Why Isn’t Marriage Exciting?

So, a few weeks back I posted some things about marriage that I learned from one of my favorite philosopher/theologians. That post is now getting more hits than my two top posts combined. This really surprised me because this blog is supposed to be about philosophy, music and Jesus. But perhaps we should be thinking a little deeper about marriage too.

My wife and I were engaged for a few months before our wedding. During that time we got a lot of advice from people. Several people warned us that once we got married the fun would be over and we would get bored of each other. However, other people gave us advice about how to keep our relationship exciting.

I think the best piece of advice we got in this area was to just actually get excited about each other. Excitement isn’t something that just happens to you, it is something that you choose to do. So, this person suggested that every once in a while I just stop and look at Naomi and say “Wow, I can’t believe I’m married to you!”

It’ll take a conscious effort not to get bored of your marriage. But doesn’t everything in life take effort? Things don’t just happen, so be as dramatic as you need to be, and every once in a while just tell your husband or wife how excited you are about them. Marriage doesn’t have to be boring if you don’t want it to be.

The video I posted is by a band called Rancid. The song is Who Would’ve Thought.

I can’t believe I’m married to you Naomi!

No Happy Endings

“The last act is tragic, however happy all the rest of the play is; at the last a little earth is thrown upon our head, and that is the end forever.” ~ Blaise Pascal

Well, maybe there are some happy endings but there are no guarantees. I saw Cloverfield the other night and thought that I’d make a few comments because it really got me thinking.

Most movies start off in a way that really sucks you in. Not so with Cloverfield. The first several minutes of the movie were very boring. They were boring because they were about real life. I won’t spoil the movie for you but let’s just say it was like watching somebody else’s home video. Not everybody’s cup of tea. But isn’t that strange? They make a movie about everyday life and it’s boring.

The second thing that I noticed about Cloverfield is that it doesn’t have a soundtrack. Unless I am completely mistaken, there is no music during the main portion of the movie. Of course, real life doesn’t have a soundtrack either unless you count MP3 players.

Finally, it should be pointed out that there isn’t a happy ending to this movie. Don’t worry, I won’t give it away. Life, of course, doesn’t come with the guarantee of a happy ending.

All in all, I think Cloverfield is a great movie. It’s a great monster movie and it can teach us a few things about life. Real life isn’t like a typical movie. Life has a slow, boring beginning, it has no soundtrack and the ending is often tragic. Yet, somehow it is still worth living.

Just something to think about.

Broken

Humanity will never heal itself.

Whenever my wife and I go back home I always find a copy of the local newspaper and flip to the opinion page. Every few months a letter is submitted by a guy who is a secular humanist. He wants people to consider why they should accept his sort of humanism. He recognizes that there is something very wrong with the way that humanity is right now. War, disease, greed, corruption; all that stuff.

How can humanism help? He argues that people need to turn away from religion and instead turn to science, reason and progress. Through science and human thinking we can begin to get past all the crappy stuff in life. Human nature can become something good. Human achievement through science and reason will give us progress beyond the crappy state of life that most people are doomed with. We’ve had religion for thousands of years and it has done nothing but bring us down.

Well, this sounds like an attractive offer doesn’t it? Imagine; no more war, no more confusion and no more demands from religion on our lives. If we just put our heads together it can all be ours. In short, I think he is wrong. I do not think that humanity can heal itself. Why? Well, let me just say first that I think science and reason are good things. Actually, I think they are more neutral than anything. What I mean is that they are like tools that we use as we live our lives. So, as human beings live their lives they use their reason and their scientific achievements to do things.

Unless they are held against their will, humans seem to do what they want; they try to fulfill their desires.

This is why science and reason can never really heal us. Science and reason are things that we use to fulfill our desires. Through our reason, we try to solve the mysteries of the universe. We try to solve problems. On the other hand, we also use our reason to calculate the best way to rob banks, commit murders, win wars, plunder villages and rape women.

We use science to find cures for diseases, build helpful machines and transport food to starving villages. Of course, we also use science to build nuclear bombs, torture people and construct Nazi empires.

Do you see what I am getting at? Human beings use things like science and reason to get what they want. So, if the person has bad desires then they will use the tools for bad things. If the human has good desires then they will use the tools for good things. A hammer can be used to build a house our bludgeon a neighbour.

I wish the guy who keeps writing these ideas would stop and think about it a bit.

If not science and religion then what?

Religion has not solved humanity’s problems. In some ways it has just given us one more thing to fight about. It’s had several thousand years, I think it is time to move beyond religion.

Science has had a couple hundred really good years. We’ve made a lot of ‘progress.’ But science has just given us one more tool to wipe each other out with.

Like I said, I think science is a good thing. It just can’t solve our problems. Might I suggest that we’ll find a solution in Jesus? I know, I said let’s get rid of religion but then I went and brought Jesus into the picture! Well, I don’t think that Jesus is mere religion. Sure, generally speaking, Christianity is a religion. It’s one of the world’s largest religions. But most Christians will say that it is not merely a religion. It is not just another one of the choices to fill that hole in our lives. Jesus talked a lot about the problems of humanity. Ultimately, he said that the solution can be found in him and nowhere else.

So, the solution is not found in the pursuit of science and it is not found in the mere association with a religious organization. It’s found in a first century prophet/savior named Jesus. The best place to learn about Jesus is in the four books and many letters that were written by his followers in the first century. The Gospel of John is a good place to start. Many of these writers knew Jesus personally. Most of them gave their lives in horrible ways so that his message could be passed on.

Give it some thought.

This song is called Broken by a band called 12 Stones…

…and this one is called Broken too, it’s by Pennywise