Christian Marriage: The New Challenge (Second Edition)

2008 Catholic Press Association Award Winner!

Couples who marry today enter into a relationship that is in many ways more challenging than it was a generation or two ago. The social institution of marriage has experienced almost cataclysmic change. The very foundations of marriage are often questioned. Yet Christian marriage, David Thomas insists, retains a power to transform and sanctify lives. Thomas presents in this second edition of Christian Marriage the same view as he did in his first book: a positive view of Christian marriage grounded in sacramental living. Yet this edition is entirely new as Thomas reflects on how current theological, cultural, and economic perspectives influence and inform Christian marriage. Thus A Journey Together (the subtitle of the earlier edition) becomes The New Challenge. And readers enter with Thomas into a discussion of contemporary concerns such as intimacy and sexuality, gender equality and relational spirituality, and parenting with hope in a world of unknowns.

Facing these challenges of marriage, Christian couples will discover ways to meet the one great challenge: to love each other as Christ Jesus has and continues to love us.

David Thomas, PhD, is the current co-director of The Bethany Family Institute. For over thirty years he was a Professor of Systematic Theology, Religion, and Family Life at St. Louis University, St. Meinrad School of Theology in Indiana, and Regis University in Denver. Thomas served as a theological consultant to the United States Catholic Bishops ' Committee on Marriage and Family Life. He and Karen, his wife of forty years, are the parents of seven children and seventy-five foster children. He now lives in Whitefish, Montana.