Can "Love is Blind" Help Break Generational Cycles?

 

This guest post is from Chloe Holden, Regent Family Law student:

Ezekiel 18:14: But suppose this son has a son who sees all the sins his father commits, and though he sees them, he does not do such things.

Each season of Love is Blind is a reality television show that draws in viewers to see if couples can fall in love with who a person truly is without ever seeing the person; but the viewers usually end up seeing how broken people are and the devastation that brokenness brings to relationships. An experiment where couples blindly get engaged, Love is Blind is designed to offer hope that one can fall in love with someone for who they are. The test begins when they meet this new fiancé and then learn if their love is strong enough to survive external factors such as appearance and lifestyle. 

In the sixth season of Love is Blind, there was a thirty-one-year-old man, Clay, who struggled with deciding whether he would be able to get married because of all that happened in his parent’s relationship. Clay's parents were divorced and while they were married his father repeatedly cheated on his mother. Clay wanted to get married but was worried he was not ready because he was afraid that he would be unfaithful to his spouse like his father was unfaithful to his mother. 

Throughout the show, Clay repeatedly said he was afraid he was going to cheat on his fiancée and couldn’t remain faithful to her. Clay struggled with how he had cheated in past relationships, and because of the atmosphere he grew up in, he was afraid he would repeat his father’s mistakes. Clay loved his father and thought the world of him but struggled with the example his father set. Clay frequently said that he doesn’t have a good role model to follow so he doesn't know how to be a good husband and father.

At the end of the show, Clay’s mother and father have an insightful conversation where his mother tells his father, Trevor, that Clay’s relational issues stem from Trevor not being a good father or role model for Clay, and Trevor responds that his own father was never in his life, cheating him of a role model as well.

This relational brokenness is a heartbreaking cycle until someone ends it. After the show, Clay sought counseling to become a better man so that he could be a faithful and loving husband and father one day and end the generational cycle. Three cheers for Clay taking this critical step!

Our children need their fathers to be in their lives and set a good example of how to be a man and a good husband and father. It’s time our generation stops the cycle of broken homes and marriages and chooses to do the work to create a healthy marriage and family.