Finding a Spouse
by Oliver Carlos
When I was in college, one of the subjects that I really enjoyed was SOC140 which was Demography. That’s the study of population. Our teacher was a German visiting professor. I found his teaching style so unique, thus I remembered so much from his class. He had a lot of stories about his native Germany, and his exams were fun to answer.
One skill he taught us was interpreting population pyramids. A population pyramid represents the population profile of a country. The bottom part of the pyramid stands for the youth, the middle part is the middle-aged population, and the peak are the elderly. Most population pyramids have wide bases and that signify that the youth are so many in that country. The narrow tops of pyramids mean that the senior citizens are few in the over-all population.
The Philippine population pyramid has a wide base because we have so many children. A family would have 1,2,3, or 4 kids. Meanwhile, my professor shared that in Germany and in many European countries, their population pyramid was upside down. That was in the early 1990s. They had so many old people, while there were very few kids in their population. He added that if they continue with the trend of not making babies, their upside-down population pyramid would later become balloon-shaped that would rise in the air. Given a few more decades, the balloon-shaped population pyramid would disappear from the frame. That means that their nation would be extinct!
Another aspect of interpreting the triangle is the relationship of the left and right sides of it. One side represents the males, while the other side are the females in a country. If one side is so large compared to the opposite side, that means that one sex (male or female) outnumber the other. Take the case of many Middle East countries. Their males outnumber the females greatly (see inset in picture above). Meanwhile, in the Philippines, we’re more or less balanced, with the females having a slightly larger population than the males (see main picture above).
Contemplating on the imbalance of male and female populations, I thought of a hypothetical question. What if all the males found wives, then there would still be some females who would be left out? Like the trip to Jerusalem game, not every player would have a seat. Some females in the Philippines would be remain unmarried. Meanwhile, in the Middle East, the situation is the other way around. It’s much worse too because of the great imbalance of males over females.
Given such pyramids, finding a spouse is a tough task. It really needs lots of prayers and divine intervention. God is the Master matchmaker whom people who wanted to get married must run to for help. In one marriage counselling sessions I attended before, my mentor Bishop Nonon Punzalan once quoted Proverbs 18:22 (NIV):
“He who finds a wife finds what is good and receives favor from the Lord.”
If ever God gives you a spouse, cherish that person. It’s God who gave that person to you, and when he gives, he gives with delight and with favor, no strings attached. God wants both of you to enjoy the relationship he authored. It’s a great blessing to be married! (It’s equally great also to remain single if one has the gift of single blessedness. I’ll write on that topic sometime in the future. But as of now, let’s talk about those who are married).
So, if you are married, celebrate the love you have with your spouse. Praise God for bringing you to each other. Thank God that he gave you a very special treasure!
