...in time of great threat of DEATH!

Acts of Paul; Thecla, was a native of Iconomium who was so impressed by the preaching of St. Paul on virginity that she broke off her engagement to marry Thamyris, a very well off man, to live a life of virginity, and to learn of Pauls teachings. She was dragged to the ruling counsel and sentenced to death for not marrying as was the law for all females. Paul was ordered to be scourged and banished from the city for his teaching. Thecla was ordered burned to death at the stake in public. GOD had mercy on her and when a great storm came it extinguished the flames, and she escaped to Paul and went with him to Antioch.
There again she was condemned to death in the arena. All for resisting Syriarch Alexander whom kidnaped her, for he was also rich and powerful and whom wished to marry her. But again GOD stepped in, and she escaped, when the female beasts kept the male beasts from doing any harm to her. She rejoined Paul at Myra in Lycia, dressed as a boy, and was commissioned by him to preach the Gospel. Her choice was to learn the word and preaching of Paul about GOD and bucked the beliefs of the present day church and the world views of what a womens role was to be. GOOD FOR HER!

Wow

The law of chastity is the Lord’s law of personal purity.

This commandment states that there must be no sexual intimacy, except between a man and a woman who have been legally and lawfully married. God knows that by following this law, we will have greater happiness and blessings and find deeper marital love in our families.

Today, marriage is simply a contract between a man, a woman and THE STATE.

I advise against it.

Then how do you explain the higher rate of divorce among Christians when compared to that of Atheists?


-Kerry O.

And this is why marriage has gone to ****........It's made to easy by today's standards...one can marry one day and get annulled the next....This is not what the intent of marriage was supposed to be.

And your proof


It has nothing to do with religion....and all about taking the easy way out....I have been with my husband for 29 years......and no divorce in sight...and as with all my Christian friends....the same...all married over 25 years....so take that statistic and I would say your wrong......info based on 15 couples that I know personally)

PEOPLE WHOM LIVE OUTSIDE THE TRUTH OF THE INTERPRETATION OF THE LAW - THE SPIRIT OF THE LAW - WILL JUSTIFY WHY THEY ARE THE VICTIM. GODS WILL IS....? MANS WILL IS....?
GODS IS STILL THEIR, AND HOW MANY MARRIAGES DOES IT TAKE TO MAKE ONE LAST - ON THE JOB TRAINING YA SUPPOSE FOR THOSE THAT DONT USE GODS HAND BOOK, THE BIBLE. TAKES TO TO TANGO.

I divorced my husband because he was evil and cruel. I couldn't fix him. I could not respect his wishes. There is no reason to stay married and throw away your life.

Of course getting married in the first place was a stupid mistake. Why should a person choose to suffer for their whole life when they could easily correct that mistake with a divorce?

If you are happy being married more power to you, but don't judge others for their choices to live a better life.

JB

JB:
"Today, marriage is simply a contract between a man, a woman and THE STATE.
I advise against it."

- for some, that may be true.

JB:
"I divorced my husband because he was evil and cruel. I couldn't fix him. I could not respect his wishes.
If you are happy being married more power to you, but don't judge others for their choices to live a better life."


I do not think that a compassionate person would judge anyone who has been emotionally or physically abused to continue in that environment.
I can't imagine that divorce is 'easy' exactly but sometimes unavoidable.

Thanks Britty.

According to the Bible, God’s plan is that marriage be a lifetime commitment. “So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate” (Matthew 19:6).


God realizes as he is all wise and we are biological in nature, though, that since a marriage involves two 'sinful human beings', divorce is going to occur. In the Old Testament, He laid down some laws in order to protect the rights of divorcees,

especially women (Deuteronomy 24:1-4).


Jesus pointed out that these laws were given because of the hardness of people’s hearts, to protect people from people not because they were God’s desire (Matthew 19:8).

true.

Ever notice how often we get an OWNERS MANUAL and just toss it aside. Sure maybe we might thrumb thru it. But like wow I know I can do it, or Im smart I can figure it out. Or maybe it's just fun to do it on my own using my GOD given brain.

And there it sits, the owners manual of life under a pile of newspapers and laying in the coffee stains on the livingroom table as we toil and tinker.

And when we break it, what ever it is we are so skillfully(not) mastering, we go scrambeling for the manual after a few choice words. lol thinking, ya know I could of saved my self a whole alot of anguish if I would of just taken a moment to read this book. live and learn lol

Yes, I dare say you could have, we all can at times.

How would you describe the example of Aquila and Priscilla?

Well, I can't quote your preferred source, Scripture, to back it up, but there _is_ this, from a pretty fair and balanced site about Religion :

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_dira.htm





Hardly what I'd call statisically valid, especially given that you don't seem to associate with atheists or agnostics.

But what the heck, just peruse the profiles of people on dating sites.

And would it be totally out of line for me to ask why there are so many married Christians playing around on dating sites? :) You KNOW what they say about smoke and fire...

-Kerry O.

Well I feel deprived in that I never had the disobedient children for which your 'Owner's Manual' recommends stoning.

And it wasn't much help in dealing with the congenital arterial defect in my brain that's nearly killed me three times.

Myself, I feel more like one of Edward R. Murrow's quotes:

"We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven into an age of unreason if we dig deep into our history and remember we are not descended from fearful men."


-Kerry O.

Im sure there might indeed be "evidence" to the contrary of this, yet this is what I found immediately on the net Feral. Of course I would never pass judgment on a person who finds themselves in the midst divorce. Its something I would personally choose not to go through and this is why I have never felt the need to substantiate any of my relationships with some state signed note of approval

Divorce rates among Christian groups:


The slogan: "The family that prays together, stays together" is well known. There has been much anecdotal evidence that has led to "unsubstantiated claims that the divorce rate for Christians who attended church regularly, pray together or who meet other conditions is only 1 or 2 percent". 8 Emphasis ours]. Dr. Tom Ellis, chairman of the Southern Baptist Convention's Council on the Family said that for "...born-again Christian couples who marry...in the church after having received premarital counseling...and attend church regularly and pray daily together..." experience only 1 divorce out of nearly 39,000 marriages -- or 0.00256 percent. 9

A recent study by the Barna Research Group throws extreme doubt on these estimates. Barna released the results of their poll about divorce on 1999-DEC-21. 1 They had interviewed 3,854 adults from the 48 contiguous states. The margin of error is ±2 percentage points. The survey found:
bullet 11% of the adult population is currently divorced.
bullet 25% of adults have had at least one divorce during their lifetime.
bullet Divorce rates among conservative Christians were significantly higher than for other faith groups, and much higher than Atheists and Agnostics experience.

George Barna, president and founder of Barna Research Group, commented:

"While it may be alarming to discover that born again Christians are more likely than others to experience a divorce, that pattern has been in place for quite some time. Even more disturbing, perhaps, is that when those individuals experience a divorce many of them feel their community of faith provides rejection rather than support and healing. But the research also raises questions regarding the effectiveness of how churches minister to families. The ultimate responsibility for a marriage belongs to the husband and wife, but the high incidence of divorce within the Christian community challenges the idea that churches provide truly practical and life-changing support for marriages."

According to the Dallas Morning News, a Dallas TX newspaper, the national study "raised eyebrows, sowed confusion, [and] even brought on a little holy anger." This caused George Barna to write a letter to his supporters, saying that he is standing by his data, even though it is upsetting. He said that "We rarely find substantial differences" between the moral behavior of Christians and non-Christians. Barna Project Director Meg Flammang said: "We would love to be able to report that Christians are living very distinct lives and impacting the community, but ... in the area of divorce rates they continue to be the same." Both statements seem to be projecting the belief that conservative Christians and liberal Christians have the same divorce rate.

According to the bible, it is better not to marry. But if you must have sex, then get married. It's better to be married than burn forever in hell.

1 Corinthians 7

7:7 For I would that all men were even as I myself. But every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that.

7:8 I say therefore to the unmarried and widows, It is good for them if they abide even as I.

7:9 But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn.

Of course this was Paul spouting this nonsense. He was not a big fan of women in general.

Just out of interest, why do you think that?