Beware of Pride

I always know when my husband is in a project planning meeting at work because he starts texting me to see what days we are busy over the next couple of weeks. My husband is a network engineer and often his projects have to be completed after business hours. He knows that I will let him know if there are any major conflicts that might come up in the evenings, such as dance recitals, youth activities and such. It's a great example of my husband letting me influence him. He seeks out my opinion before making decisions on things. alskdjflasdkjf

In "The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work," John M. Gottman wrote, "In our long-term study of 130 newlywed couples, who we followed for nine years, we found that, even in the first few months of marriage, men who allowed their wives to influence them had happier relationships and were less likely to eventually divorce than men who resisted their wives' influence. Statistically speaking, when a man is not willing to share power with his partner there is an 81 percent chance that his marriage will self-destruct." So, it turns out that when men open themselves up to being influenced by their wives, they will have a happier marriage and be less likely to get divorced. Of course, women should also be open to the influence of their husbands but in most cases, husbands are more likely to need a little work in this area.

If you're not sure how open you are to the influence of your spouse, try taking this simple questionnaire:

Accepting Influence Questionnaire
Read each statement and circle T for “true” or F for “false.”
1. I am really interested in my partner’s opinions on our basic issues. T F 
2. I usually learn a lot from my partner even when we disagree. T F 
3. I want my partner to feel that what he or she says really counts with me. T F 
4. I generally want my partner to feel influential in this marriage. T F
5. I can listen to my partner, but only up to a point. T F
6. My partner has a lot of basic common sense. T F
7. I try to communicate respect even during our disagreements. T F
8. If I keep trying to convince my partner, I will eventually win out. T F 
9. I don’t reject my partner’s opinions out of hand. T F
10. My partner is not rational enough to take seriously when we discuss our issues. T F
11. I believe in lots of give and take in our discussions. T F
12. I am very persuasive and usually can win arguments with my partner. T F
13. I feel I have an important say when we make decisions. T F 
14. My partner usually has good ideas. T F
15. My partner is basically a great help as a problem solver. T F 
16. I try to listen respectfully, even when I disagree. T F 
17. My ideas for solutions are usually much better than my partner’s. T F
18 I can usually find something to agree with in my partner’s positions. T F
19. My partner is usually too emotional. T F
20. I am the one who needs to make the major decisions in this relationship. T F

Scoring: (it sounds confusing, but we promise it’s very simple!)
1. Give yourself one point for each “true” answer, except for questions 5, 8, 10, 12, 17, 19, 20.
2. Subtract one point for each “true” answer to questions 5, 8, 10, 12, 17, 19, 20.
6 or above: This is an area of strength in your relationship. You willingly cede power to your spouse, a hallmark of an emotionally intelligent marriage.
Below 6: Your marriage could stand some improvement in this area. You are having some difficulty accepting influence from your spouse, which can cause a marriage to become dangerously unstable. The first step to righting the situation is to understand just what it means to accept influence. (Gottman, 2015. 128-129)

Grapefruit Syndrome
It's important to counsel with each other and seek for help, advice, and opinions from our spouse. Sometimes this might turn into an "airing of grievances" where we feel we need to share every little thing that bothers us. When Lola B. Waters was newly married, she read an article that said it was helpful for married couples to sit down and share habits in their spouse that they found annoying, to keep resentment from building up. 

"We were to name five things we found annoying, and I started off. After more than fifty years, I remember only my first complaint: grapefruit. I told him that I didn’t like the way he ate grapefruit. He peeled it and ate it like an orange! Nobody else I knew ate grapefruit like that. Could a girl be expected to spend a lifetime, and even eternity, watching her husband eat grapefruit like an orange? Although I have forgotten them, I’m sure the rest of my complaints were similar.

After I finished, it was his turn to tell the things he disliked about me. Though it has been more than half a century, I still carry a mental image of my husband’s handsome young face as he gathered his brows together in a thoughtful, puzzled frown and then looked at me with his large blue-gray eyes and said, “Well, to tell the truth, I can’t think of anything I don’t like about you, Honey.”

Gasp.

I quickly turned my back, because I didn’t know how to explain the tears that had filled my eyes and were running down my face. I had found fault with him over such trivial things as the way he ate grapefruit, while he hadn’t even noticed any of my peculiar and no doubt annoying ways.

I wish I could say that this experience completely cured me of fault finding. It didn’t. But it did make me aware early in my marriage that husbands and wives need to keep in perspective, and usually ignore, the small differences in their habits and personalities. Whenever I hear of married couples being incompatible, I always wonder if they are suffering from what I now call the Grapefruit Syndrome." (Goddard, 2009. 76-77)

If we can share our thoughts and opinions without turning it into a personal attack, where we focus on our spouse's annoying habits, then being influenced by each other will be a great strength to any marriage. One way to avoid "Grapefruit Syndrome" is to seek to be humble and to try and lift up our spouse instead of tearing them down.

Humbling Ourselves 

President Ezra Taft Benson said, "Pride adversely affects all our relationships—our relationship with God and His servants, between husband and wife, parent and child, employer and employee, teacher and student, and all mankind. Our degree of pride determines how we treat our God and our brothers and sisters. Christ wants to lift us to where He is. Do we desire to do the same for others?

We can choose to humble ourselves by conquering enmity toward our brothers and sisters, esteeming them as ourselves, and lifting them as high or higher than we are.

We can choose to humble ourselves by receiving counsel and chastisement.

We can choose to humble ourselves by forgiving those who have offended us."

When it comes to our marriages, we can be more open to the influence of our spouse if we humble ourselves. We will see the merit and value of our spouse's opinion and seek to include that information in our decision making. If we esteem our spouses as ourselves and lift them higher than we are, we will truly have a blissful marriage.

References:

Goddard, H. W. (2009). Drawing heaven into your marriage: eternal doctrines that change relationships. Cedar Hills, UT: Joymap Publishing.

Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (2015). The seven principles for making marriage work. New York: Harmony Books.

Staying Emotionally Connected

One thing I noticed that my husband always does when I make dinner, is he likes to come up behind me when I’m cooking at the stove and put his arms around me, lean his head down on my shoulder and watch what I’m doing. Since he’s about eight inches taller than me, he will playfully say, “So this is what it’s like be you,” and I know he wants to just say hi after a long day of work. Some days, if I put a piece of bread in the toaster, he’ll say, “Whatcha got there?” and I know he wants me to make a piece of toast for him too. Or he’ll come into the living room with a brush in his hand and tell me that he feels like he’s been rolling in hay and says, “Would you scratch at me?” These are all bids for my attention and are an important part of being emotionally connected to our spouse. 

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Bids for Attention

In “The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work,” John M. Gottman said, “Hollywood has distorted our notions of romance and what makes passion sizzle. Watching Humphrey Bogart gather teary-eyed Ingrid Bergman into his arms may make your heart pound but real-life romance is fueled by far more humdrum scenes. It is kept alive each time you let your spouse know he or she is valued during the grind of everyday life. In marriage, couples are always making what I call “bids” for each other’s attention, affection, humor, or support. Bids can be as minor as asking for a backrub or as significant as seeking help in carrying the burden when an aging parent is ill. The partner responds to each bid either by turning toward the spouse or turning away.” Staying emotionally connected is as easy as turning toward our spouse when they bid for our attention.

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If you want to know how well you and your spouse are doing when it comes to turning to each other, ask yourselves the following questions found in Gottman’s book (p.90). Give yourself one point for each true answer and if you scored higher than 12, then turning towards your partner is a great strength in your marriage.

Is Your Marriage Primed for Romance?

• We enjoy doing small things together, like folding laundry or watching TV. (T F)
• I look forward to spending my free time with my partner. (T F) 
  
• At the end of the day my partner is glad to see me. (T F)
• My partner is usually interested in hearing my views. (T F) 
  
• I really enjoy discussing things with my partner. (T F)
• My partner is one of my best friends. (T F)
• I think my partner would consider me a very close friend. (T F) 
  
• We just love talking to each other. (T F)
• When we go out together, the time goes very quickly. (T F) 
  
• We always have a lot to say to each other. (T F) 
  
• We have a lot of fun together. (T F) 
  
• My partner tells me when he or she has had a bad day. (T F) 
  
• We are spiritually very compatible. (T F) 
  
• We tend to share the same basic values. (T F) 
  
• We like to spend time together in similar ways. (T F) 
  
• We really have a lot of common interests. (T F) 
  
• We have many of the same dreams and goals. (T F)
• We like to do a lot of the same things. (T F)
• Even though our interests are somewhat different, I enjoy my partner’s interests. (T F)
• Whatever we do together, we usually have a good time. (T F)  (Gottman, 2015. 90) 

 As H. Wallace Goddard stated, “Our spouses also feel burdened from time to time. Sometimes they seem cranky—but they may be quietly carrying pain and loneliness. Rather than respond to our partner’s negativity, we can invite them to greater closeness and peacefulness when we offer persuasion, long-suffering, gentleness, meekness, and love unfeigned.” (Goddard, 2009. 60)

 

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Sometimes it can be hard to answer our partner’s bid for attention if it is wrapped in anger or other negative emotions or if we’re just plain distracted by technology. Gottman found in his research that if couples responded to bids 86% of the time, they remained married after a six year follow-up. If we do our best to reach out to our partners when they need our love, attention, or affection, marriage will truly be blissful!

References:

Goddard, H. W. (2009). Drawing heaven into your marriage: eternal doctrines that change relationships. Cedar Hills, UT: Joymap Publishing.

Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (2015). The seven principles for making marriage work. New York: Harmony Books.

Cherishing Your Spouse

I used to love watching “The Newlywed Game.” In fact, when I was getting married my sister created a similar game that we played at my bridal shower. She asked my husband-to-be questions ahead of time and then at the shower, I had to come up with his answers. She asked things like his favorite food, favorite band, favorite thing that he liked about me, how we met, etc. Of course, I got a lot of them wrong because I didn’t know everything about him at the time. This is one of the reasons why “The Newlywed Game” is so entertaining. Newlywed couples have made a commitment to each other and love each other, but are still learning about each other. In “The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work,” John M. Gottman calls this process of getting to know important things about our spouses ‘love maps.’ He states, “Emotionally intelligent couples are intimately familiar with each other’s world. I call this having a richly detailed love map—my term for that part of your brain where you store all the relevant information about your partner’s life.” (Gottman, 2015. 54.)  

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My love map has expanded and become more detailed over the years, and I feel quite confident that we would totally nail it on “The Newlywed Game,” but there are still some ways to improve my love map with my spouse. Even after 17 years of marriage, my husband surprises me by telling me something that I never knew. Having a strong love map is a way to show that your marriage and spouse are important to you. It can also help you get through stressful or difficult times together, like the birth of a child or the loss of a loved one. Strong love maps means strong marriages.

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Strengthening Love Maps

One of the ways that Gottman suggests increasing the strength of your love map is through a series of questions that he calls, “The Love Map 20 Questions Game.” Each spouse should write down 20 numbers between 1 and 60. Take turns asking each other the questions. If your spouse gets the questions right, they get the designated points plus you get one point. If the answer is wrong, no one gets any points. Whoever has the most points at the end is the winner.

 

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As we increase our love maps and take additional steps to cherish our spouse, our marriages will be filled with joy and happiness. As H. Wallace Goddard stated in his book, Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage, "It takes strength of character to see errors in a partner's grammar or perceptions and yet resist the temptation to correct needlessly. It takes godly goodness to see weakness and mistakes in our partners and yet resist the temptation to smirk. It takes heavenly humility to be proven right and yet to meekly acknowledge that we all make mistakes. It takes divine grace to discard or limit the hobbies that prevent us from helping around the house." If we focus on loving our spouses, making room in our thoughts for the things that are important to them, and avoid endless nitpicking, we will have stronger and happier marriages.

References:

Goddard, H. W. (2009). Drawing heaven into your marriage: eternal doctrines that change relationships. Cedar Hills, UT: Joymap Publishing.

Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (2015). The seven principles for making marriage work. New York: Harmony Books.

Behaviors that Negatively Affect Marriage

When I was younger, I remember going to a bridal shower for my aunt who was about to get married. One of the games we played was a giving marriage advice and then she would pick her favorite. People wrote things like, "Never go to bed angry," or, "Don't eat crackers in bed." Some of it was silly and some of it was serious. This was something I remembered as I got married and received all kinds of similar advice, some of it even contradictory. So what is the best advice to give to newlyweds? Is there a way to divorce-proof marriage?

 

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According to John M. Gottman, author of "The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work," there are behaviors that greatly increase the chances of divorce. In his book, Gottman stated that he can predict whether or not a couple will get divorced with 91% accuracy, just by observing their interaction with each other for 15 minutes. He has studied marriage relationships for over 40 years, and has even created a "Love Lab" where couples come and are observed by scientists measuring their heart rate, blood pressure, etc., while being recorded and watched through a one way mirror. Through all his research, Gottman has developed a list of behaviors are almost certain to lead to divorce. Gottman wrote, "Anger between husband and wife doesn't itself predict marital meltdown. Other couples...argue far more during the fifteen minutes of videotaping...Yet I predict that many of these couples will remain happily married-and they do. The clues to...future breakup are in the way they argue, which leaves them vulnerable to increasing negativity and distrust."

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Behavior #1: Harsh Start-Up
The first behavior that can be a predictor of divorce is the way a conversation starts. If it starts in a negative, accusatory, or sarcastic way, that can be a sign that neither the conversation nor the marriage will end well. For example, a wife brings up the unfair divide of housework to her husband in an accusatory and negative way. "When a discussion leads off this way-with criticism and sarcasm, which is a form of contempt-it has begun with a harsh start-up...A harsh start-up simply dooms you to failure. So if you begin a discussion that way, you might as well pull the plug, take a breather, and start over."

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse - Conquest, War, Famine, & Death
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Behavior #2: The Four Horsemen
Gottman goes on to explain that there are four types of negative interactions, that he calls the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. If they are running through the relationship, they will most certainly destroy everything in their path. These include: 1. Criticism, 2. Contempt, 3. Defensiveness, and 4. Stonewalling.

Criticism- There is a difference between complaints and criticism. We will always have complaints with our spouses, which is a normal part of marriage, but criticsm is different. Complaints focus on behavior while criticism focuses on character or personality. Here is an example that illustrates the difference between the two:

"Complaint: There's no gas in the car. I'm upset that you didn't fill it up like you said you would. Could you please deal with it tomorrow?
Criticism: Why can't you ever remember anything? I told you a thousand times to fill up the tank, and you didn't. You're always so careless." (Gottman, 2015)

Contempt- Sarcasm and cynicism are both forms of contempt as well as, "name-calling, eye-rolling, mockery, and hostile humor. In whatever form, contempt is poisonous to a relationship because it conveys disgust...Inevitably, contempt leads to more conflict rather than reconciliation."

Defensiveness- Many times during an argument between spouses, defensiveness is used in response to contempt or criticism. Unfortunately, this doesn't diffuse an argument. "Research shows that this approach rarely has the desired effect. The attacking spouse does not back down or apologize. This is because defensiveness is really a way of blaming your partner. You're saying, in effect, "The problem isn't me, it's you."" (Gottman, 2015. 37)

Stonewalling- When the other three horses are present, usually one spouse will shut down or disengage from the conversation by going completely silent, tuning out of the argument completely, or walking away.

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Behavior #3: Flooding
Once stonewalling occurs, that usually means that one spouse is completely overwhelmed physically and psychologically which is called flooding. As Gottman explained, the negativity from a spouse can leave the other feeling shell-shocked and defenseless. They will do anything to avoid being attacked again.


Behavior #4: Body Language
When flooding occurs, it literally changes a person's vital signs. Their heart rate will increase, they will sweat, release adrenaline and their blood pressure will rise. If one spouse is experiencing these things on a regular basis because they are being flooded by their partner, it will most definitely end in divorce. This "fight or flight" response to a spouse reduces effective communication, sense of humor or ability to problem solve.

Behavior #5: Failed Repair Attempts
Saying, "I'm sorry," making a silly face, giving flowers, or any other action to diffuse a tense situation is considered a repair attempt. When flooding has gotten to a high level, spouses may not even be able to identify that a repair attempt has been made. Thus, situations never get diffuse and arguments get more and more tense. This is why failed repair attempts are one of the most accurate ways of predicting divorce. "The presence of the four horsemen alone predicts divorce with an 82 percent accuracy rate. But when you add in the failure of repair attempts, the accuracy rate reaches into the 90s."

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Behavior #6: Bad Memories
The final sign that a marriage will most likely end in divorce is when couples look back on happy memories like their wedding day, or how they first met, and can only remember it in a negative way. Also, if they can't remember why they were attracted to each other or what they used to enjoy doing together, it may be a sign that their relationship is in serious trouble. If a spouse thinks that the only reason his partner gives him a kiss when he comes home is because she wants something from him, then it is also a sign of a serious fracture in the marriage.

Despite these 6 behaviors that can lead to a weak and troublesome marriage, the good news is that there are real and positive things that a couple can do to have a happy marriage. As H. Wallace Goddard wrote in his book, "Drawing Heaven into Your Marriage, "We will only succeed at marriage as we use eternal gospel principles to become more of what God has invited us to become. Marriage is God's graduate school for advanced training in Christian character. Those truly succeeding at marriage are those who are applying the gospel of Jesus Christ in their lives."

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I always felt that I had a strong marriage but I never really understood why and I realize now that it's because of the wonderful friendship that I have with my husband. If we develop strong and respectful friendships with our spouses, we will be starting on the right path for having a long and happy marriage.


References:

Goddard, H. W. (2009). Drawing heaven into your marriage: eternal doctrines that change relationships. Cedar Hills, UT: Joymap Publishing.

Gottman, J. M., & Silver, N. (2015). The seven principles for making marriage work. New York: Harmony Books.

Eternal Marriage

Almost 18 years ago, I got married at the young age of 19, in the Oakland Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and it remains to be one of the best and most essential decisions that I have ever made. Since I got married, or sealed, to my husband in the temple, that means that if I am faithful to the covenants that I made with the Lord, then I will be able to live with my husband and family forever. 

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As Ezra Taft Benson stated in a 1986 address, “On 3 April 1836, the Lord Jesus Christ and three other heavenly beings appeared in this holy temple.

“One of these heavenly messengers was Elijah, to whom the Lord said he had “committed the keys of the power of turning the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to the fathers, that the whole earth may not be smitten with a curse.” (D&C 27:9.)

“Elijah brought the keys of sealing powers—that power which seals a man to a woman and seals their posterity to them endlessly, that which seals their forefathers to them all the way back to Adam. This is the power and order that Elijah revealed—that same order of priesthood which God gave to Adam and to all the ancient patriarchs which followed after him.

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Because Elijah the prophet restored these priesthood keys to the earth, we have the chance to be sealed to our family members forever. This is an important part of the Lord’s plan for us to return and live with Him again. When I married my husband in the Oakland Temple, I knew that I would be making a covenant with God that our marriage would last forever.

Covenant or Contract Marriage?

Some may be asking why get married in the temple or make special covenants with the Lord? Is there a big difference between civil marriages and temple marriages?

Bruce C. Hafen believes there is a big difference between the two. He calls them contractual marriages and covenant marriages. In 1996, Hafen stated, “When troubles come, the parties to a contractual marriage seek happiness by walking away. They marry to obtain benefits and will stay only as long as they’re receiving what they bargained for. But when troubles come to a covenant marriage, the husband and wife work them through. They marry to give and to grow, bound by covenants to each other, to the community, and to God. Contract companions each give 50 percent; covenant companions each give 100 percent.

“Marriage is by nature a covenant, not just a private contract one may cancel at will. Jesus taught about contractual attitudes when he described the “hireling,” who performs his conditional promise of care only when he receives something in return. When the hireling “seeth the wolf coming,” he “leaveth the sheep, and fleeth…because he…careth not for the sheep.” By contrast, the Savior said, “I am the good shepherd…and I lay down my life for the sheep.” Many people today marry as hirelings. And when the wolf comes, they flee.” (Hafen, 1996)

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When I met my husband, I knew that he was the right one for me to marry and because I felt strongly since I was a young child, that I never wanted to get divorced, I wanted to marry my husband in the temple. By marrying in the temple, for time and all eternity, I knew I would have a greater commitment that would help carry our relationship through difficulties and trials.

Wolves of Marriage

Hafen goes on to explain that there are three main trials that marriages face today. He calls them the “wolves of adversity” in reference to the wolves in the Savior’s parable of the hireling. These are three things that can have such a profoundly damaging effect on the marriage to the point of destroying it. 

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Natural Adversity

The first is the “Wolf of Adversity.” These are natural events of life that can strain and test a relationship. As an example, my husband and I experienced a great trial when our youngest son was diagnosed with Laryngomalicia when he was 2 months old. It's a condition that effects the breathing, causing weight loss, poor sleep, and in extreme cases blue spells and low oxygen in the blood. Our son grew out of it when he was a year old and we were definitely glad to have passed through such a difficult health challenge.

Human Imperfections

The second wolf is our own human imperfections. Living with a spouse can be a great trial and sometimes their imperfections can be very difficult to live with. Hafen wrote, “One woman told me through her tears how her husband’s constant criticism finally destroyed not only their marriage but her entire sense of self-worth. He first complained about her cooking and housecleaning, and then about how she used her time, how she talked, looked, and reasoned. Eventually she felt utterly inept and dysfunctional.” (Hafen, 1996)

Our reaction to the imperfections of our spouse can have a great impact on our marriage for better or for worse.

Excessive Individualism

The third wolf is the extreme individualism that pervades our society. The idea that we need to be left alone and don’t really belong to anyone and don’t want to be tied down with messy relationships is becoming more common. To quote Hafen, “Our deepest God-given instinct is to run to the arms of those who need us and sustain us. But he drives us away from each other today with wedges of distrust and suspicion. He exaggerates the need for having space, getting out, and being left alone.” (Hafen, 1996)

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As we make covenants with God, we receive great blessings in this life to overcome difficulties with our spouses. The Lord will bless and remember those who keep the commandments. In the words of David A. Bednar, “As a husband and wife are each drawn to the Lord (see 3 Ne. 27:14), as they learn to serve and cherish one another, as they share life experiences and grow together and become one, and as they are blessed through the uniting of their distinctive natures, they begin to realize the fulfillment that our Heavenly Father desires for His children. Ultimate happiness, which is the very object of the Father’s plan, is received through the making and honoring of eternal marriage covenants.” (Bednar 2006)

References:

Bednar, David A. (2006). Marriage Is Essential to His Eternal Plan, Ensign, June.

Benson, Ezra T. (1986). What I Hope You Would Teach Your Children about the

Temple, Ensign, April, 1.

Hafen, Bruce. C. (1996) Covenant Marriage, Ensign, Nov, 26-28.

Marriage is Ordained of God

In 2008, I was living just outside of Sacramento, California which was a hotbed of political activity surrounding “Prop 8,” a ballet proposition which amended the state constitution to specify that marriage was between a man and a woman. This would also mean that gay marriage would not be recognized or issued by the state of California. It was a difficult experience as the community in which I lived was greatly divided over the issue. I personally had a gay couple who lived just a few doors down from me and other neighbors who were in support of gay marriage. 

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In a letter written to Supreme Court Justice Kennedy, Katy Faust, a woman who was raised by a same sex couple wrote the following: “This is not about being against anyone. This is about what I am for. I am for children! I want all children to have the love of their mother and their father. Being for children also makes me for LGBT youth. They deserve all the physical, social, and emotional benefits of being raised by their mother and father as well. But I fear that, in the case before you, we are at the mercy of loud, organized, well-funded adults who have nearly everyone in this country running scared.”

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I echo her sentiments that supporting the traditional role of marriage is not being against those who are gay or lesbian or their desire to live in a committed relationship. This is about supporting the right of children to be raised by their father and mother. 

I also support traditional marriage because I believe that, “The family is ordained of God. Marriage between man and woman is essential to His eternal plan. Children are entitled to birth within the bonds of matrimony, and to be reared by a father and a mother who honor marital vows with complete fidelity.” (The Family, para. 7)

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I believe that God has set this standard for his people. It isn’t my standard, but as a Christian I want to follow God and be obedient to His teachings and commandments. As Elder Russell M. Nelson stated in a commencement address at BYU, “God is the Father of all men and women. They are His children. It was He who ordained marriage as the union of a man and a woman. Marriage was not created by human judges or legislators. It was not created by think tanks or by popular vote or by oft-quoted bloggers or by pundits. It was not created by lobbyists. Marriage was created by God!” (Nelson, 2014)

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In the Supreme Court case of Obergefell v. Hodges, Justice Roberts wrote the following about traditional marriage in his dissenting opinion from the majority: "This universal definition of marriage as the union of a man and a woman is no historical coincidence. Marriage did not come about as a result of a political movement, discovery, disease, war, religious doctrine, or any other moving force of world history—and certainly not as a result of a prehistoric decision to exclude gays and lesbians. It arose in the nature of things to meet a vital need: ensuring that children are conceived by a mother and father committed to raising them in the stable conditions of a lifelong relationship." (Obergefell v. Hodges, 2015)

Roberts also stated, “The premises supporting this concept of marriage are so fundamental that they rarely require articulation. The human race must procreate to survive. Procreation occurs through sexual relations between a man and a woman. When sexual relations result in the conception of a child, that child’s prospects are generally better if the mother and father stay together rather than going their separate ways. Therefore, for the good of children and society, sexual relations that can lead to procreation should occur only between a man and a woman committed to a lasting bond. Society has recognized that bond as marriage. And by bestowing a respected status and material benefits on married couples, society encourages men and women to conduct sexual relations within marriage rather than without.” (Obergefell v. Hodges, 2015)

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Not only is it important to uphold traditional marriage as the fundamental unit of society, it is also important to uphold religious freedom. In the case of Prop. 8, the people voted that marriage was between a man and a woman but the courts decided to overturn that decision, and later the supreme court made a federal ruling to allow same sex marriage. As Justice Roberts stated, "Those who founded our country would not recognize the majority’s conception of the judicial role. They after all risked their lives and fortunes for the precious right to govern themselves. They would never have imagined yielding that right on a question of social policy to unac­countable and unelected judges." (Obergefell v. Hodges, 2015)

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Roberts continued, "Hard questions arise when people of faith exercise religion in ways that may be seen to conflict with the new right to same-sex marriage—when, for example, a reli­gious college provides married student housing only to opposite-sex married couples, or a religious adoption agency declines to place children with same-sex married couples. Indeed, the Solicitor General candidly acknowl­edged that the tax exemptions of some religious institu­tions would be in question if they opposed same-sex mar­riage. There is little doubt that these and similar questions will soon be before this Court. Unfortunately, people of faith can take no comfort in the treatment they receive from the majority today." (Obergefell v. Hodges, 2015)

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"Perhaps the most discouraging aspect of today’s decision is the extent to which the majority feels compelled to sully those on the other side of the debate. The majority offers acursory assurance that it does not intend to disparage people who, as a matter of conscience, cannot accept same-sex marriage.That disclaimer is hard to square with the very next sentence, in which the majority explains that “the necessary consequence” of laws codify­ing the traditional definition of marriage is to “demea[n] or stigmatiz[e]” same-sex couples. The major­ity reiterates such characterizations over and over. By the majority’s account, Americans who did nothing more than follow the understanding of marriage that has existed for our entire history." (Obergefell v. Hodges, 2015)

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As a Christian and an American, I love my neighbors and I also love God. I hold no hatred for those who believe differently than me. My desire is to uphold the family as an institution created by God to help His children gain earthly bodies, live on earth with their father and mother, and gain the experience needed to return and live with Him again.

References:

The family: A proclamation to the world. (1995, November). Ensign, 25, p. 102

Nelson, Russell M. (2014, Aug. 14). Disciples of Jesus Christ-Defenders of Marriage. 

Brigham Young University Commencement. 

Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. (2015). Supreme Court of the United States.