I want to address four issues in regard to marriage
- The sanctity of marriage demands that you cherish, love, care for, honor and respect your wife or husband rather than abuse or ignore her/him. Abuse and disregard of your spouse will eventually lead to the breakdown of your marriage temporarily or permanently. There is no sanctity in a marriage where there is adultery, abandonment, selfishness, and unmitigated and unrepentant physical, emotional, and sexual abuse. That is not what God intended for marriage at all. Neither the Bible nor the church supports or should support an abusive marriage or easy and quick divorce.
Address your bad behavior by repenting of it before it is too late to save your marriage.
- God permitted polygamy in the Old Testament as he did with divorce (Matthew 19:8) because of the lust and hardness of the human heart but that in no way was his will for marriage. The will of God in regard to marriage is clear: marriage is between one man and one woman for life for the purpose of companionship and procreation and stewardship of the earth. So we must avoid being minimalists in matters of obedience to God. We should rather love God lavishly as he has loved. He demonstrated his love for us by sacrificing his Son for us and we must show our love for him by obeying him and sacrificing our creative comforts for his glory. So we must pursue God’s ideal for marriage which is one man and one woman.
- If you are being abused in your marriage it is important that you confront your spouse the very first time it happens and tell your family members. If it happens again, in addition to prayer, you must inform the Church leaders and as many people as possible and seek counseling with the pastor of your church or another competent counselor who is not an abuser himself/herself. If it happens again then you must kick him out of the house or leave the house until he repents genuinely. If he doesn’t repent, he has nullified the marriage vow and covenant and effectively abandoned the marriage by his actions and impenitence.
Finally, I believe that husbands should NOT manipulate or force their wives to have anal, oral, and masochist sex in marriage. In fact, such sexually perverted behaviors have no place in a Christian marriage in the first place.
Bishop Felix Orji, OSB.
