David and Vera Mace have spent almost forty years making a vital
relationship of their own marriage, and, because of their inherent sense
of purpose, consequently have enriched the lives and marriages of
innumerable persons in some sixty countries around the world.
David Mace's first degree was in science from the University of London.
Earlier family influence led him on to Cambridge University, a degree in
theology, and work in a mission church in the slums of London. Vera,
already in youth work, joined him after their marriage in the work of
the mission church. From that point on theirs was a partnership which
focused on counselling persons in trouble. Later, a PhD. in sociology
for David and a Masters degree with a thesis on Christian marriage for
Vera, moved them into full time marriage guidance work. (Two children, a
war causing forced separation for a time, and a pacifist stand by David
which also made life more difficult, only strengthened them in their
life's purpose.) Before leaving Britain permanently in 1949, they had
set up more than one hundred marriage guidance centers and achieved
their goal of recognition for the Marriage Guidance Council.
It would be impossible to enumerate specifically here all the activities
of teaching, published writing, training seminars and travels the Maces
have shared. Theirs has been a life of richly varied experiences and
shared responsibilities.
From 1960-67 the Maces served as joint Executive Directors of the
American Association of Marriage Counsellors. At present they are
members of Summit Friends Meeting in New Jersey, currently living in
Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where David Mace is Professor of Family
Sociology at the Behavioral Sciences Center, Bowman Gray School of
Medicine. David Mace delivered the 1968 Rufus Jones Lecture, _Marriage
As Vocation_. This pamphlet and the project it presents is an outgrowth
of that experience.
"How important is it that Quakers should have good marriages, and what
should Friends General Conference be doing about it?" This question was
asked at a gathering of ten married couples, all of them Friends,
representing both the U.S. and Canada.
What brought these couples together was the common bond that all had
been leading marriage enrichment retreats at which six to eight
couples, all with stable marriages, spent an intensive weekend sharing
marital growth around the theme "communications-in-depth about
relationship-in-depth."
The project of which they had been a part dates back to the 1968 Rufus
Jones Lecture, _Marriage as Vocation_.[A] The impact of the Lecture and
the weekend following resulted in the Religious Education Committee of
Friends General Conference sponsoring a project to train couples
selected by Yearly Meetings to lead marriage enrichment programs in
their own regions. The first group was trained in 1969, the second in
1971, and, as the majority of them met again the consensus grew that
this project had been sufficiently tested to provide the basis for a
more extensive movement within our fellowship.
A number of concerns emerged that can best be expressed as questions:
Do Friends reaffirm their traditional belief in marriage and
the family as the foundation unit of the Meeting?
Do Friends believe that their mission to spread love and peace
in the world begins with the practice of love and peace in
their own primary relationships?
Are our Meetings doing their utmost to make use of modern
knowledge and experience in the preparation for marriage of
those for whom they accept responsibility?
Are our Meetings satisfied with what they are doing for the
care and support of the marriages of their members, and that
divorces that occur could not have been prevented by any means
that lay in their power?
Would Friends in positions of leadership be willing to
demonstrate their support for this project by participating in
retreats at which they can examine with others the
potentialities for growth of their own marriages?
Those who met at Pendle Hill were not in a position to answer any of
these questions in a definitive way. It is clear that answers would
vary from one Friend to another and from one Meeting to another. They
felt, however, that it would be appropriate and timely for these
questions to be more widely considered. Moreover, their own experiences
of marital growth, resulting from their sharing with other married
couples, had been so rich and rewarding that they felt they had "good
news" to pass on, and were constrained to do so.[B]