Marriage and church membership
I posted a year ago over a year ago, about why it seems pragmatically a bad idea to marry someone uncommitted to a church. Most Christians would agree with restricting dating to other Christians (e.g. 2 Cor 6:14), but I hadn't come across anything like my argument before. Yet, recently I found a couple such sources:
Cherlin ties the divorce culture in marriage to the prioritization of “choice” in “spirituality” and religion. Before we learn to divorce our husbands or wives, we learn first to divorce our parents’ churches. He is right, and we have the revolving door congregations and marriage licenses to prove it, to our shame and, ultimately, to our judgment.
- Russell Moore, reviewing Andrew J. Cherlin's book The Marriage-Go-Round
... and secondly:
I think it's also an important factor for single women as they are trying to discern the various men around them and their relationships. When you see a man who's willing to commit to a local church in a generation that commits to nothing, that doesn't even really want to commit to marriage, you're seeing somebody who has said, "All right. There's something that is greater than myself; there's a community that is greater than myself." And you're also seeing a man who's willing to submit himself to other men in terms of authority. I always counsel the women around me, when they're considering somebody they might marry, to ask themselves if this is a man who is himself accountable. If we're to practice the biblical commands to submit to and to honor and to respect our husbands, one of the greatest safeties that we will encounter is knowing that this man is himself submitted to other men.