State of Our Unions | World Congress | Virginia | Ads in Michigan | NO to Ike| Arranged Marriages | Explosive Growth | Catholic campaign - 8/3/07

[Smartmarriages]

- I'M BACK  
- REPORT FINDS 'MARRIAGE GAP' IN NEW JERSEY
- RELATE AND COUPLES CARE PRESENTED AT WORLD CONGRESS
- GROUP HOPES TO REDUCE DIVORCE IN VIRGINIA
- LOCAL AD CAMPAIGN PROMOTES MARRIAGE (OUR OWN JIM SHERIDAN)
- MAYOR DECLINES IKE TURNER DAY PROCLAMATION (BRIDGET BRENNAN)
- COUPLES IN ARRANGED MARRIAGE NEEDED FOR STUDY
- CLIP FROM RE NEWSLETTER ILLUSTRATES EXPLOSIVE GROWTH OF MARRIAGE EDUCATION
- FOLLOW UP ON CATHOLIC MARRIAGE CAMPAIGN LAUNCHED IN JUNE

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- I'M BACK  

I'm jet-lagged and wasting a lot of time trying to rebuild my "financial
identity" - my wallet was stolen in Amsterdam.  Makes me feel stupid that I
was so easily distracted and double teamed, but as my granddaughter said,
"It could have been worse - we didn't get hurt or sick." The wisdom of a 12
year old. You know the time-draining drill - closing and reopening bank
accounts, credit cards, driver's license, etc.  BUT good to be back and to
see that you've all been very busy!  Here are a bunch of wonderful marriage
posts, with more to come as I work through over a thousand emails. BTW, I
highly recommend the granddaughter trip - it was like a 2 week slumber party
and I got to know Mattie very well after being completely consumed and
distracted her entire life with Smart Marriages. And, she got to know
Venice, Amsterdam, Paris and her gramma and better understand what I do and
why I'm always so busy. I'm convinced that after two weeks of listening to
me she could start answering the press calls.  And, though she's still torn
between wishing I would retire (and have more time to spend with her and her
cousins) and continuing the work to help strengthen marriage she did
volunteer that she wants to come and help in SF. We shall see....

BTW, I'll be away again looking at hotel sites in Fla and Texas for '09 and
have to do a site visit to SF in upcoming weeks, so, patience please with
your requests.  I still don't have the new electronic evaluation report from
AMEDCO - expected glitches, but this is painful.  And, I still don't have
the registrants reports - so can't help, yet, with sending you contacts,
etc.  In time.  - diane

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- REPORT FINDS 'MARRIAGE GAP' IN NEW JERSEY

Report finds 'marriage gap' in New Jersey
by Peggy O'Crowley
NJ.com 
July 19, 2007

An increasing number of high income, highly-educated people getting and
staying married are creating a "marriage gap" that parallels the growing
economic divide of haves and havenots, according to a Rutgers University
report on marriage.

Among the findings:

- New Jersey brides and grooms are the oldest in the country.

- The divorce rate in New Jersey is among the lowest in the country.

- Married couples here have fewer children than the national average, a
reflection of its rich suburbs.

In contrast, low-income couples in the state's urban areas have higher rates
of cohabitation and out-of-wedlock births, said David Popenoe, co-director
of The National Marriage Project, which today issued "The State of Our
Unions 2007: The Social Health of Marriage in America."

"It's a microcosm of the gap," he said.

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- RELATE AND COUPLES CARE PRESENTED AT WORLD CONGRESS

Summary of the Larson, Holman, Halford, & Busby Research Presentations
at the World Congress of Behavioural and Cognitive Therapies
Barcelona, Spain
July 11-14, 2007
 
This conference, held every 3 years, brings together international scholars
from over 60 countries to focus on cutting-edge research studies on
cognitive and behavioral psychoeducational programs and therapies as well as
new findings in brain research, longitudinal outcome studies, and randomized
controlled studies of many types of interventions for depression, anxiety
disorders, eating disorders, obsessive-compulsive disorder, pain disorders,
somatoform disorders, PTSD and stress disorders, couple and family
dysfunction, parenting, etc.
 
As part of the RELATE Institute we were invited to present two lines of our
research: 
 
1) Assessment Based Interventions with Couples by Dr. Dean Busby. Busby was
one of four international experts presenting on relationship education
programs for couples. The other presenters were Kim Halford from Australia,
Kurt Hahlweg from Germany, and Alan Christiansen from California.  Busby
presented data from three studies completed in the last few years on RELATE
that have demonstrated that RELATE is the only relationship inventory that
has empirical evidence for its positive impact on couple relationships.  In
addition RELATE is effective in improving couple relations when
self-interpreted by couples, when interpreted by counselors or educators,
and when used to structure a formal session-based educational program.
 
2) Workshop on A brief, assessment-based stepped delivery couple
intervention: The RELATE CoupleCARE program by Jeffry Larson, Thomas Holman,
and Keithia Wilson (Griffith University, Australia) described how these two
empirically-supported psychoeducational programs, RELATE (USA) and
CoupleCARE (Australia/Kim Halford) can be used together in a stepped
intervention to provide first, a comprehensive assessment of couple
strengths and work areas, and second, based on the couple profile of
strengths and work areas identified by RELATE, a flexible delivery couple
education and enrichment program. Participants were introduced to both
programs and how they work together in a stepped format followed by research
findings on the impact on couple¹s relationship satisfaction and
functioning.
 
An Australian Research Council grant has been submitted by our international
team to fund a four-year randomized controlled study of the combined
programs.  We expect to hear from the grantors in early September, 2007.
 
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- GROUP HOPES TO REDUCE DIVORCE IN VIRGINIA

Group Hopes to Reduce Divorce in Virginia
July 23, 2007 
WTOP 

NORFOLK, Va. - Getting divorced in Virginia may be more difficult if a
conservative advocacy group gets its way.

Family Foundation, which led the push to ban same-sex marriage in Virginia,
has formed a commission that will recommend public policies that could
preserve traditional marriages.

Foundation executive director Victoria Cobb says the commission includes
academics as well as religious leaders. It first met July 12 and will hold
another closed meeting in September.

Attorney General Bob McDonnell and Lieutenant Governor Bill Bolling have
appointed representatives to the commission. A spokesman for Governor Tim
Kaine says the governor likely will do the same.

Cobb says says the panel won't try to curb all divorce, but they hope to
"provide speed bumps."

Information from: The Virginian-Pilot

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- LOCAL AD CAMPAIGN PROMOTES MARRIAGE (OUR OWN JIM SHERIDAN)
The Daily Telegram 
AUGUST 1, 2007 
By Phil Johnson

Local ad campaign promotes marriage
According to a local agency, exchanging vows makes people healthier, richer
and more satisfied with intimate relationships.

ADRIAN (Michigan) ‹ Getting married could make you healthy, wealthy and more
sexually satisfied, according to a new advertising campaign showing up in
Lenawee County.

According to Marriages That Work in Lenawee County, exchanging vows makes
people healthier, richer and more satisfied with intimate relationships.

³We have lulled ourselves into saying Œfor Pete¹s sake, marriage is just a
piece of paper,¹ ² said JAMES SHERIDAN, district court judge and founder of
Marriages That Work.

But Sheridan said research on the benefits of getting and staying married
has progressed from ³just a trickle² to the ³Niagara Falls² in recent years.

He said the popular media, music and movies often portray single people as
enjoying greater wealth and sexual happiness, but that simply isn¹t true.

³One of the realities of the world is we tend to behave the way we believe,²
Sheridan said.

Marriages That Work, a Lenawee County group affiliated with the Michigan
Healthy Marriage Coalition, is trying to educate the public to change the
way they perceive marriage through an ad campaign called ³Better Health,
Greater Wealth, Better Lovin¹.²

Billboards, bus panel ads and even television commercials touting the
organization¹s three-pronged message are popping up on highways and
television sets countywide.

Sharon Starling, a marketing consultant who helped develop the campaign,
said she hopes the ads will drive people to the group¹s Web site,
www.getitmarried.org, which promotes locally based programming on building
healthy relationships.

Starling cited a University of Wisconsin study saying that out of 100
couples only 55 will get married. Only 12 of those same couples will still
be married a decade later. Starling said many couples mistakenly think
living together before marriage is a good way to test their relationship.
She says it actually does more harm than good.

³We have to re-educate people because what we have found is that it is
harmful to people who want to get married,² she said.

Starling said she hopes people will take advantage of the Web site¹s
resources, because marriage can increase people¹s quality of life.

³We are offering these programs based on research,² she said.

But health, wealth and sexual satisfaction aren¹t the only benefits of tying
the knot. According to Sheridan, keeping healthy marriages also lowers the
incarceration rate. Although it would be hard to measure these effects in
the short term, he said, over longer periods prison populations would lower.

³There are studies that support this, this isn¹t just someone rambling on,²
he said.

He said many times people also rush too quickly to divorce before exploring
counseling options. Sheridan said divorce is often more damaging for both
partners and children than staying in the relationship.

Despite that, he said there are marriages that should end, specifically
those that involve domestic violence.

Sheridan said he hopes the ads will help inform people who may not have
learned the benefits of healthy marriages through formal education.

The ³Better Health, Greater Wealth, Better Lovin¹² ad campaign was funded in
part by a $1.1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services awarded to the Michigan Healthy Marriage Coalition.

****CLICK here to see our very own Judge Sheridan and one of the billboards:
http://www.lenconnect.com/articles/2007/07/22/news/news04.txt

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- MAYOR DECLINES IKE TURNER DAY PROCLAMATION (BRIDGET BRENNAN)
July 19, 2007 
St Louis Post 

ST. LOUIS ‹ Legendary musician Ike Turner will have the
stage when he returns to St. Louis, but he won't have his
day.

Mayor Francis Slay on Wednesday turned down a request to
honor Turner, the rock icon who has publicly admitted
hitting his former wife, entertainer Tina Turner.

Slay was asked to make Sept. 2 "Ike Turner Day" in St.
Louis, the same day the award-winning performer is scheduled
to play the Big Muddy Blues Festival at Laclede's Landing.

Dawne Massey, director of the music festival, made the
request. She says the mayor's office has bestowed a similar
honor in previous years for headliners at the concert.

"He helped put St. Louis rhythm and blues on the map,"
Massey said about Turner. "We were only looking to celebrate
his contributions to the music
industry. Many entertainers have checkered pasts."

On Wednesday, Slay's office received phone calls from women
who did not want the mayor to honor Turner.

One of them was BRIDGET BRENNAN, executive director of the
ST. LOUIS HEALTHY MARRIAGE COALITION.

"We believe there is a zero tolerance for any kind of
violence," Brennan said. "We would not want to honor someone
who has publicly stated they have hit their wife."

Cathy Smentkowski, an aide to Slay, said that when the
request "was brought to the mayor's attention, he did not
feel comfortable issuing it." Asked why, she would offer no
further explanation.

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- COUPLES IN ARRANGED MARRIAGE NEEDED

Dr. Robert Epstein is looking for couples in arranged marriages to interview
for an upcoming book and article on how people learn to love. If you're in a
happy arranged marriage where love has emerged over time, please contact him
at repstein at post.harvard.edu or his grad student intern, Caitlin Pincus at
Cpincus at ucsd.edu Interviews are confidential. They may be done in person if
you live in San Diego, CA, or by phone or through email.  Epstein (who
presented at Smart Marriages in 2003) is a longtime researcher and
professor, the former Editor-in-Chief of Psychology Today, a contributing
editor for Scientific American Mind, and the host of "Psyched!" on Sirius
Satellite Radio.  You can learn more about his work at http://DrEpstein.com.

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- CLIP FROM RE NEWSLETTER ILLUSTRATES EXPLOSIVE GROWTH OF MARRIAGE EDUCATION

Message from Mary Ortwein, AFREM president
 
I was remembering last week the great joy our family had two years ago when
my first grandson was born.  It was a time for all of us to bond with each
other as well as with the baby.  Some friends of theirs, who had a child
today, were not so fortunate.  The ³birth day² was marred by the new
grandparents, long divorced, who took the occasion to air old grievances. 
³So that what happened in my family when my parents divorced doesn¹t have to
keep happening² was the number two reason why my University of Kentucky
students chose a major in Family studies.  Divorce hurts, and not just now.
 
I don¹t have time to think such sobering thoughts much these days.  RE and
help for marriage are exploding!  We trained over 1000 new program leaders
in the past year.  We¹re part of 34 of the federally funded Healthy
Marriages grants.  One new Trainer-of-Leaders-in-Training taught RE to more
than 300 people in her first year as a program leader.  People are taking RE
to prisons, Headstarts, homeless shelters, churches, schools, dancing
lessons, health departments, and just about everywhere.  Almost every week
someone tells me a story of a life changed by RE: a middle aged man who
reconnected with his father in failing health, a couple reconnected on the
brink of divorce, a young woman who used it to bring a sister back into the
family.
 
At Smart Marriages last month the mood was ³we¹re making a difference!²  And
we are.  The collective ³we¹ of all of us who bring . . . RE relationship
education-along with the ³we² of those who teach a host of other wonderful
programs, who work to build a pro-marriage culture in their communities, and
who work with couples using a variety of good therapy tools.
 
The ³we² is growing.  I hope you are already a part of it.  If not, please
join us now.  We need you to make a difference.
 
As AFREM¹s president for the next year, I want to invite you to find your
niche as part of the ³let¹s make families better² movement that¹s gaining
momentum across the country.  . . .

Margaret Meade once said, ³Never doubt that a small group of committed
citizens can change the world.  Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.²

To subscribe to the free RE newsletter, visit: nire.org
 
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- FOLLOW UP ON CATHOLIC MARRIAGE CAMPAIGN LAUNCHED IN JUNE

Catholic church launches media blitz for marriage
SOME QUESTION INSTITUTION'S TRACK RECORD ON HEALTHY RELATIONSHIPS
By Stephanie Simon
Los Angeles Times
07/22/2007 

The gestures are sweet but modest: I carried my wife's purse. I made her
breakfast. I taped a note to her mirror telling her I liked her haircut.

Nothing earth-shattering there. And yet the Roman Catholic Church is
counting on publicizing these small acts of everyday kindness to revitalize
the institution of marriage.

Alarmed by the persistently high divorce rate and the growth in couples
living together without a license, Catholic bishops nationwide have teamed
up on a major media campaign aimed at promoting and strengthening marriage.

The first ad campaign, launched this month, features ordinary people talking
about what they've done to enrich their marriages. The bishops hope that the
stories - I brought my husband mustard for his sandwich; I gave him an
enormous hug to start the day - will inspire spouses everywhere to work
harder to keep the flame alive.

But some supporters of the campaign say this might not be an ideal moment
for the Catholic Church to peddle relationship advice.

"These guys are plagued by scandals involving sexual misconduct - how come
they're telling other people what to do? That's the obvious, cynical
reaction," said John Grabowski, an associate professor of moral theology at
Catholic University in Washington, D.C.

Grabowski also noted that the campaign will be colored by the debate over
same-sex marriage. The Catholic Church strongly opposes such unions; the
bishops plan to step up their political activism on the issue in coming
years. With that in the background, some viewers might dismiss the ads as
conservative propaganda.

"That's a minefield the bishops will have to walk," Grabowski said.

He thinks they can do it; indeed, he's signed on as an adviser to the
campaign.

The bishops also are consulting with couples at all stages of dating,
marriage and divorce, to make sure the advice isn't coming solely from
single men sworn to celibacy.

In future stages, the bishops' campaign - known as the National Pastoral
Initiative on Marriage - will be directed more narrowly at Catholic couples.
A pastoral letter, due out within the year, will reinforce the theology of
heterosexual marriage as a sacrament. The bishops also plan to develop
brochures and counseling resources for priests.

Aimed at everyone

For now, the ad campaign is designed with ecumenical appeal. There are no
references to the Catholic Church until the end of each spot, when the
announcer promotes the campaign's Web site, ForYourMarriage.org. The couples
interviewed appear to come from a variety of backgrounds; one woman wears a
traditional Muslim head scarf.

"How effective it will be is anyone's guess, but it can't hurt," said David
Popenoe, director of the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University.

The church is not buying airtime for the ads; it's trying to get them placed
as 30- and 60-second public-service announcements on radio, network TV and
cable outlets nationwide.

So far, the campaign has cost $600,000 in parishioner donations. Much of
that has gone to develop the Web site, which offers spot polls ("Was the
last fight you had with your spouse worth it?"), compatibility quizzes and
the marriage tip of the day.

Those tips are often grimly resolute in nature, such as this one: "Love is
not simply a feeling; it is a decision . . . When the feeling fades - and it
will at times - recommit to building your relationship."

Practical approach

That's not a very gauzy view of romance, but sociologists and counselors say
it's a vital dose of reality in an era when close to 50 percent of first
marriages, 60 percent of second marriages and 75 percent of third marriages
end in divorce. Catholics are less likely than Protestants to divorce, but
faith leaders say they still see far too many ruptured and rocky unions.

Historically, the Catholic Church has not been much help.

Many Protestant pastors - especially in hip evangelical mega-churches -
regularly devote sermons to practical advice on communication, conflict
resolution, even sex. But those topics rarely come up in Catholic homilies,
Grabowski said. Priests often require couples to attend counseling before
the wedding, but some Christian counselors say they're hard-pressed to find
parish-based programs to strengthen existing marriages.

"They don't give it the support that Protestant churches do," said Margaret
Martinez, who runs a Christian marriage counseling program called
Retrouvaille. "I'm very glad to see the bishops are finally waking up."

**************************
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12th Annual Smart Marriages Conference, Hilton San Francisco Hotel,
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