5 Ways Infidelity Infiltrates Christian Marriages

No one gets married with the intention of one day having an affair. Most adulterers start their marriage with the honest intention of making the marriage work. Over time, however, those good intentions are eroded. The cheater loses their desire or willpower to be faithful, and they end up straying.

Most cheaters do not actively seek out an affair. They may be subconsciously assessing those around them to see who would be a good lover or putting themselves in situations where they are likely to be unfaithful, but most cheaters would claim that the infidelity “just happened” or “evolved naturally” rather than being something the cheater actively and consciously sought.

Where does the switch occur, then? What makes a good-intentioned spouse change their mind and begin straying? How does infidelity worm its way into a Christian marriage?

The circumstances and motivations will be different for each cheater. An adulterer motivated by sexual desire, after all, will have a very different “cause” for their infidelity than a person who wanted the sort of emotional connection they felt they were lacking with their spouse. Despite the variety of “reasons” for adultery, there are some common threads among cheaters. Here are five ways that infidelity infiltrates Christian marriages.

Mass Media

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Scandals are perhaps the media’s favorite thing to discuss, and few scandals are juicier than an affair. A public figure’s affair allows the paparazzi to snap million-dollar pictures of a sobbing wife, an enraged husband, a smug mistress or an embarrassed lover. Stories about infidelity allow for headlines that declare “She’s Taking the Kids After His Affair!” and “Fight On the Red Carpet! He Punches Her Lover!” The pain and betrayal of infidelity are reduced to clever quips and carefully selected photographs. Those eagerly following the couple’s struggles forget that there are real people behind those eye-catching headlines. Affairs are reduced to interesting reading, and people become immune to the pain caused by infidelity.

The media’s love of infidelity also means that it is nearly impossible to avoid information about the latest celebrity divorce or politician’s scandal. Over time, infidelity becomes a common and accepted part of life instead of a tragedy. Christians are not immune to this effect. As they are bombarded with information about celebrity affairs and advertisements for dozens of movies and TV shows that focus on infidelity, cheating beings to lose its taboo status and become an acceptable practice.

Social Media

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Social media fulfills many of the same functions as mass media when it comes to welcoming affairs into Christian marriages. A celebrity’s affair quickly starts trending on Twitter, and every one with a keyboard puts their opinion about the infidelity on Facebook. Just like mass media coverage of affairs, social media desensitizes people to the very real pain caused by infidelity.

In addition to making affairs more culturally acceptable, social media also enables the cheating itself. It is very easy for people to reconnect with old flames via the internet, and even happily married people friend ex-girlfriends and ex-boyfriends on Facebook. Things may stay innocent between the exes, but it could turn into something more. Social media is excellent at giving the illusion of a real connection between people even though both parties are only showing part of their personality. It is much easier to think of someone as “perfect” when only carefully chosen or edited pictures of them are available for viewing. Social media lets people share only their funniest jokes or cleverest quips while conversations in real life involve awkward silences, stupid comments and the occasional foot-in-the-mouth. The illusory perfection found in a social media connection creates a constant high of love at a distance. The less savory parts of a potential lover’s personality are hidden by the distance created by the keyboard where a spouse shows their less than desirable side every day. The real person can never measure up false cyber-perfection.

Social media also allows for “harmless” flirting. After all, no one is hurt when a married person types “you look better than ever, gorgeous” into a comment field. That said, this flirting can rapidly build into a doozy of an emotional affair.

Work

Millions of people struggle to achieve a healthy work-life balance, and many people overdo the “work” side of the equation. Working long hours is sometimes a necessity, and hard work itself does not open the door to infidelity. Long hours on the job become a more serious problem when a person spends so much time at work that they never seem to see their spouse. In those cases, the emotional intimacy that is essential to a marriage can begin to wane. In its place, a workaholic begins to form deeper connections with their coworkers. Slowly, an affair begins to grow. This is especially true when a married person uses work to avoid problems or stress at home. Work could be their “escape” from the terrible twos, a colicky baby or teenage drama. The person is constantly aware of how imperfect their home life is which leads to an affair with a striking or understanding coworker looking more and more attractive.

Friends

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There is a quote by Jim Rohn that says “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” When one of a married person’s “five people” is a cheater, the married person is far more likely to stray themselves.

Cheating friends are another case where repeated exposure to infidelity normalizes it and makes it more acceptable. Adulterous friends, however, also force a person to justify cheating to themselves. No one wants to think badly of their friends, so if a friend is cheating, adultery must not be that bad, right?

A spouse who has friends who are unfaithful also has a built in safety net should the spouse cheat themselves. The spouse does not have to worry that an affair will cost them all their connections. Their friends are accepting of those who cheat, so the spouse would still have their friends. Similarly, adulterous friends make it clear that a person can get away with an affair, at least for a time. This can lead to a dangerous sense of “they did it, why can’t I?”

Curiosity

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Curiosity is one of mankind’s greatest gifts. It can also get people into a whole heap of trouble. An otherwise faithful spouse might well let their curiosity get the better of them and join a website dedicated to help cheaters connect. The spouse might have no intention of cheating. They might have simply been curious about what such cheating websites do or how they work. Then, the faithful spouse accidentally meets someone on the website. The two feel they have a connection and continue their association. Soon, the spouse’s curiosity has landed them up to their eyeballs in an affair.

This is a far less common way that cheating can infiltrate a marriage, but it does happen. The faithful spouse feels that there is nothing wrong with satisfying their curiosity, and they are right. There is nothing wrong with wondering how a website works. The problem is that such curiosity rarely ends with a person getting their answers and shutting down their account without using it.