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Saturday, October 18, 2008

Saturday Night- Yay!

I remember when I could never spend a Saturday night at home because all those extroverts in my family-circle made me go out and socialize and stuff. So, to pull that off I would grease the skids with a few (or more) drinks of whatever, but that seems to be standard procedure.

They still think they are doing me a favor by making me go with them and I always do end up having some semblence of "fun." And that is what happened tonight. But tonight was different. I connected with a guy that was rather fed up with his wife attributing everything she does to some bible verse.

His wife was raised in a very strict religious family. She broke away from that when she was seventeen. She actually put herself through college. Spent the last seventeen years married without much ado about religion, but now she has "resurrected" her early training, much to "Don's" dismay.

Just sayin'.

6 comments:

  1. It's REALLY tough on a marriage when that happens. I "got religion" after my former H and I had been married about 5 years. Lots of personal issues/reasons for me, all of them dumb in retrospect. But it dealt a serious blow to an already precarious relationship. I don't like the man and don't regret the marriage ending, but religion gave me a lot of stupid motives for stupider behavior. I hope the man you spoke to has a better outcome with his wife. Chances are, though, that she's using the religious crap as a smokescreen and is trying to push him away. Making it sound like she's married to a heathen is a way to minimize her responsibility in the matter.

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  2. ouch! Brutal honesty from volly.

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  3. I think Volly is onto something. If I were in Don's place, I'd try to find out what's really going out with Missus Don. But he'll need to be smart about it.

    He could work up to it by simply talking with her about what she believes and why. A series of no-pressure-no-blame discussions, followed up by a nice meal at a favorite restaurant combined with a leisurely walk/drive, would help her to open up and be candid.

    Note: This effort may or may not save the marriage.

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  4. Wow, I hadn't thought of it in that way, guys.
    You might be on to something.
    This couple always seemed pretty normal and happy to me.
    I shall relate this to Don and see what he thinks.
    We didn't get a chance to "get into" the whole story.

    Of course, he's miserable because now she can find fault with almost everything he does.

    There is also a chance she is having some kind of emotional/ mental problem too. I think he is a bit worried on that line.

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  5. I just separated from my wife of nealy 20 years, and a major reason was religion. I espouse Einstein's philosophy about god, that of a deist, in the manner of Spinoza's god.

    When we first met this was ok with my wife, but abbout 15 years ago she got sucked into a Baptist church, an dit went downhill from there, to the point where it just got nuts.

    She insists on sending our older son to a Christian school where they use use textbooks from Bob Jones University Press. It kills me when I read his science texts and they contain such bullshit as passing off a 144 day creation 6,000 years ago as science.

    In his 7th grade Life Science textbook it said-
    "Satan wants people to believe in evolution."

    I have tried counseling, psychiatrists, but she thinks that what will put our marriage back together is for me to develop a "Fear of God", which I simply can not do, as it offends my rationality.

    Needless to say there were other factors in the breakup, but the major one was the difference in religious beliefs.

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  6. Ben,

    Man, that is a tough one. I have a first marriage from way back.
    Looking back though I know that in spite of the monetary and emotional set-backs, it was for the best.

    I've served as a facilitator in group therapy and what most people, including me, don't realize is that when going through these emotional times we focus too much on the present. The truth is, a year down the road everything can be as good or better than ever.

    I hope things work out well for ya,
    sincerely,
    dale

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