We Say ‘I Do’ … But Then We Don’t Pastors Striving To Strengthen Marriage Vows

Washington residents believe marriage is a lifetime bond, despite the fact that half of all marriages in the state end in divorce, according to a recent poll.

“What people say and what people do are two totally different things,” said John Tusant, executive director of the Greater Spokane Association of Evangelicals. “People say marriage is important, yet marriages everywhere are falling apart.”

A group of Spokane pastors is trying to shore up the public’s sentiment with reality.

The group is circulating a document for pastors to sign, promising to urge couples to wait a year from the time they meet before getting married, require pre- and post-marital counseling and encourage sexual abstinence until after the wedding.

Sixty pastors already have signed on. Tusant said he expects as many as 150 signatures by Sunday, when he hopes to pack the Spokane Arena with couples who want to strengthen marriage and reduce the divorce rate.

“People are taking the easy way out,” Tusant said. “I think any couple can make a marriage work.”

The service will honor dozens of couples who have been married for more than 50 years. It will feature Promise Keepers speaker Gary Smalley and Dr. Les Parrot, founder of a marriage mentoring program.

The Rev. Tom Starr, of Maranatha Church in the Spokane Valley, said the pastors decided to dedicate the service to marriage after seeing the results of a poll on the subject.

The Washington Family Council commissioned the survey in September. The council wanted to measure attitudes and behaviors about marriage. An out-of-state firm polled 408 adults. The margin of error is plus or minus 4.9 percent.

Among the findings:

Seventy-five percent of all marriages in the state are officiated by ministers or rabbis.

One-third of couples get pre-marital counseling.

Two-thirds of people believe marriages are weaker today than they were 30 years ago, due to several factors, including more permissible attitudes about sex and divorce, greater time pressures on parents and greater financial pressures.

People who lived together before getting married are more likely to get divorced. However, this figure was not broken down by age group.

Most couples tend to rate their marriage as strong. On a scale of 1 to 10, half of the respondents said their marriage was a 10. Another 20 percent rated their marriage a 9. And 26 percent classified it from 6 to 8.

Just more than 80 percent of people said they would marry the same person again. And 94 percent of the respondents said they expected to be married for life.

The Washington Family Council plans to repeat the study every year to measure whether the attitudes and overall health of marriages in Washington is getting better or worse.

For a free summary of the study, contact the council at (800) 316-4932. A copy of the 40-page report is available for $10.

, DataTimes MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: IF YOU GO The Thanksgiving Celebration of Marriage and Family begins at 6 p.m. Sunday at the Spokane Arena.