Threat of divorce hard to spot among churchgoing couples, survey shows
“[P]pastors may have difficulty helping couples save their marriages, because churchgoers on the brink of separation often keep quiet at church about their marital woes.”
….if part of the problem is that too many church leaders view themselves as executives instead of as shepherds, and thus do not get to know the congregation well. Hence the signs of oncoming divorce are missed.
To draw a picture, my parents divorced when I was a teenager, and afterwards, at least one of my brother’s teachers approached my mother and more or less told her the reasons for the divorce—she’d (they’d?) watched my brother’s behavior and figured out that something was very wrong at home, and what it was.
Now perhaps this teacher (or these teachers) should have been a psychiatrist or something due to excellent insight, but it strikes me that if we really got to know one another, we’d start seeing the signs. And sometimes we don’t have to be that insightful—sometimes people will tell us point blank. I know I’ve had discussions about divorce with at least two coworkers—I’m still not sure what I did to be so trusted.
Aspiring to be a stick in the mud.
Discussion