I’ve been struggling for days over just what to say about this Honey Maid commercial recently shared by the Coalition for Divorce Reform on their facebook page: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8hOC7H32W20&feature=youtu.be. I truly didn’t want to sound mean, but silence is not appropriate either, it seems. Many Christians, even, have been given horrible and unbiblical counsel over many years by their pastors, who in turn were just following the official position of their Protestant denomination, whose leadership most likely sold out in the 1970’s to the tide of “no-fault” divorce sweeping the nation at the time. Those denominational leaders felt compelled to make their position on divorce and remarriage more “relevant” so as to head off the loss of membership and finances. Never mind that Jesus was very clear about His views on “blended families” that don’t result solely from widowhood: (Luke 16:18) “Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries one who is divorced from a husband commits adultery.”
During the last Super Bowl, I believe it was Honey Maid whose similar schmaltz-offering likewise extolled homosexual parenting as though the ample evidence of toxicity in those arrangements wasn’t plainly manifest in news articles about pedophilia and child molestation in those homes, or in the wistfully dysfunctional accounts of young adults who have been raised in lesbian homes, many of which were established in the aftermath of a heterosexual divorce – a situation that is increasingly common. Of course, there was conveniently no mention of the results of a 20-year longitudinal study published by the University of Texas in 2012 that showed the poor wide-ranging outcomes of every kind of childrearing arrangement vs. an intact, married heterosexual family (i.e. God’s model, eloquently described by Jesus in Matthew 19:4-6).
In this latest installment, the toxic outcomes of living out a culture of adulterous remarriage are likewise swept aside in a glisteningly sentimental display of affirmation. Nowhere is the precipitously higher failure rate of second, third and fourth marriages mentioned. Nowhere is it mentioned that spouse #2 might just be of the same gender these days. Nowhere is there mention of the higher rate of teen pregnancy, substance abuse, same-sex attraction, suicide attempts / completions, or next generation marriage failure among the children of these “blended” families. Nowhere is the high suicide rate among divorced, even remarried men such as Robin Williams mentioned. Not broken, they say!
Why is it not OK to be broken and just admit it, Honey Maid? King David, the ultimate “blended family” guy, showed us in Psalms 32 and 51 that the sort of brokenness that brings us to our knees, in sacrifice of our preference to just feel good, is actually the beginning of true wholeness.
7 Times Around the Jericho Wall / Let’s Repeal No-Fault Divorce
– by standerinfamilycourt.com