terms of challenges they have faced since separating from their spouses, it seems that the very things they mentioned as positives also presented challenges—namely, changes in family and parenting dynamics as well as the loss of social opportunities and self-esteem (especially feelings of abandonment) were all identified as trials with which they live as separated or divorced Catholics.

These individuals identified prayer, family and group support, and anti-depressants as resources they use to cope with these difficulties.

Perhaps surprisingly, the similarities stood out, not the differences, between the married couples and the divorced or separated individuals.

Still, all the participants felt that pastoral development for making marriages stronger and preventing the number of divorces through preventative measures is urgently needed.

The divorced Catholics in particular said they have not always felt supported and cared for by their parishes, and they noted feeling invisible to the Church.

What do we learn as an archdiocese from this feedback?

Obviously, we would always like to provide more and better pastoral support to married couples and to those who are divorced, but as the feedback indicates, time and other resources are always limited.

Multiplying programs is not always the best solution when many existing programs in parishes or those offered by the archdiocese are insufficiently publicized and attended.

While we are certainly committed to providing varied and flexible options for enrichment and healing, the focus groups indicated that parishes could reach out more effectively by sharing resources and collaborating more with each other.

For our part, the archdiocesan Office of Family Ministries now has the capability to send our bimonthly newsletter, Ministering to Families, by e-mail, which saves postage costs and allows us to expand our circulation to whoever would like to receive it.

(To receive a free subscription for Ministering to Families, send an e-mail to dsarell@archindy.org. Continued updates on the national marriage initiative will be forthcoming. Daniel Sarell is the director of the archdiocesan Office of Family Ministries.) †