January 21, 2008   •   VOL. 46, NO. 2   •   Oakland, CA

The paradox of marriage probed
around pool table pulpit
 

By Jacqueline Gilvard Landry
Voice correspondent

“How do you say ‘forever?’” That is the question Jesuit Father Thomas Scirghi recently posed from a pool table pulpit to a congregation of about 30 soda and suds drinkers at Oakland’s Kerry House pub.

His homily, “Desperate housewives and their husbands: Marriage in America,” was delivered at Theology on Tap, a speaker series that invites Catholics to come together for happy hour and a discussion of theological topics.

The East Bay chapter of Theology on Tap is sponsored by St. Leo Parish in Oakland, where Father Scirghi, associate professor of liturgy at the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley, celebrates Mass on Sundays.

Twenty-somethings to 60-somethings, about half of them married couples, mingled and sipped spirits before the evening program.

What is Theology on Tap? By Jacqueline Gilvard Landry Voice correspondent Theology on Tap is a speaker series bringing together Catholics to discuss theological topics in a social setting—usually a restaurant or bar. The TOT program, which has spread throughout the country since its 1981 inception in the Archdiocese of Chicago, generally is aimed at reaching 20- to 30-year-olds struggling with their faith or returning to the Church. However, the East Bay TOT chapter, sponsored by St. Leo Parish in Oakland, reaches beyond that demographic to include all adults over 20 in its programs. Each spring and fall, the East Bay TOT presents six lectures — or “six-packs” — on religious issues, preceded bya happy hour. Speakers typically are local spiritual leaders and academics. The spring program is tentatively scheduled to begin March 4 at 7 p.m. at Kerry House pub, 4092 Piedmont Avenue in Oakland. A complete schedule will be available in February. For information, contact St. Leo Church at (510) 654-6177 or e-mail Melissa Lucero at sissalucero@yahoo.com.

Organizer Melissa Lucero, a St. Leo parishioner, said the TOT programs are popular and usually draw a similar crowd. In addition to the social aspect, TOT “has become a supplement for teaching today’s topics,” she said. Recent programs have explored Catholic discernment on Iraq, virtue ethics and sexuality, and moral challenges of the environmental crisis.

Father Scirghi said his topic was not so much inspired by the popular television show “Desperate Housewives,” but by a woman’s statement to him that “marriage is just a piece of paper.”

That statement is “all too common,” Father Scirghi said, and American culture helps create ambivalence about taking the plunge.

For one thing, “Americans prize our individualism…much of that is good,” he said. But it can also be a threat.

The priest has worked since 1986 with the International Engaged Encounter, which prepares couples for the sacrament of marriage. He said he hears a frequent lament from engaged people: “I’m afraid when I enter marriage I will lose my individuality.”

He said he asks the couples, “Is it possible that by living with and for another person, maybe you will recognize and realize more of yourself?” It’s what he calls “the paradox of marriage . . . freedom through commitment.”

Another reason for commitment phobia is that “we have a transient sense of relationships,” Father Scirghi said. The Church’s stance on divorce helps defend against that attitude, he said, but overall, “our culture gives little support for married couples…divorce is like a stage of life.”

The way divorce statistics are reported also helps perpetuate the notion that marriage is not forever, he said. A 2007 New York Times article, he said, manipulated divorce data to conclude that marriages since the late 1970s were doomed. But a rebuttal study showed the Times used incomplete data, and the divorce trend is actually “reversing itself slightly.”

The divorce statistics are “bad, but not that bad,” he said.

Another culprit is the wedding industry, Father Scirghi said. “It would have us believe it is all about that day and all about the bride.”

“We say in the Engaged Encounter: ‘A wedding is a day, a marriage is a lifetime,’” he said.

For Catholics, marriage is also a sacrament which creates an “unconditional and permanent” covenant, reflected the priest.

Because “unconditional and permanent” don’t always come naturally, he said, marriage “needs to be worked at.”

Jim Nemechek, sitting with Kitty, his wife of 41 years, agreed. “It is a job,” he said. The audience chuckled, but Nemechek was quite serious. You decide that “this is a job, by God, and I’m going to do it well for the rest of my life,” he said.

Barb Bang, a grandparent who was sitting with her husband Terry, added, “Marriage isn’t a single decision…It’s an ongoing decision. It was my choice to get married and stay married,” she said.

Those decisions are elusive for some. Paul Hoffman, a younger adult, said he was afraid of marriage. “I’m an analyst. I look at what’s the most likelihood we’ll stay together,” he said, implying that the odds are not good.

Carolyn Anderson, 36, also expressed hesitancy. “I have walked away twice from the altar,” she said, adding that she will not marry unless she is ready.

But as participants pointed out, “ready” is hard to define. Norah Hippolyte, pastoral associate at St. Leo, said readiness to marry is like readiness to become a parent. “If you wait to have children till you’re ready to have children, you’ll never have children,” she said.

So how can we say “forever?” At least one way to help, Father Scirghi said, is for more Catholic couples to give witness to their marriages, as the TOT audience had just done.

Janelle Peregoy, who is engaged to be married, offered an additional observation. “Ultimately, we’re Christians and so much of it comes down to faith.”

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