Kay

gengwall,
I’m basically right there with you on that. And that is how we counseled our children.
However, what I was referring to is the practice of fathers making the choice for their children and walking them down the aisle as soon as legally possible. The teenagers are bowled over and infatuated with whole idea and have been indoctrinated/brainwashed/choose your term into believing it’s God’s best way.
The terrible ramifications I was referring to, aside from the divorces, was the suicide of our daughter’s good friend at the age of 27. Because she had been taught that divorce for any reason other than adultery was a sin, after 10 years in her desperation saw no other way out. To describe the devastation of that on her father and mother would take me all day here. As well, on my daughter and all we who loved her. Tears come to my eyes at the thought and it’s been almost five years now.
What I am talking about are well intentioned fathers and mothers, by default, who really believed it was their God given place of authority to make these choices – the problem is that such a paradigm, where the males/fathers have the “tie breaker” ulimate decision maker setup is that in reality males can be wrong and there is no one else with equal authority to counter balance that.