Got any of those pesky cohabiting couples in your church?
Here’s what one fellowship decided to do:
I (Finally) Do: Cohabitating couples treated to free church wedding.
A Long Beach, California, pastor challenged couples in his congregation who were living together to get married. Four did.
Mike Goldsworthy of Parkcrest Christian Church led the weddings in October, along with his associate pastors. They took turns administering the vows to the couples in a big, four-way ceremony. It was his effort to show that marriage is essential for Christian couples, and still viable. He told the couples that a wedding is not simply a formality.
“We believe that God’s plan for a couple is not to be living together, but marriage,” Goldsworthy told the couples, most of whom had been cohabitating for years and were raising children.
75% of millennial generation ‘never married’ as of 2009, compared to 52% of boomers at that age in 1978.
—Pew Research Center
