The discussion of marriage can become rather forbidding and gloomy when, as often happens, it bogs down on an analysis of various marital difficulties. Too often we are taken up with what is wrong with marriage rather than with what is right with it. I think that there have been many of us who have been influenced by theologians like John Calvin, a very important and creative thinker, but one who had a rather one-sided view of marriage. Consider his commentary on First Corinthians, Chapter 7, in which he says: "Marriage is a remedy ordained by God to help our weakness and is to be used by anyone who does not possess the gift of continence."1 With this kind of "enthusiasm" about marriage, it is easy to see why many Christians have come to think of it as little more than an institution for cripples. Such negativism is not present in much of today's theology, which stresses the positive values of marriage. Marriage is conceived of as a sacrament, which means an encounter with God. Thus it is a way in which human beings can meet God and share in divine life. This em phasis on its joy and goodness casts upon marriage a light very different from that in which it is seen in terms of interpersonal problems or as a remedy for concupiscence. With such diverse attitudes within Christianity, there are many who