Back on December 8th, the N.Y. Times ran a column entitled "A Challenge for Churches: Adulthood Takes Its Time" by Peter Steinfels, who outlined the insights of two sociologists of religion on delayed adulthood, "a time between ages 18 and 30 or so, when marriage and parenthood are often delayed, formal schooling is prolonged, job switching is frequent and parental support extended." Sociologist Christian Smith (the more astute of the experts, in my opinion) is quoted at length in the article:
"[T]hese are crucial years in the formation of personal identity, behavior patterns and social relationships." One returns a different person, possibly formed quite independently of any earlier faith, certainly of any participation in a religious community (Steinfels, N.Y. Times, 12/8/07).
In addition to those fortunate enough to get parental support, we also have to think of the legions who do not get extended parental support of any kind, but still navigate these years of delayed adulthood with even more vulnerability by going from one makeshift domestic arrangement to another in search of a stable economic household of some kind. This reality further emphasizes the importance of this comment:
Professor Smith puts "sex, cohabitation and marriage" (in that order) squarely on the table as "key dimensions" of the changed situation. Any emerging adults who want to abide by traditional strictures against premarital sex, he says, "face a very difficult peer culture in which to live (Ibid, emphasis added)."
In the phrase "in that order," we have the crucial key to what is happening in delayed adulthood: the American way of relating male and female has three steps (I can't call it courtship without being sacrilegious). First, sex. Second, cohabitation. Last of all, possibly marriage with one of the several or many who have been partners in sex and/or sexual cohabitation. The introduction is sex. Then, marriage is mocked in realistic detail by the involved mimicry of sexual cohabitation with whoever is willing and able to split the rent. Finally, someone along the way becomes the eventual marriage partner when no one else is left standing. Notice what this sequence does to marriage. First, the sexual act is totally divorced from any unique marital meaning or expression. Second, the act of sharing a roof, bed, and financial expenses is also divorced from and ripped out of marriage. Unsurprisingly, the eventual marriage ends up as fundamentally meaningless — it's just the last stop on a long, crowded bus ride when, finally, there is nowhere else to go. We should thus not be surprised that many marriages end or that many of those that last are really de facto, empty shells enveloped in social denial.
Smith proposes earlier marriages as a solution:
Professor Smith jumps in with the idea that perhaps parents, who already offer their adult offspring considerable financial and caretaking support, should challenge the cultural assumption that marriage ought to await financial independence. Instead, they should provide social and financial support for marriage in the early 20s rather than the late. "Teenage marriage is the best recipe for divorce," he writes, "but marriage in the 20s itself is not."
"A good argument can be made that true, authentic selves are made more than found," he writes. "It is arguably as much or more by making and keeping promises than by dabbling and deferring that we come to know who we as persons really are and are called to become (Ibid)."
For those parents and young adults who have the financial means, I think Smith's suggestion is worth very serious consideration. But many are not in that situation of extended parental financial support. This otherwise fine article, not surprisingly, evades two fundamental issues: chastity and contraception. Delaying marriage poses no hazard to personal development or to a future marriage if the young adult reserves sex for the end of the journey — for marriage. As Smith points out, chastity is very difficult in today's peer culture. Imagine the plight of a virgin in today's typical coed college dorm. He or she is likely surrounded by casual sex and sex acts taking place all over the place, with such acts being the constant theme of gossip. That's why young adults need to maintain contact with other young adults in a church where chastity is encouraged. That's why college choices and living arrangements are so crucial.
The other topic avoided is contraception. Even if we have earlier marriages, the focus will still be on delaying children through contraception so that studies can be continued with minimum interruption. As a Catholic, I view contraception even within marriage as deforming the marriage and the meaning of the marital act. The marriage becomes a form of playacting — it's not the real thing if fertility is medicated out of existence. In early marriages, where there are good, serious reasons to delay having children, natural family planning is the alternative that respects fertility and the life-giving meaning of the sex act. Yet, there is a very simple remedy that avoids and leaps over all of these complications and issues about child-bearing. The need for such a straightforward remedy is why I come back to the theme of chastity — better to delay marriage as a chaste person than to enter a contraceptive marriage that disfigures the meaning of marriage as procreative.
Some young adults, with extended parental support and great maturity, will be able to take the route of marriages in their early 20s. (By the way, one Catholic writer I admire on this topic suggests, based on his experience, that marriage in one's late twenties is better — so not all who have considered the issue are in agreement as to the best timing.) Yet, I suspect that, given our educational system, many will continue to delay marriage for financial and academic reasons. Most importantly, many should also delay marriage simply because they have not yet found the one person God wants them to marry. If you are not praying for and about your future spouse, even if as yet their identity is unrevealed to you, you are already setting the stage for a very risky and likely traumatic gamble. I heard someone say it to a group of teens, and I have to repeat it to myself and to all of us, regardless of age: if you can't truthfully say that your most important relationship is with Jesus, you are not ready to have a relationship of any kind with anyone of the opposite sex. In addition, no one should settle for a mismatch in maturity and interests just to get hitched early based on the advice of a sociologist. The vagaries of different human situations, personalities, economic circumstances, and levels of maturity require maximum freedom for deciding when and whom to marry. We can get that maximum and flexible freedom in a way that does not harm our personal development by being chaste — by reserving sex for marriage. In my view, the solution is not to urge everyone to marry earlier — although that is an alternative that should not be automatically pushed aside or ignored, but rather to urge everyone to reserve sex for marriage during these crucial years when one's personality is being formed. If you are chaste, the exact timing of your marriage will not be crucial and need not be put on a fast track according to the latest sociological findings. If you are chaste, you get the maximum freedom and flexibility suited to your own particular circumstances, talents, dreams, and level of maturity, without losing in the process your soul and your capacity to love fully. That's the easiest formula for dealing with delayed adulthood — not trying to engineer a cookie cutter rush to earlier marriages for everyone.
