Quote....
In my career as an instructor of “Fiqh of Love” and “Love Notes” with
AlMaghrib Institute, the activity and survey sessions conducted in the class environment included many personal questions submitted by students (both men and women), regarding marriage and marital life. Through this, and the overwhelming marriage counseling sessions and advices given in the course of the past four to five years, I was able to collect enough data and statistics to open a window on the status of social life in the Muslim community in America and provide an insight into the crisis of marriage we face here. The findings com from multiple locations all around the country including places such as Houston, New Jersey, New York, Chicago, The Bay Area and elsewhere - and the results were startling.
The marriage crisis is a big crisis indeed, and while many of our respected older generation are unaware of it, or at least act like that, the youth were left helpless and sometimes hopeless.
In my lecture at Ilmfest in NY “The Crisis of Marriage” back in March 2008, I attempted to speak for the youth, voice their concern and highlight some of these findings, which I’m working on publishing as a separate research insha’Allah. Many of these problems fall into systematic categories that can be summarized into three:
1. Conventional -mixed- views of marriage.
This includes, but not exclusively, issues such as ideals of love and marriage, the premarital life and experience and the determination of readiness in terms of education, career and finances.
2. Gender issues (and yes we do have a gender issue in the Muslim community).
This in this age is a natural contribution of the western culture to the American Muslim community. It includes issues of feminism, gender expectations, sexuality and marriage patterns especially egalitarian marriage and its challenge to the traditional Islamic version of patriarchy.
3. The cultural expectations.
We cannot deny the existence of at least two generations from two different cultures widely misconstrued as one culture, first generation of Muslim immigrants and the second generation of Muslims who were born or grew up in America.
The Muslim community in America is also one of the, if not the most, diverse community in America in terms of ethnicity, race, culture, education, economy, background and religious affiliation (on juristic, political and sometimes sectarian ground). With all this diversity and without getting into the details of this matter, different cultural expectations arise.
Parents (for too many different reasons) are unfortunately rated as the number one reason why too many men and women are delaying their marriages.
Surveying the youth, they admit that once they hit the road of career -per their parent’s demands- and pass the emotional cycle of love and enamor, the desire for marriage becomes for no more than a social requirement that influences their choice. Hence the decision for marriage is usually pragmatic. These marriages are what I call ‘Technical Marriages’ and many people today are technically married but not wholeheartedly married. Some decide to delay their marriages further fearing they might fall into this abyss of technical marriage not realizing that by doing so are increasing their chances of falling into it.
if you want to read more...
http://muslimmatters.org/2008/05/01/the-marriage-project-a-project-nation/