Marriage Is for Keeps: Foundations for Christian Marriage

Rating:
Summary: One of the best books on marriage
Review: If you are getting married, Catholic or not, you need to read Marriage is For Keeps. Each chapter lays out a different topic about how to focus your marriage on the THREE of you - husband, wife and GOD in the center. Each section contains thought provoking questions for you and your mate and lets you ponder how you are going to grow as a person in your marriage. There are tough spots in this book! But marriage is tough too and that's what you are really planning for - a marriage, not a wedding. A must read, whether you are about to be married or already married and wanting to find that something missing. Especially interesting and tough is the chapter on the roles in the marriage. Kippley presents the notion of wives deferring to their husbands very thoughtfully, but also notes that it is counter cultural in the US of A. He remarks that men need to be worthy of the spiritual leadership of their family if they are truly going to lead. Hmm... lots of good stuff to ponder. Enjoy! It put my 10 year old marriage back on His track.

Rating:
Summary: Has its uses for Catholic Engaged Couples
Review: This book has some use for Roman Catholic engaged couples. There is a section in the back based on the approved marriage rites that gives you ideas what readings to have, and what prayers should be said at your wedding.
The main text is only mediocre. Kippley confuses in his own mind the distinctions between his ideas, and what the Catholic church teaches, and so the book fails to make this clear. For example, the Catholic church does teach that contraception is always wrong. (Her reasons for teaching that are both more beautiful and more subtle than Kippley discusses.) It's quite unfair to the church for Kippley to summarize her teaching on openness to children by indicating that a couple is likely to get bored with each other if they don't have children. And certainly the Catholic Church does not teach that women should never wear denim jeans.
If a Catholic couple reads this book, I hope they discuss what it says with their priest. I certainly hope that no non-catholics read this book, since they will get a pretty odd view of what the Catholic church teaches.

Rating:
Summary: good book
Review: This is a good book about Catholic marriage, especially the NFP section. Read it! Give it to your friends.