Is Being in Love Enough for a Happy Marriage?

What is missing in so many marriages and why do so many marriages fail? According to Dr. Henry Cloud & Dr. John Townsend, authors of the award-winning bestseller "Boundaries," the crucial element for harmony in marriage is not being "in love," but being mature.

If we are immature when we marry, our tendency will be to look to our spouse to complete us. But this is an impossible task since no other person can ever make us into the complete person we long to be. We need to do that for ourselves.

In "Boundaries in Marriage," the authors state "to the degree that each is less than complete as a person, the oneness will suffer under the strain of that incompleteness." The following list are some of the abilities that people need to possess before getting married. The ability to:

• Connect emotionally
• Be vulnerable and share feelings
• Have an appropriate sense of power and assertiveness
• Say no
• Have initiative and drive
• Have at least a minimal amount of organization
• Accept imperfections and have grace and forgiveness
• Grieve
• Think for oneself and express one's opinions
• Take risks
• Grasp and use one's talents
• Be responsible and follow through
• Be sexual
• Be spiritual
• Have a moral sense
• Have an intellectual life

Likewise, Rev. Moon teaches us that immaturity is the fundamental cause of the breakdown of families and society. Rev. Moon also states that immaturity was the very cause of man's initial separation from God in the beginning of human history. Our original ancestors were meant to first become mature individuals before marrying and having children. Instead, Adam & Eve, while still immature, united sexually and had children. As a result, their immaturity was passed down from generation to generation. History has been one great dysfunctional cycle of children bearing children. (See the Human Fall.)

Today we see that this is very evident in the high numbers of teenage pregnancies and out-of-wedlock childbirths. Too many young people think it's perfectly okay to fall in love, have sex and bear a child outside of marriage. This is a recipe for disaster and contributes to so many of our social problems such as school dropouts, poverty, juvenile delinquency and crime.

So if we want to see a better society and a better world, then let's start with our own families and even before that, with our own marriages. Just remember - first comes maturity, then love, then secure marriages, happy families and a peaceful society.

Unification Church Marriages

Myths about Marriage

Teachings of Rev. Sun Myung Moon: See Through the Eyes of Love

Think how different the world would be if we were able to see the world through the eyes of love. Then how could we ever hurt each other, or abuse animals and the natural world for self-centered purposes? To revolutionize the world, let's start by changing ourselves from looking out only for ourselves, to seeing through the eyes of love for each another.

"The truth of the universe is that we must acknowledge each other and help each other."

Rev. Moon teaches that the greatest person is the one who loves the most. In the end, the only thing that really matters is not how much knowledge, status or possessions we have gained in our lifetimes. What really matters is how much we have loved others.

"Pull out your old vision and replace it with new "eyeballs" of true love."

To practice true love, we must look at everything through the eyes of true love - our spouse, children, neighbors, all people and all of nature. Then everyone and everything becomes beautiful to behold.

"True love is a love that forgets it already gave love and gives love again."

Think of a mother, who unconditionally gives of herself to her children. That is the love that God has for each one of us. This is the love that we are meant to give to each other as well. When there is true love we never grow weary, because as we give love our hearts open up to receive more and more love coming to us from God.

"Love is the master key that opens the gates of happiness." - Oliver Wendell Holmes

For more information, go to Rev. Sun Myung Moon

The Purpose of Life

Is it possible that the purpose of life could be very simple? In the Bible it says that God gave us three blessings - to be fruitful, multiply and have dominion over the earth. These were God's simple instructions on how to live our lives. But what do they really mean?

Be Fruitful. A tree becomes fruitful only after it matures completely. Likewise, man and woman are meant to reach full maturity before bearing fruit, or their children. In actuality, this means to become the kind of unconditional loving person that each of us is meant to be. Without first becoming a loving person, we can't become the spouse and parent that our family needs.

Multiply. Based upon attaining our full maturity, we can then multiply. Can you imagine a Christlike man and a Christlike woman joining in marriage and creating a family? This was God's ideal. Children from this marriage would grow up with complete security and would pass on the love that they had received to their children and future generations.

Have Dominion over the Earth. This means to take care of the natural world with love. Each of us was created with our own unique abilities and talents to use in interacting with each other and the natural world in loving ways.



So if all of these three blessings were fulfilled, what more could we ask for? Our purpose in life would be fulfilled. Each of us would be completely loving and secure, we would live in a peaceful society within our loving families, and we would fulfill our potential through our interaction with the world around us. Sounds like the Kingdom of Heaven to me!

For a more complete explanation, see Chapter 1, Section 3 of the Divine Principle.