Why bother getting married?

The question was posed over a beer and was considered.

If marriage is simply about sex, then why bother? One could live with a partner and enjoy sexual pleasures to the nines and when the heat gets turned down simply find another. And since marriage isn't about having children, but rather preventing conception in 101 different ways, then truly, why bother?

If marriage can be dissolved by signing a paper before a judge at an exorbitant cost, why bother with the marriage part and just dissolve a partnership at no cost? Doesn't having a pre-nupital agreement already scream redundant. Just do away with the marriage thing and make your own personal contract that can broken when one feels like it.

If marriage is about companionship and not being alone, then why bother with the 'marriage' part. One simply needs to find a companion and stick with them as long as the feel like.

If marriage is about saving money on taxes - oh wait, that doesn't matter anymore. One can claim a common-law partner on their taxes. Never mind.

If marriage is about preserving a blood-line, royal or the like ... oh wait, we've done away with kings and queens and hierarchy as well. I keep forgetting everyone is equal and is supposed to do their best to be like everybody else. I wonder if this is why teachers dress like the students in some schools ...?

If marriage is about having a family one doesn't need to be married to have a family anymore. Children in Canadian society have the lost the right to have a mother and a father. Two woman can have a so-called 'marriage' and though they have no biological way of begetting a child, are allowed to adopt. Obviously marriage can no longer be about the children in these cases and it is more about filling a void or feeling special or something or other.

If marriage ... is there any other reason to be married?

The Catholic Church says so. But who are they? Just a bunch of old codgers wearing dress robes making up rules to keep people from enjoying sex. I mean, that Church has been around for 2000 years, what possibly could they have to contribute to our modern society today? The idea that marriage is a covenant and is unbreakable - well everyone knows that is just silly. Jesus didn't mean it when He said only God could sever a marriage and that anyone who marries after a divorce is in adultery. Simply ask the Protestants. They divorce and remarry all the time and they still love Jesus. Who was Jesus anyways? God?

And this antiquated idea that marriage is for procreation - give us all a break St. Augustine. We all know you had a child out of wedlock and you called him a 'gift of God'. Children are resilient. Look around you. Most adults have lived through a divorce as a child and they're all fine. Right? Further, we love having sex. Having children just gets in the way of the pleasure we want. It's my life and I should be able to have sex as much as I want. For the Church to tell me birth control is intrinsically evil because it is unnatural is ridiculous. Them believing they are the voice of God on morality is unnatural. We all make up our own morality do we not? Morality is based on how we all collectively feel about something.

We can also toss Chesterton out the window. He, one of these philosopher guys, actually believed it was against the dignity of man to use contraceptives! Why? The buffoon had the audacity to suggest that copious amounts of sex without natural consequences could causes vices in our nature ... like being able to eat whatever we want whenever we want without consequences. What is a vice? The Protestants don't read Chesterton anyways and they still love Jesus. They stick with the good writers like CS Lewis and really just his Chronicles of Narnia.

And this Catholic talk about sin, sin, sin! St. Paul, when he said that fornicators don't go to Heaven, meant those folk that are having sex in ... well ... evil ways ... those bad guys. You can't call a person a 'fornicator' because they love someone and are living with them and sleeping with them. He meant only those that don't love. I know this is what the Bible means here because I feel like that is what Holy Spirit is revealing to me.

No. There is no reason to get married as far as I can see. And at the end of the day don't we 'dare to hope' that God won't send anyone to hell anyways (I say this just in case there is some sort of sin here ...).

No. We're free to do as we please. And we'll be happier this way right. Just look around. Isn't everyone ... happier?