Each fall for roughly a decade, I walk into a large lecture hall in DeBartolo Hall to teach a class on the sacrament of marriage to more than 250 Notre Dame undergraduates. The course is basically a classic treatment of the sacrament — beginning with cultural analysis around dating in our age, moving to a deeper understanding of the nature of love in philosophy, and then concluding with a study of the theology of marriage in Catholic, Protestant and Orthodox contexts. 

Why would 250 undergraduates line up to read Jean-Luc Marion or Hildegard of Bingen? 

Well, for the most part, nearly all the students in the class want to get married. And somehow, they have come to see this class as a way of helping them to achieve this end. If they can only figure out what love and marriage are, maybe they will find their person. 

That’s a lot to put on a single theology class meeting from 12:30-1:45 p.m. on Monday and Wednesday. What does happen is that students come face-to-face with their fears around marriage. 

A typical Notre Dame undergraduate is afraid of marriage. Many of them are scared because they have come from divorced homes. If it didn’t work for their parents, how will it work for them? They’re also afraid that they just don’t have time to think about marriage until they are much older. If they let questions of dating, love and marriage interfere with long-term goals, then they won’t have professional success. 

They’re also just afraid of dating. I regularly hear from students about being “ghosted” in the early stages of a relationship — everything was going fine until the fear of commitment surfaced on the part of the other person and all communication was cut off. A once-upon-a-time close friend now treats the wounded party like a stranger. The shame and sorrow of being ghosted is even worse if the students experienced some sort of physical intimacy during an extended “talking phase.” It’s objectifying and therefore heartbreaking to share a part of yourself with another person, only to have this gift rejected. 

So, you could imagine an undergraduate saying to him or herself, “Forget about it. I’m probably never getting married” — especially when, at present, it is acceptable to treat all institutional commitments lightly. You don’t plan on a lifetime career in a specific field, being told from the time that you’re young that you need to be adaptable, depending on the economy. You don’t live in your hometown (or any hometown) since you need to be able to move wherever opportunities arise. And since marriage is that supreme institutional commitment, it should be worn especially lightly. 

Ironically, the gift of a class of 250 students is that you can talk about these fears. The students recognize in the class that they’re not alone. They’re not the only ones afraid — and in that sense, they become part of a community who is dissatisfied with the prevailing culture of dating. 

More importantly, the class gives students the hope of freedom. From a Catholic perspective, the fruit of cultural analysis should be awareness that things could change. Divorce isn’t inevitable. Ghosting isn’t a necessity. Human beings possess the freedom to change situations. 

That’s the challenge I lay out to the students in the first classes every fall: You don’t like the way that dating works at Notre Dame — change it. Start by asking someone out on a date, letting them know that you’re interested in something more than a hookup. If 250 students do this on a campus of 9,000, that’s enough to make an impact. 

Also, just because your parents are divorced doesn’t mean that’s your future. Divorced kids, as my students often tell me, know very well what was wrong with the marriages of their parents. Being aware of those things, you can avoid participating in them yourself. 

Lastly, the narrative that professional achievement and personal happiness are at odds is the supreme myth. In fact, it may be the reason that so many couples find themselves unhappy in the first place — they see their relationships as obstacles to professional success. You don’t have to live as if that’s the case. You could live, as the Christian tradition proposes, as if personal flourishing is connected to relationship. I am happy, I am successful, not because of what I have achieved unto myself but because of who I am in relationship with others — who have made possible that achievement. 

Here, I’m honest with the students. I wouldn’t have completed my doctorate in theology without my marriage. I wouldn’t be able to navigate the difficulties of academic life without my spouse. We are in it together — and that commitment has been integral to any personal success I have experienced. 

In fact, God has made me this way — dependent on other people. The worship I offer to God each morning depends on reliance: It is the Lord who opens my lips, that I might offer him praise. 

That reliance upon God is freedom, and since we are created in the image and likeness of God, that same reliance extends to other human beings. 

So, yes, there’s fear. But fear becomes less powerful if we name it; if we recognize that many of our fears are founded not on reality but on powerful, cultural myths that we have received — and if we come to see that the loving God who made us wants us to experience this freedom in relationship with other people.

The gift of an education is that students have been able to recognize that the kind of mythic thinking that dominates romance and commitment today is self-defeating. I’ve seen them embrace new practices, to help develop a better culture of loving commitment. Undergraduates terrified of admitting that they love their boyfriend or girlfriend recognize that dependency is good. It’s okay to be vulnerable. Many cease hooking up, looking instead to engage in healthier dating practices. And at least once a year, I get an email from a Notre Dame graduate who took my class, telling me that they’re getting married. Such emails often come from students who were most afraid of commitment. And yet, here they are — getting hitched. 

And the cherry on top? They ask me to send along to them, as they’re preparing for marriage, the syllabus from our class. They’re hoping to reread everything again and discuss it with their future spouse as they get ready for marriage. 

So I pass along Jean-Luc Marion and Hildegard of Bingen one more time, looking forward to the way that this couple will create a new culture wherever they will set up their first home — a culture of vulnerability, commitment, and friendship with God, one another, and, eventually, their kids. 

Timothy P. O’Malley is the director of education at the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame.