Marriage is a school of sanctity; children are a blessing

[Maria]

Marriage is a Holy Mystery and a school of sanctity, and children are part of that school of sanctity. It is not surprising that saints often have children who are saints as our homes are to be domestic churches where our children can grow in holiness.

As we lead our children to God, our precious children can help lead us to God in many ways. They teach us to love others, to be grateful, to be less selfish, and to be more careful. They are truly a gift from the Lord. For example, if we have the habit of cussing, our children will exaggerate and use those cuss words at every convenient opportunity embarrassing us and helping us to stop and watch our speech. In fact, our priest gave a sermon about this. Once a man came to confession, as he was concerned about the words coming out of his children's mouth. When the priest mentioned that he had heard him say those very words, the man was red-faced, and shortly cleaned up his speech. In addition, he started praying and leading the prayers at home. In fact, he became a model of Christian kindness. This is why the Church says that Marriage is a school of sanctity.

[JamesR]

That sounds very nice and all, but the thought of having children if I ever get married truly does scare me.

For starters, I've seen a female in labour before. I saw my mom give birth to my sister back in 2010. It wasn't pretty, and I couldn't imagine putting my wife through such a horrendous experience. Second, I feel like children are a waste of work. They take so much time, effort, and money that I could otherwise be devoting to prayer, almsgiving, and going to Church. My biggest fear is that if I have children, I'll become a Sunday-only Christian that's only religious once a week because I won't have time to glorify God in any other way.

To be honest, the only reason I want marriage is for female companionship--to have a woman to truly love and take care of--and for marital relations. Other than these two things, I'd love to live like ascetics with my wife, similar to St. John Kronskandt (sp?) and his wife. Having children doesn't interest me very much and given the fact that I'm the eldest, firstborn child in the family, I feel that I've taken care of enough children in my young, pre-20 lifespan.

Problem is, almost every female I've ever met wants children, and certainly every religious female I've met has. Marrying an Orthodox female is already hard enough given how small our American population is--in fact, there's a good chance I may end up just getting an Orthodox mail order bride provided she's truly Orthodox, chaste (no inappropriate photos), and isn't just trying to escape her country--but finding an Orthodox female that doesn't want children is even harder because of how much it narrows down my pool of potential female spouses. The only religious female I ever met that didn't want children was this cute Asian maiden who's father is a Protestant minister.

Everyone tells me that at best, I'll probably have to reconcile and have at least 1 child if I ever get married to make my wife happy.

[jgress]

It's a mistake to go into marriage with a definite intention of not having children. If you have practical concerns about not being ready for children but wanting to get married soon, you need to discuss that with your spiritual father or parish priest.