The only religion in the world that protects the indissolubility of marriage is the Catholic Church. In other words, She does not believe in or allow divorce. But, ever since the sexual revolution of the 60’s, the sewer of the world has steadily flowed into the Catholic Church too. There are strong currents pushing for the Catholic Church to buckle under and accept the prevailing ideologies of divorce, birth control, living together and homosexual lifestyles. This is culminating right now with Pope Francis calling the second Extraordinary Synod of Bishops on the Family in October this year.

Besides being very concerned about the attack on marriage in the Catholic Church, we should be coming up with constructive ways to help have happy marriages that are temptated to break up and end in divorce. Even satanist, atheists, protestants and modernist Catholics want a happy marriage. The reality is that not even these people enjoy the divorce process. So we need to give them a better prerogative than marriages that are bound to fail, or maybe survive in unhappiness.

So, what exactly will contribute to a happy permanent marriage?

Sexual purity beginning in childhood. All efforts should be made by parents and grandparents to protect children from loosing their innocence and to teach them the great value of being a virgin till marriage. Young men must be taught by their dads about the danger of falling into lust, masturbation and pornography. Young women need to be instructed by their mothers how to respect their bodies and purity. When these young men and women are 18 years old and feel the call to marriage and to be parents, they should have girl friends, boy friends as friends, not lovers. Then, when the men are mature and able to support a family and the women able to take on the great sacrifice of raising a family, they can family date. That is where they go to each others houses and socialize in the real family setting, not a superficial relationship away from the family. This is where they find out the true character of the person they are interested in pursuing a future marriage with. Any possible future spouse has to come from a holy Catholic family. How is his/her dad and mom behave, work, speak and pray? Do they have a happy marriage? Most children that come from healthy married parents are also successful in a life long marriage. Does the future spouse pray, go to Latin Mass, read the Bible and love God? Can you really see this in the way they pray, live, dress, speak and act? What are their morals? Without God in the soul of the future spouse, the marriage will never last. What weaknesses and strengths are in the future spouse? Do they party, smoke, drink to an excess, use drugs? Are they hard workers, mature, disciplined and responsible? Have they done well in their studies? Are they honest and transparent? Are they responsible with money? Do they spend a lot? Are material things important to them? Do they have debt? Do they have the same life dreams and expectations as you do? Is she willing to sacrifice to stay home to cook, (does she even know how to cook), clean and take care of the children? Is he able and willing to work hard to support a family? How do they believe in raising children when it comes to homeschooling, discipline and dress? Does he know how to be a holy head of the family as Jesus is head of the Church who laid down His life for them as a servant? Is he going to abuse his power and strength to hurt his wife? Does she know how to be subjected to her future husband as we are to Christ? The courtship time should be long and there must never be any physical touching because this can lead to the sexual sins. All impure activity destroys love and causes guilt that gets carried into the life long marriage. As much as you may justify sins of impurity before marriage, your conscience does not agree with you. God put the conscience in us for truth and it can not be fooled. The future spouse may have pleasure, but the price of it is bad feelings of guilt, deep inside, that stay with the marriage for good. Love, admiration and respect are very important to have in the courtship. Love is not sexual attraction and it does not have to be strong. Love grows over the years when there is admiration and respect for the person you would like to marry. The sentiments of love come and go. Commitment last all the life long. Once married, then the virgin couple explore the beauty and sacredness of sex. They understand that sex is to have children. So they never use birth control and accept all the children God wishes to give them. Many children make a marriage work. God never intended a marriage to work with just two people and a few children. Each child God sends has a unique part to play in the happiness of the family’s future. Birth control destroys marriages too. Once married, prayer and the sacramental life is the center of this families lives. It can never be neglected.

These are just a few suggestions to help people create a happy future marriage that will last ’till death do us part’. Many people think they will change the spouse once they get married. What an illusion. The only person we can change is our own very selves. Remember, the seeds of divorce were planted way before the couple even got married.

We are so blessed to be traditional Catholics and to have a very good chance of being happy in our marriage and family.