Clergy Favor Pre-Marital Counseling

Billings Gazette (Cheyenne, MT): Local church leaders think they've come up with a way to reduce the state's divorce rate: Put an end to quickie marriages. Clergy came together Friday to endorse a policy that would require couples undergo four months of marriage preparation before being married in participating churches. "Couple by couple, community by community, congregation by congregation, a difference will be made," said Harriet McManus, co-chairwoman of the nonprofit group Marriage Savers. Gov. Dave Freudenthal praised the project, which is being funded in part by more than $200,000 in grants from the Wyoming Department of Family Services and the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. The program will include counseling sessions and assign successfully married couples to mentor engaged couples. "I am firmly convinced that the government can only do so much," Freudenthal said. "What I like about what you're doing is you actually try to make sure people are fully informed." Organizers said Wyoming has one of the nation's highest divorce rates. The Rev. Kurt Borgaard, of First Christian Church, said organizers hoped that by reducing divorce rates, they would also address a number of other social ills. "When divorce rates go up, so do all the negative statistics," Borgaard said.