"The underlying problem is the fact that the marriage enrichment retreat
meets unfelt needs. People don't feel keenly that they need it. If you
think your marriage is sound, you aren't strongly motivated to spend a
weekend making it even sounder. To get the tingle of a potential
deepening and enriching takes emotional impact. This means hearing from
someone obviously sensible who is warmly convinced about it."
A number of theories were developed to explain this resistance to our
project. In general, it is true that it takes _problems_ to motivate
married couples to seek help, just as it takes pain to induce many
people to visit a doctor; and in both cases, action may prove to be too
late to be effective. On the other hand, many couples with basically
stable marriages are wistfully aware that their relationship falls short
of their expectations. But it takes a strong stimulus, in the form of a
cordial personal invitation, to get them to take the necessary steps to
enroll for a retreat.
Whatever the cause of this reticence, expressing itself on occasions as
resistance, it seems an inappropriate response to the needs and
opportunities of our day and age and one of the many factors responsible
for the alienation between young and old which is popularly termed the
"generation gap." Our trainees were themselves mainly in the second half
of life, and they well understood the "privatism" that is a legacy of
our past. They themselves, however, had lost nothing, and gained a great
deal by the efforts they had made to cultivate greater openness to
others, both in their marriages and in their wider relationships, and
they would lovingly invite other Friends to make the same venture. They
would also plead with Friends to give stronger support to, and undertake
more active participation in, a project to provide marriage enrichment
retreats for the couples in the care of our Meetings.
Some views were expressed suggesting a special reticence among Friends.
There seemed to be some foundation for two theories--first, that Quakers
tend to be very heavily involved in social projects, sometimes to the
neglect of their own family relationships; and second, that they tend to
be somewhat puritanical in the sense that they consider it improper to
open their private lives to others. There may be a deep dichotomy in
attitudes of Friends here such as reported by one couple: "vivid
impressions of honest encounters between those who regard the worship of
God as a private affair, and those who feel the need to reach out to
their Meeting community for personal support and a sense of communion
which includes closer relationships with other Friends."
Like other Friends, we are finding that these experiences can release
hitherto unrealized and untapped resources of spiritual strength and
power. As expressed by one couple: "For two years we passed through a
dark time in our family, trying to find resources to deal with a
seemingly insurmountable problem. At our first retreat, with the loving
support of the group, we were able as a couple to recover our
self-confidence, sense of worth, and well-being, and reaffirm our
strengths to each other.
"The family problem has now been happily resolved, and we have found
extra strength to participate fully in the expression of our Quaker
concerns in the larger community. Our Meeting did much to sustain us
through the bleakest times, and bring us back into clearness and light;
but what helped us the most to help ourselves was our activities with
the marriage enrichment project. We continue to nurture at home the new
openness and depth we have discovered, and have committed ourselves to
maintain the healthy growth that has been made possible for us."