OUR MAD, MAD MARRIAGES - Part 1
Plain Truth Magazine
November 1965
Volume: Vol XXX, No.11
Issue:
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OUR MAD, MAD MARRIAGES - Part 1

Our family life is SICK! Nearly one in three marriages ends in divorce! MILLIONS are unhappy, frustrated. It's time you knew WHY — time you looked candidly at YOUR marriage — time you KNEW what marriage is. WHY it is and HOW to make your marriage happy!

   SHOCKED onlookers in Los Angeles watched a man pursue a fleeing woman, shooting as he ran. The 30-year-old woman fell to the floor, mortally wounded. She was Mrs. Lorena Clark, mother of 2 children — she died en route to Central Receiving Hospital shortly after the wild shooting.
   Witnesses said her estranged husband, Mr. Lawrence Clark, had fired two or three more shots at her prostrate body before running from the crowded State Employment Office!

Why?

   Did you know the majority of murders are NOT committed by professional hoodlums in connection with a robbery? Did you know MOST murders are committed by "friends" or RELATIVES of the victims?
   And did you know that even two years ago the F.B.I. reported MORE THAN ONE-HALF Of ALL MURDERS INVOLVING DOMESTIC SITUATIONS in the United States were committed by husbands and wives? And did you know that nationally, in 1963, 31 percent of all willful killings occurred within the family unit?
   What's happening? Why such VIOLENCE? Why so much anger, so much hatred between marital partners?
   Old-fashioned "tiffs" and "spats" between married couples have given way to fist fights, knifings, beatings, shootings! Husbands and wives involved in murder-suicide, or homicide, are increasingly in the news. But why? What terrible changes are occurring among our families? Why are so many MARRIAGES falling apart? What are the pressures that drive marital partners who once said they LOVED each other into the venomous vortex of HATE?
   Millions of husbands and wives live together today as if total strangers. Divorce is on the increase. Separations, disappearances, desertions are becoming commonplace.
   What about YOUR home? What about YOUR marriage? If you're not married — do you sincerely hope some day to become married — and then divorced? Do you LOOK FORWARD to a FAILURE in one of the most serious steps in your physical lifetime? Of course not.
   If you're presently divorced — do you know WHY? Do you know what happened, REALLY, to bring about such a tragedy?
   If you are one of the MILLIONS of couples who have deep marital TROUBLES — whose lives are not really happy — don't be ashamed to ADMIT it — and seek to do something about it, before it's too late.
   Our modern marriages are deteriorating. Couples today find it difficult to converse, to share, to sincerely blend together as a family unit.
   It's common, today, to see husband and wife sitting at a table in a restaurant — each staring at others about them, dolefully, disinterestedly — and see them silently finish their meal, pay the check, and leave.
   Our marriages are going mad. Thousands live together who literally HATE each other. Others just barely "tolerate" an unhappy marriage — disgruntled, frustrated, MAD most of the time.
   WHY? What is it that turned these marriages upside down? How does it come to be that two people, who, while only years before were breathing terms of endearment to each other — proposing, making marriage plans, caught up in the joys and thrills of young love — are now in the throes of ANGER and VIOLENCE?
   What MAKES a marriage "go sour"?
   Believe it or not, the answers are fairly simple. Marriage counselors admit they don't know. Judges, lawyers, friends of the family are all a little bewildered. Each, in his own turn, has a try at talking a couple out of a divorce — some succeed, but most fail.
   But let's begin at the beginning — and discover the real answers.
   There are many causes for the growing number of divorces among our peoples — many excuses, too. But it's time you asked who invented marriage — what are the laws establishing, safeguarding and regulating it?
   Are those laws important?
   In a society of degenerating standards, relaxing morals, increasing lawlessness and violence — it is obvious those laws are ignored. But those laws are VITALLY IMPORTANT TO YOU — IF you want a happy marriage!

Our Decaying Societies

   A Harvard expert on human behavior says we are becoming "victims of a sex mania as malignant as cancer and as socially menacing as Communism. Prof. Pitirim Sorokin, in a book titled The American Sex Revolution, says we (and it's just as true, if not more so, of Britons, Africans, Australians, Canadians or Swedes) are drifting toward sex anarchy in the same manner that marked the downfall of earlier societies, including Rome and Greece.
   "We are completely surrounded by the rising tide of sex which is flooding every compartment of our culture, every section of our social life," he wrote.
   He cited, as reflecting our people's "sex obsession," the rising divorce rate, the upsurge in sex crimes, the emphasis of sex in radio and television, stage plays, movies, popular songs, pictures, reading matter and advertising — in short, in every facet of life.
   "Our morals," said Sorokin, "have changed so notably that continence, chastity and faithfulness are increasingly viewed as oddities, as the ossified survival of a pre-historical age."
   And that's tantamount to saying happy marriages are only fossil relics of the past.
   Pressures of society continue to gnaw away at the foundation of society — as if society meant to destroy ITSELF!
   In nearly all entertainment media — marriage is stultified. The picture of middle-aged couples celebrating their golden wedding anniversary gratifies no one. But DIVORCE is praised.
   Novels make light of divorce. Jokes, cartoons by the scores pockmark the pages of men's and women's magazines — impugning the home, licensing divorce, or suggesting with tongue in cheek that mates are to be killed, rather than loved.
   Millions flocked to see the motion picture, "How To Murder Your Wife!" It was just "good clean fun" according to most — but regardless as to how well camouflaged, regardless as to the "sick" humor so many seem to enjoy today — the story was built around a man who was trying to do just that.
   Motion pictures concern themselves with every possible evil, investigating every twisted avenue of perversion — gnawing away at the vitals of home life. A normal, wholesome, "average" courtship with resultant marriage, and the establishment of a balanced HOME life would attract No one. But DIVORCE? Triangles? Unfaithfulness? These are "box-office!" These sell seats!
   Sick societies breed sick homes — it's a contagion.
   And whether people's "standards" change or not; whether "societies" change or not; the LAWS GOVERNING HAPPY MARRIAGES DO NOT CHANGE! They remain inviolable — absolute! People can BREAK those laws — societies can IGNORE those laws — but the penalty will be exacted, nevertheless!

What IS "MARRIAGE"?

   Marriage is something that occurs ONLY in the HUMAN family.
   But WHY?
   Just what is there about marriage that makes it so universally "sacred"?
   Stone-age tribes in New Guinea exact the penalty of DEATH for fornication — premarital intercourse. Unfaithfulness among African tribes is punished swiftly and surely! Chastity before marriage is held up as of TREMENDOUS importance among the Nepalese.
   Why such UNIVERSAL belief in the "sacredness" of marriage? Why are WEDDINGS usually occasioned by CEREMONY? Why is marriage such a LEGAL matter? Ever think about it?
   Because marriage is the foundation of EVERY society — it's the backbone and muscle of a nation; the head and heart of a tribe; and it PICTURES a union on a SPIRITUAL plane!
   LAWS govern marriage.
   And those laws are living. They're just as inexorable as the laws of physics or chemistry. Just as all-POWERFUL as the law of gravity, or inertia, or the laws of thermodynamics. You can't SEE "gravity." But you can FEEL ITS EFFECTS!
   You can't "see" (though you can READ about them) the laws of marriage — but the PENALTIES are SWIFT AND SURE when those laws are broken. God is the great Lawgiver. He INVENTED marriage.
   Not only did God set invisible LAWS in motion which exact PENALTIES when broken — He ordained tremendous REWARDS and BLESSINGS for obedience to those laws!
   It's the same in every facet of life!
   Your body is a marvelous mechanism. Obey the LAWS that govern its health and well-being, keeping fit by RIGHT foods, plenty of sunshine, fresh air, exercise and adequate sleep, and your body can experience RADIANT and JOYOUS health — filled with vitality.
   But violate the laws of your body, and headaches, backaches, night sweats, hallucinations, fears, worries, aches and pains, colds, flu, arthritis, hernias, corns and bunions, constipation, fatigue, and a monumental host of strange diseases is the result!
   It's the same with your marriage!
   Do you resent one another? Do YOU argue, disagree, become disgusted, annoyed, irritated, or short-tempered with your mate? Do YOU "get fed up" with the actions of your partner in life? Do certain personal habits of your mate irritate you? Do you fight? Do you BRAWL? Do you even CURSE one another?
   MILLIONS DO!
   And no wonder!
   They're SMASHING the laws of marriage — TRAMPLING UNDER FOOT the very rules of marriage that COULD produce such JOYS as they have never known before!
   Animals don't marry. Humans do. And while marriage is PHYSICAL in nature — it was instituted by a SPIRIT Being, God the Father, and is SPIRITUAL in origin!
   When God first created man on this earth (and HE DID CREATE MAN — and you can PROVE it!) He said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make an help ANSWERING [perfectly FITTING; exactly compatible] to him" (Gen. 2:18).
   It was GOD who ordained marriage.
   He made man and woman to be perfectly compatible one toward the other — the PERFECT team — mentally, physically and spiritually.
   Since God INVENTED marriage, it was HE who had the prerogative to lay down the inexorable laws concerning it. Those laws protect the home — BIND the partners together by a SPIRITUAL CONTRACT!
   Though societies demand licenses, blood tests, justices of the peace or ministers — it is GOD who BINDS the marital partners together for life!
   Notice it! "Have ye not read, that He which MADE them at the beginning made them male and female, and said, 'For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?' Wherefore they are no more twain, but ONE FLESH. What therefore GOD hath joined together [not man, or the lesser LAWS of man!], LET NOT MAN PUT ASUNDER!" (Matt. 19:5, 6)
   Marriage, then, is a physical UNION — but it IS DIVINE in ORIGIN, and it is a SPIRITUAL CONTRACT, HIGH above the lesser laws of human societies. Once BOUND in heaven, that contract is UNALTERABLY IN EFFECT TILL DEATH!
   Marriage is SERIOUS!
   Marriage is PERMANENT!
   Marriage is for adults!

The Onslaught of Sex

   Today, the married state is being attacked.
   Divorce is becoming almost popular.
   No longer is public SHAME connected with the admission that one partner or the other has utterly FAILED to live a peaceful and happy married life — but virtual POPULARITY hinges on the number of unsuccessful marriages contracted.
   But in the words of J. Paul Getty, reputed to be one of the wealthiest men in the world, "I'd give away all my millions for just ONE successful marriage!"
   The world stares at the spectacle of the "Hollywood marriage-go-round" with near adoration. Jokes in magazines ridicule the married state; imply middle-aged husbands are better off without middle-aged wives.
   Broken homes, triangles, extra-marital excursions and affairs — these are the spicy tales that sell movies, novels and magazine serials.
   And not only is the attack against marriage coming from sheer sensual LUST, and the perverted entertainment media — but from CHURCH leaders, from "psychologists" and "marriage counselors."
   Many openly advocate the complete ABOLITION of the married state. They promulgate FREE "love" — meaning the animal license to openly cohabit with any and all members of the opposite sex, regardless as to children or other unfortunate consequences.
   Others advocate "marriages" between men. Man with man — living together in disgusting perversion — utterly condemned by their Maker! Yes, even RELIGIOUS leaders talk of permitting such perverted abominations.
   For example, a San Francisco gynecologist told a group of general practitioners recently there is "no such thing as a 'good' or 'bad' sex act." The doctors were told "when love is 'mature,' each partner's welfare is as important to the other as his own..." And, according to the gynecologist, "this 'mature' kind of erotic love is possible between two people of the same sex!" (By George Getze, Los Angeles Times, October 28, 1965)
   But the Almighty Creator THUNDERS at perverted, lust-driven man, "KNOW YE NOT that the unrighteous shall NOT inherit the Kingdom of God? BE NOT DECEIVED: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor EFFEMINATE, nor ABUSERS OF THEMSELVES WITH MANKIND, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortionist, shall inherit the Kingdom of God" (I Cor. 6:9-10).
   But the scales of perversion have dipped so low today that GOVERNMENTS seek to "legalize" absolute PERVERSION, just as they thought to "legalize" DIVORCE!
   On October 28, 1965, the House of Lords approved a bill "permitting" homosexual acts between consenting adult males in private. The bill passed by a vote of 116 to 46.
   Think of it! Serious, adult, "educated," leaders in GOVERNMENT are unashamed at PUTTING THEIR NAMES to bills — hoping to LEGISLATE that homosexuality is "legal." Puny man shakes his fist in defiance of his Creator, thinking to make laws in open REBELLION against the really LIVING laws of God!
   Is it any wonder FAMILIES are decaying?
   According to the mayor's Citizens Anti-pornography Commission in New York City, "A veritable floodgate of obscenity [has been] opened in the last 12 months in the form of obscene pocket books, magazines and greeting cards, to such an extent that it is unbelievable." The group reported how the pulp sex novel, once thought to be the preserve of skid row drunks and derelicts, has now emerged from the underground to become an $18-milliona-year business. This year, by conservative estimate, the burgeoning industry will produce more than 500 titles probing the slimy depths of nymphomania, transvestitism, lesbianism, male homosexuality, sadomasochism, fetishism, incest and all other weird, twisted forms of perversion — which formerly were mentioned only in medical publications.
   Any newsstand today is a colorful collection of unabashed sex. Titles shout out infidelity, murder, rape, homosexuality, sadism, triangles, and all assorted forms of weird, mixed-up perversion.
   Dozens of the more "respectable" publications carry articles regularly which treat with the same subjects, though in not quite so blatant a manner.
   And what is the steady reading diet of millions of married mates?
   What is their steady TV diet? What type motion pictures do they see? What type magazines, novels, and comic strips do their minds dwell on?
   Simple. The only thing available. Sloppy illicit sex. Perverted sex. Weird sex. Free sex. Pre-marital sex. Extramarital sex. Violence and sex. Intrigue and sex. Mystery and sex. War and sex.
   Would you like to "kid" yourself these things are not true? Help yourself. Believe whatever makes you "happy." That's your privilege. But for those who are not afraid of the PLAIN TRUTH on the subject — one of the major, continuing reasons for marital fights, arguments, brawls, disagreements, and final DIVORCE is the steady diet of SEX AND VIOLENCE being absorbed by the average marital partners. What about YOU?
   What about YOUR marriage? What about YOUR diet of reading, entertainment, conversation — your very thoughts?
   Today's "new moralists" — themselves guilty of their own lustful desires, and, like all humans, seeking comfort in numbers, justification in the deeds of others, try to reason out in their own minds that marriage is only a "social" necessity — only an invention of MAN.

Why Is Marriage?

   But WHAT IS MARRIAGE FOR?
   Is it really only a passing social phenomenon? Only a temporary transition in social evolution? In the minds (?) of many a would-be sociologist — so it seems. Once having ignorantly concluded there is no God — and therefore no great LAWGIVER who ORDAINED marriage, and who BINDS it for life — abysmally ignorant dupes of the devil seek to destroy the building blocks of society itself.
   Marriage is for MUCH greater purposes than simple propagation of the races.
   Let's understand!
   God is a RULING FAMILY of persons! (Write for our free article, "Is Jesus GOD?") In the beginning God said, "Let us make man in OUR image" (Gen. 1:26). The word used in the ancient Hebrew for our English word "God" was "ELohim" which is PLURAL.
   Elohim means MORE than one — such as group, church, family, and so forth.
   Read carefully the first chapter of John and the first chapter of Hebrews. You'll see the clearest proof that the One who DID the commanding and creating revealed in the book of Genesis was the great One who later "emptied Himself" (Phil. 2:6-7) and "took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men!"
   Jesus prayed to His FATHER.
   He reveals a FAMILY relationship between Himself and His FATHER in heaven, calling us HIS CHILDREN!
   Now notice a spiritual principle of vital importance!
   God inspired Paul to write How we may come to know more about the "hidden" things of God — How we may better understand His great PLAN; more about His "God-HEAD" and OFFICE! "Because that which may be KNOWN OF GOD IS EVIDENT [margin] to them, for God has SHOWN it to them. For the invisible things of Him from the CREATION OF THE WORLD are CLEARLY seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead" (Rom. 1:19-20).
   God says you may understand more about HIM, about His GODHEAD by looking at the MATERIAL CREATION!
   So LOOK at the material creation.
   THINK about it.
   All life begins with a small germ; a seed, or life-giving sperm cell! A tiny grain of mustard seed, a bean, an acorn, or a human sperm cell.
   Thus a butterfly lays eggs; the eggs become larvae, the larvae become pupae, and the pupae hatch into butterflies. Bean seeds become stalks; the stalks flower, are germinated, and produce bean seeds. The new seeds produce more stalks, and so on.
   All life is CYCLICAL!
   Boys and girls mature, and marry. They engender children, who mature and marry. All life IS MALE AND FEMALE. Even in PLANT life, whether spores or seed plants, there is still, however difficult to discern, that cyclical life character evident!
   Ignorant savages, instead of seeing the handiwork of a great and ALL-KNOWING GOD in the marvels of creation, began worshiping the CREATION ITSELF!
   Evolution is just another form, dressed up in "modern" language and dress, of ancient pagan SUPERSTITION about how the earth and all myriad life upon it MIGHT have begun.
   No new species are being formed today. No NEW life cycles are being started. It should be obvious to anyone that the cycle of life HAD TO HAVE A BEGINNING. Somehow the chicken and the egg; the bean and beanstalk, the human parents and their little baby, all got STARTED at some time in the past — and, furthermore, they ALL STARTED AT THE SAME TIME, since life IS INTERDEPENDENT. No life form lives or dies entirely to and for itself. Rather, each form of life is intricately balanced with, and dependent upon, other life forms.
   Looking to the physical creation, you see FAMILIES! Whether mineral, plant, or animal, various KINGDOMS or FAMILIES are evident. God reveals a definite PATTERN by His creation, to which His greatest creation of all, man, remains insensate.
   But among all these great "family" groups — MAN ALONE marries! And WHY? Simply because human beings are not equipped with instinct, but with MIND. Baby animals automatically, through instinct, take their place in the animal kingdom. But baby humans must be TAUGHT. This vital teaching and training of children is only one of many reasons why God established the marital state; the home.
   You were born for a GREAT PURPOSE — greater than the human mind can, of itself, ever imagine. (If you have not understood the almost fathomless truth about the very PURPOSE in human life, be sure to write immediately for the booklet, Why Were You BORN?)
   That great purpose, as you will understand when you have really studied our free booklet, involves being BORN AGAIN — BORN OF GOD!
   It involves becoming a member of the GOD FAMILY!
   God is a family. He is working out a marvelous plan to ENLARGE His family, to Recreate HIMSELF — adding to His family by the begettal of CHILDREN — the very picture of human marriage.

Happiness — Result of Lawful Conduct

   Space permits only the briefest mention of this truly awesome meaning in human marriage in this short article; so be sure to read the BOOK, God Speaks Out on "The NEW MORALITY"! It is explained THOROUGHLY there.
   God intends every human being to experience marriage! He had said, "It is not GOOD that man should live alone," when He provided the perfect life's PARTNER for Adam. Even though, for specific reasons and special jobs, God did not allow a small number of His servants to marry, it is, nevertheless, in His overall purpose that humans marry!
   The family is the BASIS of all society. It is the beginning of culture, of knowledge, of true religion, and of authority. It is the very essence of protection, of solidarity, of security, of love and warmth, of understanding — of mutual respect and equality.
   And God INTENDED it SO.
   Your HOME was your first protection. It was your first shelter, your first knowledge, your first happiness, your first experiences in life. But today MILLIONS of children are born OUT of wedlock — WITHOUT any home. Millions more are cast adrift by parents who RIP APART a home. Other millions continue to live in a home TORN ASUNDER by strife, by lustful, hateful, perverted practices. Our HOMES are sick!
   Is it any wonder our societies are becoming SICK?
   Do you want happiness? Do you desire to share the rich and deeply rewarding experiences of MARRIED life that actually PICTURE the very plan of God?
   There is a WAY to marital happiness — definite laws regulating human conduct which can GUARANTEE it!

Read about it in the next issue.

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Plain Truth MagazineNovember 1965Vol XXX, No.11