Relationship Radio: Marriage, Sex, Limerence & Avoiding Divorce
Relationship Radio: Marriage, Sex, Limerence & Avoiding Divorce
How to Navigate Religious Differences Without Hurting Your Marriage
Enjoy the episode? Send us a text!
What if navigating religious differences could actually strengthen your marriage? Join us as we explore this idea with David Mathews, a workshop facilitator here at Marriage Helper. We promise insights into the complexities of religious disagreements and how they intertwine with respect, control, and open communication. Drawing on real-life stories, we uncover the core issues that can arise and how addressing them can transform your relationship, emphasizing the importance of mutual understanding and acceptance.
This episode sheds light on creating a safe space for dialogue, even when unresolved personal traumas complicate religious conflicts. We discuss a couple's journey through a Marriage Helper workshop, where they discovered that issues beyond faith were affecting their relationship. The power of addressing and accepting these differences is highlighted as a tool for building stronger marriages. As we conclude with thoughts on parenting disagreements and the potential for reconciliation or amicable separation, our conversation offers a rich tapestry of advice and hope for couples navigating similar waters.
If you're struggling in your marriage, don’t wait. Get our FREE resource: The 7 Steps to Rescue Your Marriage 👉 https://marriagehelper.com/free
📞 BOOK A CALL WITH OUR TEAM: https://marriagehelper.com/call
🔗 Website: https://marriagehelper.com
📱 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marriagehelper
👀 TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@marriagehelper
Follow our other channels!
📺 https://youtube.com/@kimberlybeamholmes
📺 https://youtube.com/@drjoebeam
This week we're continuing our series on the things we disagree on, and last week we talked about politics and in today's episode we are talking about religion. We are tackling the two big issues up front that people typically say you shouldn't talk about at parties, at family dinners, but in your marriage these are things that you're going to talk about and the thing is that you may have married your spouse with both of you having similar political beliefs, similar religious beliefs, similar ways that you want to raise your kids, but over time things evolve or over time maybe you realize you didn't talk about the things and how you differed and it's come up in a real big way. I'm joined today by David Matthews, dear friend and beloved of Marriage Helper, all things, one of our workshop facilitators, and I'm asking you to talk to us about this. Like what do couples do? How can couples handle it when they disagree about religion?
Speaker 2:First of all, thanks for having me. And this is a fun topic, Fun, putting it in quotes Define fun, define fun. And you already described some of the people we're talking to. But it's all sorts right. You could both have the same faith when you're married and then one changes. A couple very dear to us is going through that right now. She's declared she's an atheist.
Speaker 1:Started as a Christian.
Speaker 2:Yeah, started as a Christian and she's still I mean, he's still a Christian, and it causes a lot of turmoil, right. And then sometimes people like a dear friend of ours he's Catholic, she's an atheist. They were married. I'm going to use them as an illustration today. But so many different combinations, right, so many different. You could be going to the same church and have different religious views. We've dealt with that a lot. As people change and grow, the others hold on, maybe, to traditional views and there's really conflict there. So I hope what we say today applies to every case that's out there, because we're going to set some core issues here.
Speaker 1:So what are some of the core things, the core issues that people are really, really fighting over?
Speaker 2:I think the core issue is respect because, to give you an illustration, as you said, we've been leading the marriage workshop since 2006. So it's about 18 years and early on we had a couple that was there and he shared I'm at this workshop because I want to obey God. I want to obey God and what he was implying was his wife was a God-hater that's how she read it right. They were still going to the same church, but he was controlling her by stating basically, I'm more of a God person than you are, and so what we teach at the workshop says you know, what you teach at Marriage Helper is. So right on with all of this, because if I feel disrespected as a husband to Debbie, if she feels disrespected, it's going to color every way we handle these tough issues like religion, politics, child rearing, all that stuff. It's going to affect it. We've learned that control is a big issue and, in talking to all the facilitators your father, dr Beam and other people as well we think control is one of the biggest issues of couples coming to our workshops, because it's one of the biggest issues of married life.
Speaker 2:I was a nice controller. I was a good guy controller. I didn't slam things. I didn't throw things, didn't yell and scream and cuss, but I was a controller of Debbie and when we disagreed about anything she had felt disrespected for years and I didn't know I was a controller. And so the guy at the workshop that said I want to obey God. They had religious differences in their marriage but she wasn't about to cow down to him because she had had it with his control. He didn't realize he was a controller at all. So we see this at the workshops all the time. So we might be arguing up here about how to raise children or religion, but down here, at the core issue, it's disrespect. And John Gottman in the Marriage Clinic says that there are three main reasons people divorce they feel disliked, unloved and disrespected. They feel unloved, unliked and disrespected and anytime anybody is controlling the other person they're going to feel disrespected. And if after 10, 15 years somebody feels disrespected and you have a problem like religion, then it's not going to go well.
Speaker 1:So the thing about religion, though, is it typically is combined with a strong belief about the afterlife. So there's like, if my husband were to become an atheist, I would be scared for his soul, right Like I would be concerned because I want him to be in heaven, yes, and not just heaven, like, yes, heaven, but also like, because of my beliefs as a Christian, what Jesus does for him here and now. So there would be a very real fear for me.
Speaker 1:So then? So how do you, when you have that fear based on something way more eternal, how do you not control? How do you respect the other person when you are so concerned for them?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't think it's a contradiction. I don't think they're mutually exclusive. I can accept the other person as they are without agreeing with them, and I can be deeply concerned for their soul. And if you weren't deeply concerned, as a Christian too, I would say well, kimberly, that is a big issue and it certainly is. The question is, what helps? You know what really does help? We had a couple like this in a church or individual, a guy whose wife was not a believer and he left tracts. I don't even know if our listeners, viewers, know what a tract is the pamphlets, the pamphlets. He would leave them, he would write notes, he'd have scripture. None of that did any good because she felt controlled by him.
Speaker 2:Oh he left them for her like around the house oh yes, all the time he came and talked he was like 80. They had been married like 50 years, so he was deeply concerned for her soul and yet everything he did was a push. It wasn't a pull in. You can't control what you can influence, right? One of the things I thought about as I learned we were going to do this, one of the things I thought about as I learned we were going to do this, was about people's story. The story is important.
Speaker 2:We had a couple that came to our grief retreats, our Spark of Life grief retreats, and then they came to a marriage workshop right here in Nashville and she was an atheist, he's Catholic and he was concerned about her soul. But they've been together like 10 or 15 years and we grew to love both of them very much and she's the one that came to our retreat. And at the retreat we heard her story. She told me she was an atheist, eating with her that Saturday night. I'll never forget it and I just said tell me why you're an atheist. I'd like to know, because we don't push religion on people at the workshops, right, and we don't push religion at our spark retreats, but we want to influence because we have deep conviction. So I said tell me about it. And she said well, her mother came in when she was eight years old and said you pick your father and me to live with.
Speaker 2:And she's eight years old and she picked her daddy. She didn't know what to do. The mother was leaving. The mother walked out the door and she didn't see her mother for like 15 years, golly. And the mother was having an affair and it turned out and ran off with somebody else and it was her dad and her against the world. That was her story. And when she moved to the United States, she was from another country. She moved to the United States. She was from another country. She moved to the United States and was a beautiful human being with a lot of question marks in her mind about her story. And when the story came out, her father ended up having cancer and she reached out to some Christian people who said they would help financially, but they told her because she didn't go to church, they couldn't help her.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:So that was her back story and I said so your rejection of God is probably the rejection of a God I've rejected. She was an atheist and she said what would your God do different? I said my God would hug you and love you as you are and call you into a loving relationship where God loves you. Mm-hmm. And that started changing everything, because now he knew the story. Now he didn't know the story before the retreat. Then they came to the workshop and so, knowing the story, you can influence better. Without pushing, you can pull. And my recommendation to people, like if you were married to an atheist, is what does your religion tell you you need to do with your husband? What does your religion tell you to do? To love him, obviously, but not to give up your faith, but to do all you can do without control. And since I was a controller and didn't know it until this Marriage Helper Workshop opened my eyes in 2006.
Speaker 1:Thanks, Marriage Helper. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2:Well, it did make all the difference in our marriage.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because I realized I was a controller by trying to fix Debbie. So religious differences carry with it. I think this inherent thing that makes control easier because I justify it. I can justify it by what you said about what I want them to go to heaven and it scares me. And so the control nature can come through because it's a right reason. If that makes sense, it's a right reason, but it's really no right reason to control.
Speaker 1:So should you divorce someone who is unequally yoked?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that could be part of your religion as well. But remember Peter said in 1 Peter 3, if you're married to an unbeliever, win them without what A word? You can win them without a word. So your own religion would say basically, if you can live in peace, stay, but if they want to leave, let them leave. But that's a tough one and really there's so many different circumstances, one answer doesn't fit all.
Speaker 2:And I love that passage of Peter because it fits in with the marriage helper philosophy of not controlling, of not pushing, but pull in influence by the way you treat them with respect. I've seen that with that couple I'm telling you about. She's coming real close to being a believer. She has been pulled in in a healthy way, without making her feel like you're just, you know, an infidel, loser, right. But I've got to know the story too. Maybe the God they're rejecting is not the God you're accepting. Maybe there's a difference in those gods. And you know we're getting real deep here because it could be—it has to be a change of attitude of the person Like you're, as an example not that you and Rob's an atheist, but your example you used. It's a tough situation so obviously you might need some more help if you're in that situation. But sometimes people both are believers, but different kinds of believers.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I think that's an important next point to talk about as well. So you know, you and I come from a similar upbringing denomination within the Christian faith.
Speaker 2:We're going to therapy for that, but that's not.
Speaker 1:Maybe more so than me. I feel like I got saved from it.
Speaker 2:You got saved.
Speaker 1:But my husband and I grew up in that one as well, and this specific denomination within the Christian faith was pretty, would you say, dogmatic, like what's the word.
Speaker 2:It depended on where you went, but yeah, some were very dogmatic that I'm going to reference.
Speaker 1:There was a very strong belief in some churches still to this day that women should be silent in church, maybe in the home. So when Rob and I first got married, he was very much like women should not have any kind, and so he was like I feel super uncomfortable about any of that happening. I felt disrespected, not even because I worked. Actually, ironically, I was. I did work at a church when he and I started dating. I was a director of missions at a church but he but the thought of like a woman getting up and saying something on a Sunday to him, he was like this is a sin, like that's wrong.
Speaker 2:Even if the car in the parking lot has its lights on, I mean, even if she got up and made an announcement. Right, right, right, right yeah, that's what I was going to say.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, exactly. If there's a car, there's a child that needs to be here, right, like you're not allowed to do that. So I felt disrespected just because I was a woman and it was like this feels, oppressive, this feels, and at that time in our marriage we just couldn't have productive conversation about it. Now, now today, he is way different in his belief about that. But I can see how just the specific issues like instrumental music or Catholic versus Christian, or like all of these things that could rip someone apartism by immersion, baptism by sprinkling right, like these things, that people may end up going even to different churches even though they both believe in the same God. How do you deal with those kinds of issues?
Speaker 2:I think you have to set a safe environment. Everything we teach at Marriage Helper plays a part here. I think it's vital Because, again, it might be issues up here, but the real issue is respect. The real issue is I don't feel respected because you're trying to put me in your box of belief. You know your particular box and I think we all need to grow through those things. They're very difficult. It's like religion, I mean, it's like politics. Does the other side have a point every now and then?
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, they do Believe it or not?
Speaker 2:Yeah, believe it or not. Both sides do, and you know we're not taking sides here Right, both sides do, and in religion that needs to happen too. So what does your faith tell you you ought to do right? And so, within the same church environment and you have different beliefs.
Speaker 2:Two of our best friends in life went through this. She was very open-minded and very progressive in her thoughts. He was very legalistic in his thoughts, but the difference was he was genuine in his faith and even though he got upset sometimes in our discussion, she liked me to be around him because he listened to me, right. So I was saying, well, and I told him you need to listen to your wife, you don't have to agree with anything. And he was such a genuine person who wanted to keep growing. If you're a God person, you should never arrive. There's always room for growth. And so to realize that and kind of a fundamental point listen to my spouse, try to understand why. You know what's the story behind it. And there's so many illustrations here of couples. We've had couples come to the workshop who the foundational things that we teach at Marriage Helper, creating a safe place create pulls, not pushes.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Accept right Traction begins everything. But then acceptance is the key. I do not have to change my beliefs to have an accepting attitude and create a safe environment and my wife has every right to her views and if we set that environment then the conflict of religion can be dealt with. But if I don't have that foundation and a lot of people don't, and again control can come out when it's religious differences, because I am on God's side and that kind of attitude needs to.
Speaker 2:I mean, I see Jesus with the adulterous woman, I see him with the woman at the well and they had different religious views. They had different religious views. She was a Samaritan who believed in five books of the Old Testament, the Pentateuch, that was it and the place to worship was at Samaria. He said no, the place to worship is Jerusalem and basically said she was wrong in that. But she was not turned off by it. Why? Because he accepted her. Go call your husband. Well, she had had a lot of husbands and she was living with somebody, not her husband, and she didn't feel condemned by him. So if you're a Christian and you're dealing with this, the scenario you said like they're more radical or they're more legalistic, or you disagree about some things, like women, maybe we need to go back to the Scriptures with Jesus and see how he treated those who disagreed with Him, you know. And she walked away, a changed woman, because she felt his love and acceptance.
Speaker 1:But to the Pharisees he was.
Speaker 2:He was very tough because their hearts and so he you know we're not talking and the Pharisees were trying to kill him and he had to go to the cross. So he kind of set that up in a way. I mean, you know, we could go on all day about that.
Speaker 1:Do you remember, like two years ago, when I called you and said when did you become a heretic? Do you remember this conversation?
Speaker 2:Oh, I do. You called me a heretic. I did I said when did you become a heretic? It didn't bother me, it was kind of a badge of honor.
Speaker 1:And we had like a 45-minute conversation about the issue at hand. And that's one of the things I've been thinking of is we disagreed about something, but I came to you and I wasn't saying it fully, Like you know. I was like when, David, did you become a heretic? Like which part? And we actually had a good conversation about your side, about my side, and, at the end of the day, of course, still respect each other and have a great relationship, and it's that kind of thing that if that could happen in marriages Right, and knowing somebody's story is so important it really is.
Speaker 2:We had a couple come, had a terrible marriage to the workshop, came to me first and sent them to the workshop and he was very much checked out of religion. They went to our church and he came most of the time but he was completely checked out and they disagreed about everything right and he was kind of a practicing religious agnostic. You know, when they went to the workshop things happened because he talked about his past pain and his very religious father who was a leader in a church, had abused him when he was eight, nine, ten years old and he had never told his soul that, never a soul.
Speaker 1:Until the workshop Until the workshop.
Speaker 2:Wow, and it was a long time ago and she had scar tissue. He was well in attachment wording. He was fearful, avoidant or dismissive, avoidant. He was avoiding intimacy and had never said I love you, never, had held her for 30 years and she came into office and said it's over. It's over and you know, one of the presiding things was his religious views too. That hurt her and he's not into this, you know, and he treats me terrible. But the whole core issue was a past childhood hurt and when that came out, doing his homework, going to Marriage Helper in Los Angeles, back in those days, he went to LA. It all came out and that was 16 years ago and they came back different but she still had scar tissue. But the real issue wasn't religion. The real issue was he had a religious father who was a hypocrite and a sick man who had hurt him deeply and they had to work through that.
Speaker 2:He called me about a year ago and he knows I tell his story at the workshop. He knows I tell his story. He gave me permission and their religious differences are now nothing, but they were a big issue. But he had to get to the core of what's going on. It's not always that simple, of course that's not simple. And she still had scar tissue and they had to get therapy afterwards. And he did and they did. And when he called me a year ago we hadn't talked in like eight years. He said are y'all still doing the marriage helper workshop? I said yes, we are. And he said are you still using my story? I said yes, I am. And he said can you tell him something when you tell the story? I said yeah. He said I'm more in love with my wife than I've ever been. We will never leave each other.
Speaker 2:16 years ago came to the workshop but they went to the core. They had to go to the core. It did affect his religious views Sometimes people do change their views, but there's usually a story about it. But acceptance is the key and treating each other with respect, without giving up your beliefs. And I think, like if you were married to Robin, if he had done this, your passion would say tell me about it, I'm a safe place, you can tell me anything. So if you have that, then you're actually demonstrating your religion in a real way. That's really relationship right and not ritual. A real way. That's really relationship right and not ritual, and so you would show that.
Speaker 2:And what else could you do? What else could you do? Right? And if you have to divorce because of differences and it's making it hard, then find some good counsel, find some good. But I would say, first, come to Marriage Helper, take a, save your Marriage course, do something. Do an online workshop, do an in-person workshop, because that's where these issues can really come to the surface. They do all the time. You know that. Yeah, and we don't do psychotherapy at the workshops. We don't do therapy. But what happens at the workshop? You're in a safe environment.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And things do happen, and maybe it's not your differences of religion, and sometimes if it really is a difference. In other words, he or she's not budging. You're not budging because you can't give up your faith, the expression we love to use in grief work, and we use it too in the marriage helper work. When working with people. All you can do is all you can do, and all you can do is enough. You do all you can do. Sometimes it doesn't appear to be enough to save the marriage, but there's nothing else to do. But make sure you do all you can do, not being perfect, but and my encouragement if you're in this situation is use Marriage Helper because it can form a foundation where you can deal with this in a healthy way and even if you do divorce, because of this you can remain friends and that's important for your future and it's important for the kids, no matter how old the kids are 100%.
Speaker 1:Yeah, let's start with trying to understand each other's story.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the story, it's crucial, the story's crucial, okay.
Speaker 1:Well, we're going to dive into the next topic.
Speaker 2:Oh dear.
Speaker 1:Which will be the next video, depending on when you're watching this. We're going to talk about kids. When you disagree about how to parent kids, what's going on with kids, so be sure that you come back next week or you go ahead and watch that one next. No-transcript.
.png)
.png)
