title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: The Netherlands deployed further troops and helicopters to Afghanistan in 2006 as part of a new security operation in the south of the country. In mid-2006, Dutch special forces of the Korps Commandotroepen as part of the Deployment Task Force successfully deployed to Tarin Kowt to lay the ground for the increasing numbers of engineers who were due to build a base there. By August 2006 the Netherlands had deployed the majority of 1,400 troops to Uruzgan province in southern Afghanistan at Kamp Holland in Tarin Kowt (1,200) and Kamp Hadrian in Deh Rahwod (200). PzH 2000 self-propelled artillery pieces were deployed and used in combat for the first time. The Dutch forces operated under the command of the ISAF Task Force Uruzgan and were involved in some of the more intensive combat operations in southern Afghanistan, including Operation Medusa and the Battle of Chora. On 18 April 2008, on the second day of his command, the son of the Chief of Defence (Netherlands) general Peter van Uhm, Lieutenant Dennis van Uhm, was one of two servicemen killed by a road-side explosion. As of 1 September 2008, the Netherlands had a total of 1,770 troops in Afghanistan excluding special forces troops.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: Between 2002 and 2021, Dutch military personnel worked successively in the Afghan provinces of Kabul, Baghlan, Kandahar, Uruzgan, Kunduz and Balkh, with the aim, among other things, to bring stability and to build up the security apparatus, the army and the police.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: From 2015 until 2021, approximately 160 Dutch troops of the Korps Commandotroepen, NLMARSOF and multiple conventional support elements were deployed to the city of Mazar-e-Sharif as part of NATO's Resolute Support Mission. Dutch troops co-operated with personnel of the German Kommando Spezialkräfte as part of the German-Dutch lead Special Operations Advisory Team (SOAT). The SOAT provided advice and assistance during operations of the Afghan police tactical unit, the Afghan Territorial Force-888 (ATF-888). The SOAT was granted authority to deploy in the entirety of Afghanistan in 2019. The operations ended with the withdrawal of all United States and allied troops from Afghanistan in 2021.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: A contingent of 1,345 Army and Marines Corps personnel, supported by Royal Netherlands Air Force helicopters, was deployed to Iraq in 2003, based at Camp Smitty near As Samawah (southern Iraq) with responsibility for the Muthanna Province, as part of the Multinational force in Iraq. On June 1, 2004, the Dutch government renewed their stay through 2005. The Netherlands removed its troops from Iraq in March 2005, leaving half a dozen liaison officers until late 2005. The Netherlands lost two soldiers in separate attacks.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: On 24 September 2014, the Dutch government announced its participation in the military campaign against ISIL, and sent six F-16 fighter jets to Iraq to bomb ISIL. Their motivations to join this war: ISIL's advance in Iraq and Syria, while displaying "unprecedented violence" and "perpetrating terrible crimes against population groups", formed "a direct threat for that region"; ISIL's advance in Iraq and Syria "causes instability at the borders of Europe" which threatens "our own [Dutch] safety". Figures requested by in August 2015 showed that the Netherlands was among the most active countries within the coalition, third behind only the United States and the United Kingdom. In January 2016, the Netherlands extended their bombings of ISIL to Syrian territory. By the end of July 2016 the Dutch Air Task Force flew more than 2100 missions and carried out over 1800 air strikes. At the end of the Dutch contribution to the Air Task Force, in December 2018, the Royal Netherlands Air Force had flown over 3000 missions and conducted approximately 2100 air strikes.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: From 2015 until the spring of 2018, KCT and NLMARSOF special operations forces deployed advice and assist (A&A) teams to northern Iraq in cooperation with the Belgian Special Forces Group (SFG). During this deployment, they provided support to Kurdish Peshmerga and Iraqi Army forces before, during and after operations in the battle against ISIL, as part of the Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent Resolve.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: As a maritime nation and birthplace of the earliest maritime law, the Netherlands have historically highly valued the "mare liberum" principle. Hence, the Dutch government decided to contribute a significant amount of naval assets to combating piracy off the coast of Somalia since its most recent surge starting in 2005. The Royal Netherlands Navy was an active contributor to NATO's Operation Allied Protector and Operation Ocean Shield, as well as to the European Union's Operation Atalanta. Ships partaking in these missions included "De Zeven Provinciën"-class frigates, landing platform docks HNLMS "Rotterdam" and HNLMS "Johan de Witt", and submarines of the "Walrus"-class. Additionally, surface combatants permanently carried boarding teams of the Netherlands Marine Corps. These boarding parties were often composed of operators of the Netherlands Maritime Special Operations Forces (NLMARSOF). In addition, conventional marine units supply Vessel Protection Detachments (VPDs) which continue to guard Dutch merchant vessels during transits through piracy-prone waters as of 2021.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: The Dutch naval forces were regularly engaged in combat. Firefights between the naval ships and Somali pirates have cost the lives of pirates on multiple occasions. During the Action of 5 April 2010, a boarding team of the Unit Interventie Mariniers liberated container ship MV "Taipan" after rappelling down from HNLMS "Tromp"'s helicopter onto containers on the ship's deck under the cover of machine gun fire. The successful operation was filmed with a helmet camera, the video footage reached worldwide news media and gained millions of views on YouTube. Moreover, NLMARSOF frogmen have successfully conducted sabotage operations of pirates' motherships by clandestinely attaching explosives to the ships' bilge.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: Special forces of the Korps Commandotroepen were deployed to Mali since 2014 as part of the UN mission MINUSMA. The primary task of the Dutch forces was to gather intelligence on local Islamist and rebel groups and to protect the people of Mali against said groups. Since 2016, conventional detachments consisting of 11 Air Assault Brigade and 13 Light Brigade troops were part of the MINUSMA rotations as well. Additionally, the Dutch contribution consisted of a RNLAF AH-64 Apache and CH-47 Chinook detachment which provided the necessary air support and transport for the infantry units on the ground.


title: Netherlands Armed Forces

text: On 16 March 2015, a Dutch AH-64 Apache attack helicopter of the Dutch MINUSMA air detachment crashed during a firing exercise, killing the two pilots. On 6 July 2016, two servicemen of 11 Air Assault Brigade were killed during a mortar-firing exercise, while a third serviceman was severely wounded. The incident lead to the resignation of the minister of Defence Jeanine Hennis-Plasschaert and Chief of Defence General Tom Middendorp after a critical report by the Dutch Safety Board found that the safety standards were subpar. The Netherlands ended their sizable contribution to the peacekeeping mission in May 2019 to send additional troops to Afghanistan instead.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: From the earliest days of the Christian faith, Christians have honored "holy matrimony" (as Christian marriages are referred to) as a divinely blessed, lifelong, monogamous union between a man and a woman. According to the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer (1979), reflecting the traditional view, "Christian marriage is a solemn and public covenant between a man and a woman in the presence of God," "intended by God for their mutual joy; for the help and comfort given one another in prosperity and adversity; and, when it is God's will, for the procreation of children and their nurture." However, while many Christians might agree with the traditional definition, the terminology and theological views of marriage have varied through time in different countries, and among Christian denominations.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Many Protestants consider marriage to be a sacred institution or "holy ordinance" of God. Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox Christians consider marriage as a holy sacrament or sacred mystery. However, there have been differing attitudes among denominations and individual Christians towards not only the concept of Christian marriage, but also concerning divorce, remarriage, gender roles, family authority (the "headship" of the husband), the legal status of married women, birth control, marriageable age, cousin marriage, marriage of in-laws, interfaith marriage, same-sex marriage, and polygamy, among other topics, so that in the 21st century there cannot be said to be a single, uniform, worldwide view of marriage among all who profess to be Christians.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Christian teaching has never held that marriage is necessary for everyone; for many centuries in Western Europe, priestly or monastic celibacy was valued as highly as, if not higher than, marriage. Christians who did not marry were expected to refrain from all sexual activity, as were those who took holy orders or monastic vows.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In some Western countries, a separate and secular civil wedding ceremony is required for recognition by the state, while in other Western countries, couples must merely obtain a marriage license from a local government authority and can be married by Christian or other clergy if they are authorized by law to conduct weddings. In this case, the state recognizes the religious marriage as a civil marriage as well; and Christian couples married in this way have all the rights of civil marriage, including, for example, divorce, even if their church forbids divorce.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Since the beginning of the 21st century, same-sex couples have been allowed to marry civilly in many countries, and some Christian churches in those countries allow religious marriage of same-sex couples, though others forbid it, along with all other same-sex relationships.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Christians believe that marriage is considered in its ideal according to the purpose of God. At the heart of God's design for marriage is companionship and intimacy.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The biblical picture of marriage expands into something much broader, with the husband and wife relationship illustrating the relationship between Christ and the church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: It is also considered in its actual occurrence, sometimes involving failure. Therefore, the Bible speaks on the subject of divorce. The New Testament recognizes a place for singleness. Salvation within Christianity is not dependent on the continuation of a biological lineage.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Genesis creation account tells the story of when God instituted marriage. This took place after the creation of the first woman, Eve, from Adam, the first man.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Polygyny, or men having multiple wives at once, is one of the most common marital arrangements represented in the Old Testament, yet scholars doubt that it was common among average Israelites because of the wealth needed to practice it. Both the biblical patriarchs and kings of Israel are described as engaged in polygamous relationships. Despite the various polygynous relationships in the Bible, Old Testament scholar Peter Gentry has said that it does not mean that God condones polygyny. He also made note of the various problems that polygynous relationships present with the examples of Abraham, Jacob, David, and Solomon in the Bible. Alternatively, this could be a case of graded absolutism.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Betrothal ("erusin"), which is merely a binding promise to get married, is distinct from marriage itself ("nissu'in"), with the time between these events varying substantially. Nonetheless, when a couple is betrothed, they are held accountable to the laws against adultery, like an officially married couple. From this, it is implied that a couple is considered to be married even they've only betrothed. Since a wife was regarded as property in biblical times, the betrothal ("erusin") was effected simply by purchasing her from her father (or guardian) (i.e. paying the bride price to the woman and her father); the woman's consent is not explicitly required by any biblical law. Nonetheless, in one Biblical story, Rebecca was asked whether she agreed to be married before the marriage took place. Additionally, according to French anthropologist Philippe Rospabé, the payment of the bride price does not entail the purchase of a woman, as was thought in the early twentieth century. Instead, it is a purely symbolic gesture acknowledging (but never paying off) the husband's permanent debt to the wife's parents.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Like the adjacent Arabic culture (in the pre-Islamic period), the act of marriage appears mainly to have consisted of the groom fetching the bride, although among the Israelites the procession was a festive occasion, accompanied by music, dancing, and lights. To celebrate the marriage, week-long feasts were sometimes held.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Old Testament times, a wife was submissive to her husband, which may interpreted as Israelite society viewing wives as the chattel of husbands. The descriptions of the Bible suggest that she would be expected to perform tasks such as spinning, sewing, weaving, manufacture of clothing, fetching of water, baking of bread, and animal husbandry. However, wives were usually looked after with care, and bigamous men were expected to ensure that they give their first wife food, clothing, and sexual activity.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Since a wife was regarded as property, her husband was originally free to divorce her with little restriction, at any time. A divorced couple could get back together unless the wife had married someone else after her divorce.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Bible clearly addresses marriage and divorce. Those in troubled marriages are encouraged to seek counseling and restoration because, according to some advocates of traditional marriage ethics, most divorces are neither necessary nor unavoidable.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the gospels of both Matthew and Mark, Jesus appealed to God's will in creation. He builds upon the narratives in where male and female are created together and for one another. Thus Jesus takes a firm stance on the permanence of marriage in the original will of God. This corresponds closely with the position of the Pharisee school of thought led by Shammai, at the start of the first millennium, with which Jesus would have been familiar. By contrast, Rabbinic Judaism subsequently took the opposite view, espoused by Hillel, the leader of the other major Pharisee school of thought at the time; in Hillel's view, men were allowed to divorce their wives for any reason.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Some hold that marriage vows are unbreakable, so that even in the distressing circumstances in which a couple separates, they are still married from God's point of view. This is the Roman Catholic church's position, although occasionally the church will declare a marriage to be "null" (in other words, it never really was a marriage). William Barclay (1907-1978) has written:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Jesus brought together two passages from Genesis, reinforcing the basic position on marriage found in Jewish scripture. Thus, he implicitly emphasized that it is God-made ("God has joined together"), "male and female," lifelong ("let no one separate"), and monogamous ("a man...his wife").


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Jesus used the image of marriage and the family to teach the basics about the Kingdom of God. He inaugurated his ministry by blessing the wedding at Cana. In the Sermon on the Mount he set forth a new commandment concerning marriage, teaching that lustful looking constitutes adultery. He also superseded a Mosaic Law allowing divorce with his teaching that "...anyone who divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality (Gk. "porneia"), causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery". Similar Pauline teachings are found in Corinthians 7. The exception clause—"except for..."—uses the Greek word "porneia" which is variously translated "fornication" (KJV), "marital unfaithfulness" (NIV 1984), "sexual immorality" (NIV 2011), "unchastity" (RSV), "et al". "The KJV New Testament Greek Lexicon, KJV" says "porneia" includes a variety of sexual "deviations" to include "illicit sexual intercourse, adultery, fornication, homosexuality, lesbianism, intercourse with animals, etc., sexual intercourse with close relatives..."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Theologian Frank Stagg says that manuscripts disagree as to the presence in the original text of the phrase "except for fornication". Stagg writes: "Divorce always represents failure...a deviation from God's will... There is grace and redemption where there is contrition and repentance... There is no clear authorization in the New Testament for remarriage after divorce." Stagg interprets the chief concern of Matthew 5 as being "to condemn the criminal act of the man who divorces an innocent wife... Jesus was rebuking the husband who victimizes an innocent wife and thinks that he makes it right with her by giving her a divorce". He points out that Jesus refused to be trapped by the Pharisees into choosing between the strict and liberal positions on divorce as held at the time in Judaism. When they asked him, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any cause?" he answered by reaffirming God's will as stated in Genesis, that in marriage husband and wife are made "one flesh", and what God has united man must not separate.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: There is no evidence that Jesus himself ever married, and considerable evidence that he remained single. In contrast to Judaism and many other traditions, he taught that there is a place for voluntary singleness in Christian service. He believed marriage could be a distraction from an urgent mission, that he was living in a time of crisis and urgency where the Kingdom of God would be established where there would be no marriage nor giving in marriage:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Matthew 22, Jesus is asked about the continuing state of marriage after death and he affirms that at the resurrection "people neither marry nor be given in marriage; they are like the angels in heaven.".


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Apostle Paul quoted passages from Genesis almost verbatim in two of his New Testament books. He used marriage not only to describe the kingdom of God, as Jesus had done, but to define also the nature of the 1st-century Christian church. His theological view was a Christian development of the Old Testament parallel between marriage and the relationship between God and Israel. He analogized the church as a bride and Christ as the bridegroom─drawing parallels between Christian marriage and the relationship between Christ and the Church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: There is no hint in the New Testament that Jesus was ever married, and no clear evidence that Paul was ever married. However, both Jesus and Paul seem to view marriage as a legitimate calling from God for Christians. Paul elevates singleness to that of the preferable position, but does offer a caveat suggesting this is "because of the impending crisis"—which could itself extend to present times (see also Pauline privilege). Paul's primary issue was that marriage adds concerns to one's life that detract from their ability to serve God without distraction.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Some scholars have speculated that Paul may have been a widower since prior to his conversion to Christianity he was a Pharisee and member of the Sanhedrin, positions in which the social norm of the day required the men to be married. But it is just as likely that he never married at all.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Yet, Paul acknowledges the mutuality of marital relations, and recognizes that his own singleness is "a particular gift from God" that others may not necessarily have. He writes: "Now to the unmarried and the widows I say: It is good for them to stay unmarried, as I am. But if they cannot control themselves, they should marry, for it is better to marry than to burn with passion."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Paul indicates that bishops, deacons, and elders must be "husbands of one wife", and that women must have one husband. This is usually understood to legislate against polygamy rather than to require marriage:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the Roman Age, female widows who did not remarry were considered more pure than those who did. Such widows were known as "one man woman" ("enos andros gune") in the epistles of Paul. Paul writes:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Paul allowed widows to remarry. Paul says that only "one-man women" older than 60 years can make the list of Christian widows who did special tasks in the community, but that younger widows should remarry to hinder sin.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Building on what they saw the example of Jesus and Paul advocating, some early Church Fathers placed less value on the family and saw celibacy and freedom from family ties as a preferable state.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Nicene Fathers such as Augustine believed that marriage was a sacrament because it was a symbol used by Paul to express Christ's love of the Church. However, there was also an apocalyptic dimension in his teaching, and he was clear that if everybody stopped marrying and having children that would be an admirable thing; it would mean that the Kingdom of God would return all the sooner and the world would come to an end. Such a view reflects the Manichaean past of Augustine.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: While upholding the New Testament teaching that marriage is "honourable in all and the bed undefiled," Augustine believed that "yet, whenever it comes to the actual process of generation, the very embrace which is lawful and honourable cannot be effected without the ardour of lust...This is the carnal concupiscence, which, while it is no longer accounted sin in the regenerate, yet in no case happens to nature except from sin."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Both Tertullian and Gregory of Nyssa were church fathers who were married. They each stressed that the happiness of marriage was ultimately rooted in misery. They saw marriage as a state of bondage that could only be cured by celibacy. They wrote that at the very least, the virgin woman could expect release from the "governance of a husband and the chains of children."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Tertullian argued that second marriage, having been freed from the first by death,"will have to be termed no other than a species of fornication," partly based on the reasoning that this involves desiring to marry a woman out of sexual ardor, which a Christian convert is to avoid.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Also advocating celibacy and virginity as preferable alternatives to marriage, Jerome wrote: "It is not disparaging wedlock to prefer virginity. No one can make a comparison between two things if one is good and the other evil." On First Corinthians 7:1 he reasons, "It is good, he says, for a man not to touch a woman. If it is good not to touch a woman, it is bad to touch one: for there is no opposite to goodness but badness. But if it be bad and the evil is pardoned, the reason for the concession is to prevent worse evil."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: St. John Chrysostom wrote: "...virginity is better than marriage, however good... Celibacy is...an imitation of the angels. Therefore, virginity is as much more honorable than marriage, as the angel is higher than man. But why do I say angel? Christ, Himself, is the glory of virginity."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, said that the first commandment given to men was to increase and multiply, but now that the earth was full there was no need to continue this process of multiplication.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: This view of marriage was reflected in the lack of any formal liturgy formulated for marriage in the early Church. No special ceremonial was devised to celebrate Christian marriage—despite the fact that the Church had produced liturgies to celebrate the Eucharist, Baptism and Confirmation. It was not important for a couple to have their nuptials blessed by a priest. People could marry by mutual agreement in the presence of witnesses.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: At first, the old Roman pagan rite was used by Christians, although modified superficially. The first detailed account of a Christian wedding in the West dates from the 9th century. This system, known as Spousals, persisted after the Reformation.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Today all Christian denominations regard marriage as a sacred institution, a covenant. Roman Catholics consider it to be a sacrament. Marriage was officially recognized as a sacrament at the 1184 Council of Verona. Before then, no specific ritual was prescribed for celebrating a marriage: "Marriage vows did not have to be exchanged in a church, nor was a priest's presence required. A couple could exchange consent anywhere, anytime."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the decrees on marriage of the Council of Trent (twenty-fourth session from 1563), the validity of marriage was made dependent upon the wedding taking place before a priest and two witnesses, although the lack of a requirement for parental consent ended a debate that had proceeded from the 12th century. In the case of a divorce, the right of the innocent party to marry again was denied so long as the other party was alive, even if the other party had committed adultery.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Catholic Church allowed marriages to take place inside churches only starting with the 16th century, beforehand religious marriages happened on the porch of the church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Roman Catholic Church teaches that God himself is the author of the sacred institution of marriage, which is His way of showing love for those He created. Marriage is a divine institution that can never be broken, even if the husband or wife legally divorce in the civil courts; as long as they are both alive, the Church considers them bound together by God. Holy Matrimony is another name for sacramental marriage. Marriage is intended to be a faithful, exclusive, lifelong union of a man and a woman. Committing themselves completely to each other, a Catholic husband and wife strive to sanctify each other, bring children into the world, and educate them in the Catholic way of life. Man and woman, although created differently from each other, complement each other. This complementarity draws them together in a mutually loving union.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The valid marriage of baptized Christians is one of the seven Roman Catholic sacraments. The sacrament of marriage is the only sacrament that a priest does not administer directly; a priest, however, is the chief witness of the husband and wife's administration of the sacrament to each other at the wedding ceremony in a Catholic church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Roman Catholic Church views that Christ himself established the sacrament of marriage at the wedding feast of Cana; therefore, since it is a divine institution, neither the Church nor state can alter the basic meaning and structure of marriage. Husband and wife give themselves totally to each other in a union that lasts until death.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Priests are instructed that marriage is part of God's natural law and to support the couple if they do choose to marry. Today it is common for Roman Catholics to enter into a "mixed marriage" between a Catholic and a baptized non-Catholic. Couples entering into a mixed marriage are usually allowed to marry in a Catholic church provided their decision is of their own accord and they intend to remain together for life, to be faithful to each other, and to have children which are brought up in the Catholic faith.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Roman Catholic teaching, marriage has two objectives: the good of the spouses themselves, and the procreation and education of children (1983 code of canon law, c.1055; 1994 catechism, par.2363). Hence "entering marriage with the intention of never having children is a grave wrong and more than likely grounds for an annulment." It is normal procedure for a priest to ask the prospective bride and groom about their plans to have children before officiating at their wedding. The Roman Catholic Church may refuse to marry anyone unwilling to have children, since procreation by "the marriage act" is a fundamental part of marriage. Thus usage of any form of contraception, in vitro fertilization, or birth control besides natural family planning is a grave offense against the sanctity of marriage and ultimately against God.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Most Protestant denominations hold marriage to be ordained by God for the union between a man and a woman. They see the primary purposes of this union as intimate companionship, rearing children and mutual support for both husband and wife to fulfill their life callings. Protestant Christian denominations consider marital sexual pleasure to be a gift of God, though they vary on their position on birth control, ranging from the acceptance of the use of contraception to only allowing natural family planning to teaching Quiverfull doctrine—that birth control is sinful and Christians should have large families. Conservative Protestants consider marriage a solemn covenant between wife, husband and God. Most view sexual relations as appropriate only within a marriage. Protestant Churches discourage divorce though the way it is addressed varies by denomination; for example, the Reformed Church in America permits divorce and remarriage, while connexions such as the Evangelical Methodist Church Conference forbid divorce except in the case of fornication and do not allow for remarriage in any circumstance.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Many Methodist Christians teach that marriage is "God's gift and covenant intended to imitate God's covenant with humankind" that "Christians enter in their baptism." For example, the rite used in the Free Methodist Church proclaims that marriage is "more than a legal contract, being a bond of union made in heaven, into which you enter discreetly and reverently."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Roles and responsibilities of husband and wives now vary considerably on a continuum between the long-held male dominant/female submission view and a shift toward equality (without sameness) of the woman and the man. There is considerable debate among many Christians today—not just Protestants—whether equality of husband and wife or male headship is the biblically ordained view, and even if it is biblically permissible. The divergent opinions fall into two main groups: Complementarians (who call for husband-headship and wife-submission) and Christian Egalitarians (who believe in full partnership equality in which couples can discover and negotiate roles and responsibilities in marriage).


title: Christian views on marriage

text: There is no debate that Ephesians 5 presents a historically benevolent husband-headship/wife-submission model for marriage. The questions are (a) how these New Testament household codes are to be reconciled with the calls earlier in Chapter 5 (cf. verses 1, 18, 21) for mutual submission among all believers, and (b) the meaning of "head" in v.23. It is important to note that verse 22 contains no verb in the original manuscripts, which were also not divided into verses:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the Eastern Orthodox Church, marriage is treated as a Sacred Mystery (sacrament), and as an ordination. It serves to unite a woman and a man in eternal union before God. It refers to the 1st centuries of the church, where spiritual union of spouses in the first sacramental marriage was eternal. Therefore, it is considered a martyrdom as each spouse learns to die to self for the sake of the other. Like all Mysteries, Orthodox marriage is more than just a celebration of something which already exists: it is the creation of something new, the imparting to the couple of the grace which transforms them from a 'couple' into husband and wife within the Body of Christ.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Marriage is an icon (image) of the relationship between Jesus and the Church. This is somewhat akin to the Old Testament prophets' use of marriage as an analogy to describe the relationship between God and Israel. Marriage is the simplest, most basic unity of the church: a congregation where "two or three are gathered together in Jesus' name." The home is considered a consecrated space (the ritual for the Blessing of a House is based upon that of the Consecration of a Church), and the husband and wife are considered the ministers of that congregation. However, they do not "perform" the Sacraments in the house church; they "live" the Sacrament of Marriage. Because marriage is considered to be a pilgrimage wherein the couple walk side by side toward the Kingdom of Heaven, marriage to a non-Orthodox partner is discouraged, though it may be permitted.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Unlike Western Christianity, Eastern Christians do not consider the sacramental aspect of the marriage to be conferred by the couple themselves. Rather, the marriage is conferred by the action of the Holy Spirit acting through the priest. Furthermore, no one besides a bishop or priest—not even a deacon—may perform the Sacred Mystery.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The external sign of the marriage is the placing of wedding crowns upon the heads of the couple, and their sharing in a "Common Cup" of wine. Once crowned, the couple walk a circle three times in a ceremonial "dance" in the middle of the church, while the choir intones a joyous three-part antiphonal hymn, "Dance, Isaiah"


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The sharing of the Common Cup symbolizes the transformation of their union from a common marriage into a sacred union. The wedding is usually performed after the Divine Liturgy at which the couple receives Holy Communion. Traditionally, the wedding couple would wear their wedding crowns for eight days, and there is a special prayer said by the priest at the removal of the crowns.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Divorce is discouraged. Sometimes out of "economia" (mercy) a marriage may be dissolved if there is no hope whatever for a marriage to fulfill even a semblance of its intended sacramental character. The standard formula for remarriage is that the Orthodox Church joyfully blesses the first marriage, merely performs the second, barely tolerates the third, and invariably forbids the fourth. "On the basis of the ideal of the first marriage as an image of the glory of God the question is which significance such a second marriage has and whether it can be regarded as Mysterion. Even though there are opinions (particularly in the west) which deny the sacramental character to the second marriage, in the orthodox literature almost consistently either a reduced or even a full sacramentality is attributed to it. The investigation of the second marriage rite shows that both positions affirming the sacramentality to a second marriage can be justified."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Early church texts forbid marriage between an Orthodox Christian and a heretic or schismatic (which would include all non-Orthodox Christians). Traditional Orthodox Christians forbid mixed marriages with other denominations. More liberal ones perform them, provided that the couple formally commit themselves to rearing their children in the Orthodox faith.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: All people are called to celibacy—human beings are all born into virginity, and Orthodox Christians are expected by Sacred Tradition to remain in that state unless they are called into marriage and that call is sanctified. The church blesses two paths on the journey to salvation: monasticism and marriage. Mere celibacy, without the sanctification of monasticism, can fall into selfishness and tends to be regarded with disfavour by the Church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Orthodox priests who serve in parishes are usually married. They must marry prior to their ordination. If they marry after they are ordained they are not permitted to continue performing sacraments. If their wife dies, they are forbidden to remarry; if they do, they may no longer serve as a priest. A married man may be ordained as a priest or deacon. However, a priest or deacon is not permitted to enter into matrimony after ordination. Bishops must always be monks and are thus celibate. However, if a married priest is widowed, he may receive monastic tonsure and thus become eligible for the episcopate.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Eastern Orthodox Church believes that marriage is an eternal union of spouses, but in Heaven there will not be a procreative bond of marriage.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Non-Chalcedonian Churches of Oriental Orthodoxy hold views almost identical to those of the (Chalcedonian) Eastern Orthodox Church. The Coptic Orthodox Church allows second marriages only in cases of adultery or death of spouse.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church), celestial (or eternal) marriage is a covenant between a man, a woman, and God performed by a priesthood authority in a temple of the church. Celestial marriage is intended to continue forever into the afterlife if the man and woman do not break their covenants. Thus, eternally married couples are often referred to as being "sealed" to each other. Sealed couples who keep their covenants are also promised to have their posterity sealed to them in the afterlife. (Thus, "families are forever" is a common phrase in the LDS Church.) A celestial marriage is considered a requirement for exaltation.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In some countries, celestial marriages can be recognized as civil marriages; in other cases, couples are civilly married outside of the temple and are later sealed in a celestial marriage. (The church will no longer perform a celestial marriage for a couple unless they are first or simultaneously legally married.) The church encourages its members to be in good standing with it so that they may marry or be sealed in the temple. A celestial marriage is not annulled by a civil divorce: a "cancellation of a sealing" may be granted, but only by the First Presidency, the highest authority in the church. Civil divorce and marriage outside the temple carries somewhat of a stigma in the Mormon culture; the church teaches that the "gospel of Jesus Christ—including repentance, forgiveness, integrity, and love—provides the remedy for conflict in marriage." Regarding marriage and divorce, the church instructs its leaders: "No priesthood officer is to counsel a person whom to marry. Nor should he counsel a person to divorce his or her spouse. Those decisions must originate and remain with the individual. When a marriage ends in divorce, or if a husband and wife separate, they should always receive counseling from Church leaders."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In church temples, members of the LDS Church perform vicarious celestial marriages for deceased couples who were legally married.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The New Church teaches that marital love (or "conjugial love") is "the precious jewel of human life and the repository of the Christian religion" because the love shared between a husband and a wife is the source of all peace and joy. Emanuel Swedenborg coined the term "conjugial" (rather than the more usual adjective in reference to marital union, "conjugal") to describe the special love experienced by married partners. When a husband and wife work together to build their marriage on earth, that marriage continues after the deaths of their bodies and they live as angels in heaven into eternity. Swedenborg claimed to have spoken with angelic couples who had been married for thousands of years. Those who never married in the natural world will, if they wish, find a spouse in heaven.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Jehovah's Witnesses view marriage to be a permanent arrangement with the only possible exception being adultery. Divorce is strongly discouraged even when adultery is committed since the wronged spouse is free to forgive the unfaithful one. There are provisions for a domestic separation in the event of "failure to provide for one's household" and domestic violence, or spiritual resistance on the part of a partner. Even in such situations though divorce would be considered grounds for loss of privileges in the congregation. Remarrying after death or a proper divorce is permitted. Marriage is the only situation where any type of sexual interaction is acceptable, and even then certain restrictions apply to acts such as oral and anal sex. Married persons who are known to commit such acts may in fact lose privileges in the congregation as they are supposed to be setting a good example to the congregation.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Christianity, an interdenominational marriage (also known as an ecumenical marriage) is a marriage between two baptized Christians who belong to different Christian denominations, e.g. a wedding between a Lutheran Christian man and a Catholic Christian woman. Nearly all Christian denominations permit interdenominational marriages.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Methodism, ¶81 of the 2014 "Discipline" of the Allegheny Wesleyan Methodist Connection, states with regard to interdenominational marriages: "We do not prohibit our people from marrying persons who are not of our connection, provided such persons have the form and are seeking the power of godliness; but we are determined to discourage their marrying persons who do not come up to this description."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Catholic Church recognizes as sacramental, (1) the marriages between two baptized Protestants or between two baptized Orthodox Christians, as well as (2) marriages between baptized non-Catholic Christians and Catholic Christians, although in the latter case, consent from the diocesan bishop must be obtained, with this being termed "permission to enter into a mixed marriage". To illustrate (1), for example, "if two Lutherans marry in the Lutheran Church in the presence of a Lutheran minister, the Catholic Church recognizes this as a valid sacrament of marriage." Weddings in which both parties are Catholic Christians are ordinarily held in a Catholic church, while weddings in which one party is a Catholic Christian and the other party is a non-Catholic Christian can be held in a Catholic church or a non-Catholic Christian church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Christianity, an interfaith marriage is a marriage between a baptized Christian and a non-baptized person, e.g. a wedding between a Christian man and Jewish woman.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the Presbyterian Church (USA), the local church congregation is tasked with supporting and including an interfaith couple with one being a baptized Presbyterian Christian and the other being a non-Christian, in the life of the Church, "help[ing] parents make and live by commitments about the spiritual nurture of their children", and being inclusive of the children of the interfaith couple. The pastor is to be available to help and counsel the interfaith couple in their life journey.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Although the Catholic Church recognizes as natural marriages weddings between two non-Christians or those between a Catholic Christian and a non-Christian, these are not considered to be sacramental, and in the latter case, the Catholic Christian must seek permission from his/her bishop for the marriage to occur; this permission is known as "dispensation from disparity of cult".


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In Methodist Christianity, the 2014 "Discipline" of the Allegheny Wesleyan Methodist Connection discourages interfaith marriages, stating "Many Christians have married unconverted persons. This has produced bad effects; they have either been hindered for life, or have turned back to perdition." Though the United Methodist Church authorizes its clergy to preside at interfaith marriages, it notes that Corinthians 6 has been interpreted "as at least an ideal if not an absolute ban on such [interfaith] marriages as an issue of scriptural faithfulness, if not as an issue of Christian survival." At the same time, for those already in an interfaith marriage (including cases in which there is a non-Christian couple and one party converts to Christianity after marriage), the Church notes that Saint Paul "addresses persons married to unbelievers and encourages them to stay married."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Anglican denominations such as the Episcopal Church in United States the Anglican Church of Canada, the Anglican Church in Aotearoa, New Zealand and Polynesia, the Anglican Episcopal Church of Brazil, the Scottish Episcopal Church in Scotland and mainline Protestant denominations such as the United Church of Christ, the United Church of Canada, the Metropolitan Community Church, the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Quakers, the United Reformed Church in United Kingdom, the Church of Scotland, the Methodist Church of Great Britain, the Church of Iceland, the Church of Sweden, the Church of Denmark, the Church of Norway, the United Protestant Church in Belgium, the Protestant Church in Baden, the Evangelical Church in Berlin, Brandenburg and Silesian Upper Lusatia, the Evangelical Church of Bremen, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Brunswick, the Evangelical Church of Hesse Electorate-Waldeck, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Oldenburg, the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Hanover, the Church of Lippe, the Evangelical Reformed Church in Bavaria and Northwestern Germany, the Evangelical Church in the Rhineland, the Protestant Church in Hesse and Nassau, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Northern Germany the Protestant Church of the Palatinate, the Evangelical Church of Westphalia, the Mennonite Church in the Netherlands the United Protestant Church of France, the Catholic Diocese of the Old Catholics in Germany, the Christian Catholic Church of Switzerland, some Reformed churches in Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches for example the Reformed Church of Aargau, the Protestant Church of Geneva or the Evangelical Reformed Church of the Canton of Zürich and some non-trinitarian denominations such as the Unity Church and the Unitarians, some international evangelical denominations, such as the Association of Welcoming and Affirming Baptists and Affirming Pentecostal Church International perform weddings between same-sex couples.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, some Lutheran and united churches in Evangelical Church in Germany, some Reformed churches in Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches, and the Protestant Church in the Netherlands do not administer sacramental marriage to same-sex couples, but blesses same-sex unions through the use of a specific liturgy.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Roman Catholic Church, the Orthodox Christian Church, and other more conservative Protestant denominations do not perform or recognize same-sex marriage because they do not consider it as marriage at all, and considering any homosexual sexual activity to be sinful. The Global Anglican Future Conference (GAFCON) consisting of the Church of Nigeria, Anglican Church of Kenya, Anglican Church of Tanzania, Rwanda and Uganda; Anglican Church of South America, Australia, parts of England, Canada, USA and Church of India through the Jerusalem Conference clearly asserted "the unchangeable standard of Christian marriage between one man and one woman as the proper place for sexual intimacy."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: With respect to religion, historic Christian belief emphasizes that Christian weddings should occur in a church as Christian marriage should begin where one also starts their faith journey (Christians receive the sacrament of baptism in church in the presence of their congregation). Catholic Christian weddings must "take place in a church building" as holy matrimony is a sacrament; sacraments normatively occur in the presence of Christ in the house of God, and "members of the faith community [should be] present to witness the event and provide support and encouragement for those celebrating the sacrament." Bishops never grant permission "to those requesting to be married in a garden, on the beach, or some other place outside of the church" and a dispensation is only granted "in extraordinary circumstances (for example, if a bride or groom is ill or disabled and unable to come to the church)." Marriage in the church, for Christians, is seen as contributing to the fruit of the newlywed couple regularly attending church each Lord's Day and raising children in the faith.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Christians seek to uphold the seriousness of wedding vows. Yet, they respond with compassion to deep hurts by recognizing that divorce, though less than the ideal, is sometimes necessary to relieve one partner of intolerable hardship, unfaithfulness or desertion. While the voice of God had said, "I hate divorce", some authorities believe the divorce rate in the church is nearly comparable to that of the culture at large.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Christians today hold three competing views as to what is the biblically ordained relationship between husband and wife. These views range from Christian egalitarianism that interprets the New Testament as teaching complete equality of authority and responsibility between the man and woman in marriage, all the way to Patriarchy that calls for a "return to complete patriarchy" in which relationships are based on male-dominant power and authority in marriage:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: 1. Christian Egalitarians believe in an equal partnership of the wife and husband with neither being designated as the leader in the marriage or family. Instead, the wife and husband share a fully equal partnership in both their marriage and in the family. Its proponents teach "the fundamental biblical principle of the equality of all human beings before God".


title: Christian views on marriage

text: "There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: According to this principle, there can be no moral or theological justification for permanently granting or denying status, privilege, or prerogative solely on the basis of a person's race, class, or gender.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: 2. Christian Complementarians prescribe husband-headship—a male-led hierarchy. This view's core beliefs call for a husband's "loving, humble headship" and the wife's "intelligent, willing submission" to his headship. They believe women have "different but complementary roles and responsibilities in marriage".


title: Christian views on marriage

text: 3. Biblical patriarchy, though not at all popular among mainstream Christians, prescribes a strict male-dominant hierarchy. This view makes the husband the ruler over his wife and his household. Their organization's first tenet is that "God reveals Himself as masculine, not feminine. God is the eternal Father and the eternal Son, the Holy Spirit is also addressed as He, and Jesus Christ is a male". They consider the husband-father to be sovereign over his household—the family leader, provider, and protector. They call for a wife to be obedient to her head (her husband).


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Some Christian authorities permit the practice polygamy (specifically polygyny), but this practice, besides being illegal in Western cultures, is now considered to be out of the Christian mainstream in most parts of the globe; the Lutheran World Federation hosted a regional conference in Africa, in which the acceptance of polygamists and their wives into full membership by the Lutheran Church in Liberia was defended as being permissible. While the Lutheran Church in Liberia permits men to retain their wives if they married them prior to being received into the Church, it does not permit polygamists who have become Christians to marry more wives after they have received the sacrament of Holy Baptism.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Much of the dispute hinges on how one interprets the New Testament household code "(Haustafel)", a term coined by Martin Luther, which has as its main focus hierarchical relationships between three pairs of social classes that were controlled by Roman law: husbands/wives, parents/children, and masters/slaves. The apostolic teachings, with variations, that constitute what has been termed the "household code" occurs in four epistles (letters) by the Apostle Paul and in 1  Peter.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: In the early Roman Republic, long before the time of Christ, the law of "manus" along with the concept of "patria potestas" (rule of the fathers), gave the husband nearly absolute autocratic power over his wife, children, and slaves, including the power of life and death. In practice, the extreme form of this right was seldom exercised, and it was eventually limited by law.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Theologian Frank Stagg finds the basic tenets of the code in Aristotle's discussion of the household in Book 1 of "Politics" and in Philo's "Hypothetica 7.14". Serious study of the New Testament Household Code "(Haustafel)" began with Martin Dilbelius in 1913, with a wide range of studies since then. In a Tübingen dissertation, by James E. Crouch concludes that the early Christians found in Hellenistic Judaism a code which they adapted and Christianized.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Staggs believe the several occurrences of the New Testament household code in the Bible were intended to meet the needs for "order" within the churches and in the society of the day. They maintain that the New Testament household code is an attempt by Paul and Peter to Christianize the concept of family relationships for Roman citizens who had become followers of Christ. The Staggs write that there is some suggestion in scripture that because Paul had taught that they had newly found freedom "in Christ", wives, children, and slaves were taking improper advantage of the "Haustafel" both in the home and the church.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: "The form of the code stressing reciprocal social duties is traced to Judaism's own Oriental background, with its strong moral/ethical demand but also with a low view of woman... At bottom is probably to be seen the perennial tension between freedom and order... What mattered to (Paul) was 'a new creation' and 'in Christ' there is 'not any Jew not Greek, not any slave nor free, not any male and female'.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Two of these Christianized codes are found in Ephesians 5 (which contains the phrases "husband is the head of the wife" and "wives, submit to your husband") and in Colossians 3, which instructs wives to subordinate themselves to their husbands.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The importance of the meaning of "head" as used by the Apostle Paul is pivotal in the conflict between the Complementarian position and the Egalitarian view. The word Paul used for "head", transliterated from Greek, is "kephalē". Today's English word "cephalic" ( ) stems from the Greek "kephalē" and means "of or relating to the head; or located on, in, or near the head." A thorough concordance search by Catherine Kroeger shows that the most frequent use of "head" "(kephalē)" in the New Testament is to refer to "the anatomical head of a body". She found that its second most frequent use in the New Testament was to convey the metaphorical sense of "source". Other Egalitarian authors such as Margaret Howe agree with Kroeger, writing that "The word 'head' must be understood not as 'ruler' but as 'source.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Wayne Grudem criticizes commonly rendering "kephalē" in those same passages only to mean "source", and argues that it denotes "authoritative head" in such texts as Corinthians 11. They interpret that verse to mean that God the father is the authoritative head over the Son, and in turn Jesus is the authoritative head over the church, not simply its source. By extension, they then conclude that in marriage and in the church, the man is the authoritative head over the woman.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Another potential way to define the word "head", and hence the relationship between husband and wife as found in the Bible, is through the example given in the surrounding context in which the word is found. In that context the husband and wife are compared to Christ and his church. The context seems to imply an authority structure based on a man sacrificing himself for his wife, as Christ did for the church; a love-based authority structure, where submission is not required but freely given based on the care given to the wife.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Some biblical references on this subject are debated depending on one's school of theology. The historical grammatical method is a hermeneutic technique that strives to uncover the meaning of the text by taking into account not just the grammatical words, but also the syntactical aspects, the cultural and historical background, and the literary genre. Thus references to a patriarchal Biblical culture may or may not be relevant to other societies. What is believed to be a timeless truth to one person or denomination may be considered a cultural norm or minor opinion to another.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Christian Egalitarians (from the French word "égal" meaning "equal") believe that Christian marriage is intended to be a marriage without any hierarchy—a full and equal partnership between the wife and husband. They emphasize that nowhere in the New Testament is there a requirement for a wife to "obey" her husband. While "obey" was introduced into marriage vows for much of the church during the Middle Ages, its only New Testament support is found in Peter 3, with that only being by implication from Sarah's obedience to Abraham. Scriptures such as state that in Christ, right relationships are restored and in him, "there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Christian Egalitarians interpret scripture to mean that God intended spouses to practice "mutual submission", each in equality with the other. The phrase "mutual submission" comes from a verse in Ephesians 5 which precedes advice for the three domestic relationships of the day, including slavery. It reads, "Submit to one another ('mutual submission') out of reverence for Christ", wives to husbands, children to parents, and slaves to their master. Christian Egalitarians believe that full partnership in marriage is the most biblical view, producing the most intimate, wholesome, and reciprocally fulfilling marriages.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The Christian Egalitarian view of marriage asserts that gender, in and of itself, neither privileges nor curtails a believer's gifting or calling to any ministry in the church or home. It does not imply that women and men are identical or undifferentiated, but affirms that God designed men and women to complement and benefit one another. A foundational belief of Christian Egalitarians is that the husband and wife are created equally and are ordained of God to "become one", a biblical principle first ordained by God in Genesis 2, reaffirmed by Jesus in Matthew 19 and Mark 10, and by the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 5. Therefore, they see that "oneness" as pointing to gender equality in marriage. They believe the biblical model for Christian marriages is therefore for the spouses to share equal responsibility within the family—not one over the other nor one under the other.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: David Dykes, theologian, author, and pastor of a 15,000-member Baptist church, sermonized that "When you are in Christ, you have full equality with all other believers". In a sermon he entitled "The Ground Is Level at the Foot of the Cross", he said that some theologians have called one particular Bible verse the Christian "Magna Carta". The Bible verse reads: "There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." Acknowledging the differences between men and women, Dykes writes that "in Christ, these differences don't define who we are. The only category that really matters in the world is whether you are in Christ. At the cross, Jesus destroyed all the made-made barriers of hostility:" ethnicity, social status, and gender.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Those of the egalitarian persuasion point to the biblical instruction that all Christian believers, irrespective of gender, are to submit or be subject "to one another in the fear of God" or "out of reverence for Christ". Gilbert Bilezikian writes that in the highly debated Ephesians 5 passage, the verb "to be subject" or "to be submitted" appears in verse 21 which he describes as serving as a "hinge" between two different sections. The first section consists of verses 18–20, verse 21 is the connection between the two, and the second section consists of verses 22–33. When discussion begins at verse 22 in Ephesians 5, Paul appears to be reaffirming a chain of command principle within the family. However,


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The egalitarian paradigm leaves it up to the couple to decide who is responsible for what task or function in the home. Such decisions should be made rationally and wisely, not based on gender or tradition. Examples of a couple's decision logic might include:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Complementarians hold to a hierarchical structure between husband and wife. They believe men and women have different gender-specific roles that allow each to "complement" the other, hence the designation "Complementarians". The Complementarian view of marriage holds that while the husband and wife are of equal worth before God, husbands and wives are given different functions and responsibilities by God that are based on gender, and that male leadership is biblically ordained so that the husband is always the senior authority figure. They state they "observe with deep concern" "accompanying distortions or neglect of the glad harmony portrayed in Scripture between the intelligent, humble leadership of redeemed husbands and the loving, willing support of that leadership by redeemed wives". They believe "the Bible presents a clear chain of authority—above all authority and power is God; God is the head of Christ. Then in descending order, Christ is the head of man, man is the head of woman, and parents are the head of their children." Complementarians teach that God intended men to lead their wives as "heads" of the family. Wayne Grudem, in an article that interprets the "mutual submission" of Ephesians 5 as being hierarchical, writes that it means "being considerate of one another, and caring for one another’s needs, and being thoughtful of one another, and sacrificing for one another."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Scriptures such as 1 Corinthians 11:3: "But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God", (KJV) is understood as meaning the wife is to be subject to her husband, if not unconditionally.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: According to Complementarian authors John Piper, Wayne Grudem, and others, historically, but to a significantly lesser extent in most of Christianity today, the predominant position in both Catholicism and conservative Protestantism places the male as the "head" in the home and in the church. They hold that women are commanded to be in subjection to male leadership, with a wife being obedient to her head (husband), based upon Old Testament precepts and principles. This view holds that, "God has created men and women equal in their essential dignity and human personhood, but different and complementary in function with male headship in the home and in the Church."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Grudem also acknowledges exceptions to the submission of wives to husbands where moral issues are involved. Rather than unconditional obedience, Complementarian authors such as Piper and Grudem are careful to caution that a wife's submission should never cause her to "follow her husband into sin."


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Roman Catholic Church teaching on the role of women includes that of Pope Leo XIII in his 1880 encyclical "Arcanum" which states:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Though each of their churches is autonomous and self-governed, the official position of the Southern Baptist Convention (the largest Protestant denomination in the United States) is:


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The patriarchal model of marriage is clearly the oldest one. It characterized the theological understanding of most Old Testament writers. It mandates the supremacy, at times the ultimate domination, of the husband-father in the family. In the first century Roman Empire, in the time of Jesus, Paul, and Peter, it was the law of the land and gave the husband absolute authority over his wife, children, and slaves—even the power of life or death. It subordinates all women.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Biblical patriarchy is similar to Complementarianism but with differences of degree and emphasis. Biblical patriarchists carry the husband-headship model considerably further and with more militancy. While Complementarians also hold to exclusively male leadership in both the home and the church, Biblical patriarchy extends that exclusion to the civic sphere as well, so that women should not be civil leaders and indeed should not have careers outside the home.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Patriarchy is based on authoritarianism—complete obedience or subjection to male authority as opposed to individual freedom. Patriarchy gives preeminence to the male in essentially all matters of religion and culture. It explicitly deprives all women of social, political, and economic rights. The marriage relationship simply reinforced this dominance of women by men, providing religious, cultural, and legal structures that clearly favor patriarchy to the exclusion of even basic human dignity for wives.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Historically in classical patriarchy, the wives and children were always legally dependent upon the father, as were the slaves and other servants. It was the way of life throughout most of the Old Testament, religiously, legally, and culturally. However, it was not unique to Hebrew thought. With only minor variations, it characterized virtually every pagan culture of that day—including all Pre-Christian doctrine and practice.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: While Scripture allowed this approach in Old Testament times, nowhere does the Bible ordain it. In the Hebrew nation, patriarchy seems to have evolved as an expression of male dominance and supremacy, and of a double standard that prevailed throughout much of the Old Testament. Its contemporary advocates insist that it is the only biblically valid model for marriage today. They argue that it was established at Creation, and thus is a firm, unalterable decree of God about the relative positions of men and women.


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Biblical patriarchists see what they describe as a crisis of this era being what they term to be a systematic attack on the "timeless truths of biblical patriarchy". They believe such an attack includes the movement to "subvert the biblical model of the family, and redefine the very meaning of fatherhood and motherhood, masculinity, femininity, and the parent and child relationship." Arguing from the biblical presentation of God revealing himself "as masculine, not feminine", they believe God ordained distinct gender roles for man and woman as part of the created order. They say "Adam’s headship over Eve was established at the beginning, before sin entered the world". Their view is that the male has God-given authority and mandate to direct "his" household in paths of obedience to God. They refer to man's "dominion" beginning within the home, and a man's qualification to lead and ability to lead well in the public square is based upon his prior success in "ruling his household".


title: Christian views on marriage

text: Thus, William Einwechter refers to the traditional Complementarian view as "two-point Complementarianism" (male leadership in the family and church), and regards the biblical patriarchy view as "three-point" or "full" complementarianism (male leadership in family, church "and society").


title: Christian views on marriage

text: The patriarchists teach that "the woman was created as a helper to her husband, as the bearer of children, and as a "keeper at home", concluding that the God-ordained and proper sphere of dominion for a wife is the household. Biblical patriarchists consider that "faithfulness to Christ requires that (Biblical patriarchy) be believed, taught, and lived". They claim that the "man is...the image and glory of God in terms of authority, while the woman is the glory of man". They teach that a wife is to be "obedient" to her "head" (husband), based upon Old Testament teachings and models.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Bradley Aaron Keselowski (; born February 12, 1984) is an American professional stock car racing driver, team owner, and entrepreneur. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 6 Ford Mustang for RFK Racing, a team he also co-owns. He was the owner of Brad Keselowski Racing, which fielded two full-time trucks in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski, who began his NASCAR career in 2004, is the second of only six drivers who have won a championship in both the Cup Series and the Xfinity Series, and the twenty-fifth driver to win a race in each of NASCAR's three national series.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: He is the owner and founder of Keselowski Advanced Manufacturing, a hybrid manufacturing company based in Statesville, North Carolina, specializing in additive metal technologies as well as CNC machining.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski was born in Rochester Hills, Michigan, and grew up in a racing family. He is the fifth child of Kay and Bob Keselowski and the nephew of Ron Keselowski. His older brother, Brian, is also an active racing driver. The Keselowski family is of Polish descent.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski spent much of his adolescence working at his father's race shop; he swept and mopped the floors, and mowed the grass. In 2000, Keselowski began racing stock cars in the Factory Stock division.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In 2004, at only 20 years old, Keselowski began his NASCAR career as the driver of the No. 29 Ford F-150 for the generally owned company in the Craftsman Truck Series. He made his debut in the Kroger 250 at Martinsville, where he started twenty-sixth and finished thirty-third. He made seven more starts that season, with his best finish coming in the UAW/GM Ohio 250 at Mansfield, where he finished 16th.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski began competing in the Truck Series full-time in 2005 with backing from SUBcrews.com and Samson Stone. He opened the season with a seventh-place finish in the Florida Dodge Dealers 250 at Daytona, his only top ten finish of the year. He would end up finishing twenty-first in points. He ran the first two races of 2006 for K-Automotive before a lack of sponsorship caused the team to temporarily suspend operations. Keselowski then drove the No. 02 Chevrolet at Kentucky and Memphis, filling in for an injured Kelly Sutton, and drove the No. 63 Ford for MB Motorsports at Bristol and in the season finale, the Ford 200 at Homestead.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski began competing in the Busch Series full-time in 2007. He drove the No. 23 Chevrolet Monte Carlo SS for Keith Coleman Racing until the team suspended operations in July. Earlier in June, during the 2007 Truck Series season, Keselowski was tabbed by Germain Racing to replace Ted Musgrave in the No. 9 Team ASE Toyota Tundra for the O'Reilly 200 at Memphis after Musgrave was suspended for an in-race scuffle with another driver at the Milwaukee Mile. Keselowski won his first career pole for the race, and led sixty-two laps, but got turned around by Travis Kvapil as they fought for the lead with ten laps to go. Keselowski wound up finishing 16th. Shortly afterward, Keselowski was called by car owner Dale Earnhardt Jr. to drive the No. 88 United States Navy-sponsored Chevrolet for JR Motorsports for three races, and eventually the rest of the Busch Series season. During the Camping World 300 at California Speedway, Keselowski was involved in an accident involving A. J. Allmendinger and J. J. Yeley. Keselowski was able to climb out of his damaged car but complained of foot pain. He would later be treated and released from Loma Linda University Medical Center and was cleared to race at Richmond the following weekend. Keselowski would close the 2007 season out with five top-ten finishes and a twenty-fifth-place finish in points.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In 2008 Keselowski re-signed with JR Motorsports for the 2008 Nationwide Series season, and earned his first career victory in the Federated Auto Parts 300 at Nashville Superspeedway, holding off Clint Bowyer. Keselowski would hold off Bowyer again for his second career win in the Food City 250 at Bristol Motor Speedway. He ended the season third in points, the highest finish by a full-time Nationwide Series-only driver. Keselowski also got his first taste of Sprint Cup action during the 2008 season. He was on standby for an ill Jeff Gordon at Kansas and for expectant father Casey Mears at Talladega, before competing in two races for Hendrick Motorsports in the No. 25 GoDaddy.com Chevrolet Impala. Keselowski finished 19th in his Cup debut, the Dickies 500 at Texas, and 23rd in the Ford 400 at Homestead.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski returned to JR Motorsports to drive the No. 88 Chevrolet for the 2009 Nationwide Series, with sponsorship from GoDaddy.com, as well as competing in a limited Cup schedule. He drove the No. 25 GoDaddy.com Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports in seven races and drove the No. 09 Miccosukee-sponsored Chevrolet for Phoenix Racing in five races.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski pulled off a massive upset and earned his first career Sprint Cup victory in the Aaron's 499 at Talladega. He pushed Carl Edwards towards the front from fifth with two laps to go. Coming out of turn four on the final lap, he attempted to trick Edwards into blocking on the high side so that he could pull underneath. Edwards moved high to block, opening the door for Keselowski to attempt a pass on the low side. When he saw Keselowski moving low, Edwards again tried to block him. Their cars made contact, with Edwards spinning as Keselowski charged to the checkered flag. Due to the rear-wing design on 2009 Car of Tomorrow, Edwards' car lifted off of the ground as it spun backward. After Ryan Newman's No. 39 hit Edwards' car, it sailed into the catch fence separating the track from the front grandstands, then skidded to a halt in the middle of the track. Eight fans were injured by flying debris; the most serious one being a woman who broke her jaw and was taken by helicopter to a nearby hospital. Keselowski earned his first career victory on his fifth career start and earned James Finch his first career victory as an owner in his twentieth year of racing. The race's final lap was the first Sprint Cup lap that Keselowski ever led, and therefore the only lap he led for the entire race; this was the first time in history that the very first lap a Sprint Cup driver led was the final lap of a race.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski's victory at Talladega earned him more seat time in the James Finch-owned Chevy. Originally scheduled to appear next in the 18th race of the season, at Daytona International Speedway, he was then rescheduled to appear in the upcoming race at Richmond International Raceway. Keselowski also was entered into the Sprint All-Star Race as well. He was forced to pull out of the Richmond race due to commitments to his Nationwide Series team.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski got his third Nationwide Series victory at Dover when Kyle Busch cut a tire on the restart and second-place Joey Logano made contact, allowing Keselowski to pass both.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: After taking a gamble and staying out past his pit window, Keselowski garnered his fourth win at the first-ever Nationwide race at Iowa Speedway after battling Kyle Busch to take over and maintain the first position. Keselowski finished first over Kyle Busch, though Busch still tied a record with his ninth consecutive top-two finish.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: At Montreal in the 2009 NAPA 200, Keselowski had a promising run. After a brief red flag for sprinkles, Keselowski only could hold his spot up in the top fifteen causing him to lose some spots in the standings. With three laps left, Keselowski barely avoided a pile-up in turn 1 to end up in the fifth spot earning back his lost points. When the race ended with rival Carl Edwards as the winner, Keselowski among other drivers said that the pile-up and the shocking finish between Marcos Ambrose and Carl Edwards; resembled the finish of the Montreal race in 2007 when Marcos Ambrose almost won but was crashed by Robby Gordon during the confusion of a similar crash in turn 1.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski's next Nationwide Series victory came in August at the CARFAX 250 at Michigan International Speedway. Pole-sitter Brian Vickers and points-leader Kyle Busch dominated the race, but Keselowski passed them both on the final lap after a blocking move by Vickers on Busch forced both drivers to slow down slightly.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: The rest of Keselowski's 2009 season in Sprint Cup was less than stellar. After the win, he only captured two top fifteen finishes until November 2009. He met controversy at the fall race in Talladega when he bumped future teammate Kurt Busch going into the tri-oval causing a fifteen-car melee, that included Busch, Jeff Gordon, and Mark Martin - who went upside down after being clipped by Martin Truex Jr. Because Keselowski was already being ridiculed by most of the drivers and fans for how he drove aggressively throughout the races, this wreck earned him some jeers, including a disapproving look from Mark Martin.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In the Nationwide Series, Keselowski also had a series of run-ins with Denny Hamlin. Throughout 2007, 2008, and 2009, Keselowski and Hamlin tangled in many races. After Keselowski punted Hamlin during the autumn Phoenix event in the Nationwide race, Hamlin said he would retaliate. The next week Hamlin kept his promise, intentionally colliding into Keselowski early in the race. The wreck ended Keselowski's huge chances of beating Kyle Busch for the championship. NASCAR black-flagged Hamlin 3 laps for aggressive rough driving, but Hamlin recovered for a top ten spot. Hamlin was unapologetic in an interview and while Keselowski also remained unrepentant, saying "I've already moved on," Keselowski got little or no sympathy from most of his fellow competitors.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski ended up in third spot behind rivals Carl Edwards and Kyle Busch in the final NNS standings.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Although Keselowski had rubbed some of his fellow drivers the wrong way with his driving style, the results he produced on the track seemed to indicate that a permanent move to the Sprint Cup Series was an inevitability. Despite his relationship with Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Hendrick Motorsports, the team did not have a car for him to drive full-time as each of their four regular teams had established drivers under contract. Keselowski began looking elsewhere and left the Chevrolet camp to drive a Dodge for Team Penske.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In 2010, Keselowski replaced David Stremme in the No. 12 Dodge Charger in the Cup Series and ran the full Nationwide Series schedule as well in the No. 22 Discount Tire. In Atlanta, on lap 41, Keselowski unintentionally tapped Carl Edwards on a restart and Edwards went up to the wall to collect Joey Logano. Later, Keselowski appeared to be headed toward a top-5 finish at Atlanta with three laps to go when Edwards, apparently in retaliation for this accident, intentionally spun Keselowski. Keselowski's car caught air and despite the roof flaps working his car overturned, hitting the front-stretch wall roof-first in an accident that resembled the Talladega finish of the previous year. His new teammate Kurt Busch ended up winning the race. Edwards was parked by NASCAR and Keselowski was physically okay, but shaken up from the heavy impact.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski scored his first 2010 Nationwide win at Talladega on April 25, after crashing out of the Sprint Cup race earlier in the day, and then went on to win five more races at Richmond, Nashville, Michigan, and Charlotte. At Gateway International Raceway in 2010 Brad Keselowski fought rival Carl Edwards again in the closing stages of the Nationwide Race. On the final lap, Keselowski got loose and unintentionally bumped Edwards. Keselowski briefly took the lead, but gave the position back and fell in behind Edwards. The two ran side by side through turns two and three before Edwards ran high in turn 4 and then made a hard left into the right quarter panel of the No. 22, tuning him intentionally into the wall hard at the finish line and causing an 11 car wreck. Keselowski's car came down in front of the field and was hit hard by the car of Shelby Howard. Keselowski climbed out of his car with a grimace on his face and mostly unscathed, though one driver was sent to the hospital with rib injuries. With his team and in victory lane Edwards was loudly booed as he bragged publicly that the crash was not an accident. Keselowski was infuriated and told a reporter that Edwards just wrecked him for no reason, saying, "I am sure Edwards will say sorry or think about how cool he is in his mind but that is not reality." That week NASCAR put Edwards on probation for his actions, fined him $25,000, and deducted 60 points from him in the Nationwide Series point standings. NASCAR also placed Keselowski on probation just in case Keselowski felt the need to pay Edwards back. Both drivers were then told by NASCAR to either calm down the rivalry or face an indefinite suspension from the sport.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: At Bristol in the Nationwide Series race Keselowski was the center of controversy because he was involved in an accident caused by Kyle Busch. In turn 3 with 33 laps left, Busch slid in front of Keselowski, causing Keselowski to bump him. Busch was angry that Keselowski bumped him, so in the next turn, Busch retaliated, by intentionally wrecking Keselowski into the wall. NASCAR did not penalize Busch because they had previously made a rule allowing drivers to police themselves called "Boys have at it." Keselowski finished in 14th instead of possibly contending for the race win. Kyle Busch ended up winning the race and admitted that wrecking Brad was on purpose in a post-race conference. In reply to the crash, Keselowski called Busch "an ass" during driver introductions before the Cup race. Both drivers were given a warning by NASCAR the next week and temporary placed on probation. In 2012, Keselowski and Kyle Busch announced that they ended their rivalry though they've had a few run-ins since (Such as when Keselowski and Busch made contact at Watkins Glen in 2012 and Busch crashing Keselowski at Kansas in 2013) that didn't boil over.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: The next week at Montreal, Keselowski redeemed himself from Bristol. Keselowski had his greatest finish at the track in 4th spot. He was in the 6th spot on the restart but Robby Gordon ran out of gas on the restart letting Keselowski battle Paul Menard for 4th place. Eventually, as Boris Said and Max Papis had a close amazing finish for the win, Keselowski had a similar finish with Paul Menard with Keselowski holding off Menard for 4th spot.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: With crew chief Paul Wolfe all year, Keselowski won his first ever NASCAR Nationwide Series title, collecting 6 wins, five poles, 26 top 5s, and 29 top 10s along the way. His 26 top 5s beat Kyle Busch's record of 25 top 5s set in 2009.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In the Sprint Cup, it was a different story. Keselowski finished 25th in the final Sprint Cup standings and recorded one pole, no wins, 0 top 5s, and 2 top 10s.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: For 2011, Keselowski moved over to Penske's long-time flagship car, the No. 2 Miller Lite-sponsored Dodge. The switch with Kurt Busch, who had driven the car since 2006, occurred due to a sponsorship change and consolidation of operations at the team. Royal Dutch Shell, who had most recently sponsored Kevin Harvick's No. 29 Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing, signed on to sponsor Penske's second car, which Keselowski had been driving. At the insistence of Shell, the more experienced Busch was moved to the renumbered No. 22 Dodge and his crew went with him. Keselowski, meanwhile, had his crew follow him to the No. 2 and the team's third unit, the No. 77 which had been driven by Sam Hornish Jr., was dissolved (its sponsor, Mobil 1, had left the team) and its operations merged with Keselowski's team.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski's Nationwide Series crew chief Paul Wolfe replaced Jay Guy in the Sprint Cup Series; Todd Gordon became Keselowski's crew chief in the NASCAR Nationwide Series.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski's 2011 Cup season began slowly, but starting in May his fortunes began to change. He won the pole for the 2011 Coca-Cola 600, and the following week, he was able to get the lead with nine laps to go and hold off a charging Dale Earnhardt Jr. to win the 2011 STP 400 at Kansas Speedway on fuel mileage. During his victory celebration, he ran out of fuel.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: While testing at Road Atlanta in August, Keselowski was driving over 200 miles per hour on a straightaway, but his brakes unexpectedly failed. Keselowski could not stop and slammed into a solid concrete wall violently at approximately 190 MPH and broke his left ankle. Keselowski was airlifted to a hospital, claiming he had terrible back pain. Despite racing with injuries, Keselowski won his second race of the season at the Good Sam RV Insurance 500 at Pocono Raceway less than a week after the accident. The win put him into contention to grab one of the two "Wild Card" spots available in the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: The next week, Keselowski finished second at the 2011 Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at The Glen. He took the lead on a restart two laps to go but was passed by Marcos Ambrose in turn five of the same lap. A violent crash involving David Reutimann and David Ragan on the last lap forced NASCAR to throw the caution, and Ambrose was declared the winner. Keselowski followed his 2nd-place finish with a 3rd-place finish at the Pure Michigan 400. The next week, Keselowski won his third race of the year at the Irwin Tools Night Race at Bristol.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: That win virtually assured Keselowski a spot in the 2011 Chase for the Cup, given NASCAR's rule change designating the final two Chase spots as wild card slots for drivers ranked 11th through 20th in the points with the most wins. Keselowski finished the regular season 11th in points, using his three wins to qualify for his first career Chase.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski was a factor for much of the Chase, before a late spin during the Tums Fast Relief 500 at Martinsville Speedway derailed his championship hopes. Still, Keselowski finished his second full Cup season fifth in the point standings, 84 points behind champion Tony Stewart. Keselowski finished the season with more wins than teammate Busch (three to two) and with better points finish.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In addition to continuing running in the Sprint Cup Series and a limited Nationwide Series schedule for Penske Racing, Keselowski has competed in a limited number of Camping World Truck Series races for his own team as a teammate to Parker Kligerman.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Statistically, 2012 was Keselowski's best Sprint Cup season to date: he won five races on the way to winning his first Sprint Cup championship. Keselowski started the year by memorably posting pictures and status updates via Twitter from his car during a red flag period. Cars were stopped on the track when a mechanical failure on Juan Pablo Montoya's car caused it to run into a jet dryer under caution at the Daytona 500, leading to a large fire that damaged the track surface, which had to be repaired before the race could be concluded. Keselowski was caught up in a crash on lap 188 and finished 32nd.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: On March 18 he won his first race of the season, the Food City 500 at Bristol. He also won the Aaron's 499 at Talladega from a late-race restart and a push from Kyle Busch that allowed him to overtake Matt Kenseth. It was the first time since Dave Marcis in 1976 that Dodge won a Sprint Cup Series race at Talladega and only the fourth win at the track for the automaker. (This also proved to be Dodge's last win at the track as the manufacturer left NASCAR following the end of the 2012 season.)


title: Brad Keselowski

text: On June 30, Keselowski picked up his 3rd win at Kentucky Speedway, the first driver to win three races in the 2012 Cup season and joining Kyle Busch as the first two-time Sprint Cup winners of the race at Kentucky. Beginning with Kentucky, Keselowski went on a hot streak that lasted to the season finale at Homestead that ultimately earned him his Sprint Cup title. In these 19 races, he only finished worse than 11th twice (30th at Bristol and 15th at Homestead).


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski won the first Nationwide series race to be contested at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the Indiana 250. Although Penske Racing has fifteen victories in the Indianapolis 500, this was the team's first NASCAR triumph at the track.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In August 2012, Keselowski put himself in second place at the Nationwide race at Watkins Glen. He led the closing stages but several cautions ended up putting his old rival Carl Edwards to the lead; with two laps to go Keselowski fell back to second place and Edwards charged for the win and in victory lane, he confirmed he and Keselowski no longer dislike each other; Keselowski in his review said the same confirmation.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: The next day, Keselowski led 37 laps in the Finger Lakes 355 at Watkins Glen. With two laps to go, he was second behind Kyle Busch, and had Marcos Ambrose behind him. Busch slipped on oil after taking the white flag, and Keselowski slid into him, spinning him out in the esses. Keselowski then led most of the final lap before Ambrose was able to get by Keselowski in the final turns; Keselowski finished second to Ambrose in an almost carbon-copy repeat of the previous year's finish.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski notched another 2nd-place finish the following week at Michigan, leading with 10 laps to go but being passed by Jimmie Johnson and Greg Biffle. Johnson's engine blew up leading with six laps to go, giving the race to Biffle. Keselowski's strong showing during the 2012 Sprint Cup season qualified him automatically for the Chase for the Sprint Cup, which he entered in 4th place on account of his 3 regular-season wins.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: In September, he won the first race in the Chase, the GEICO 400 at Chicagoland Speedway. Two weeks after that, he won at Dover after several of the dominant leaders had to pit late for fuel, allowing him to assume the point lead. Keselowski continued on a hot streak of top-eleven finishes: 7th at Talladega, 11th at Charlotte, and 7th at Kansas, although his point lead over Jimmie Johnson narrowed during this stretch. He lost the point lead to Johnson the following week at Martinsville, finishing sixth while Johnson won. The next week Keselowski finished second at Texas, racing Johnson hard before relinquishing the lead. His aggressive driving at the end of the race prompted defending champion Tony Stewart to say that Keselowski drove with a 'death wish.'


title: Brad Keselowski

text: While Johnson wrecked the following week in Phoenix, Keselowski's sixth-place finish allowed him to reassume the points lead by 20 points. During a red flag period due to Jeff Gordon intentionally crashing Clint Bowyer, Keselowski again tweeted a photo from his car. NASCAR fined Keselowski $25,000 for this, stating that it was prohibited under NASCAR rules (despite NASCAR not having penalized Keselowski for tweeting a photo from his car during the lengthy red flag at the Daytona 500). He qualified third for the finale at Homestead-Miami, but was then moved up to second after pole-sitter Joey Logano was involved in a Saturday practice wreck involving Greg Biffle and Denny Hamlin. Keselowski finished in 15th place, but still clinched his first Sprint Cup championship when Johnson dropped out of the race with gear failure, joining Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt as the only drivers to win the Cup championship within their first three full-time seasons. In an interview on ESPN's SportsCenter during the post-race celebration, Keselowski admitted to being "a little buzzed" after consuming plenty of his sponsor, Miller Lite. The video of his interview went viral; interviewer Kevin Connors called it the best interview in SportsCenter's history.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: Keselowski opened the 2013 season with four straight top-5 finishes, including a fourth-place finish in the Daytona 500 despite being caught up in two crashes. He almost was on point to repeat what Dale Earnhardt had accomplished in 1995 – start off the season following his championship with five top five finishes, but this attempt came to an end at the Auto Club 500, where he finished 24th after dealing with handling issues. He posted three more top-10s in the next three races before suffering a dropped cylinder in his engine towards the end of the Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond International Raceway that relegated him to a 33rd-place finish. From April–May 2013, Keselowski had one of his worst spring starts of a NASCAR season.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: At Talladega, Keselowski had a promising run. After a long red flag due to rain Keselowski was entering the top ten. He drove his way up to contention to win after two crashes. On the last restart, Keselowski started on the low line. Because of a misunderstanding, Keselowski was not happy with the race winner David Ragan after he ended up in the 15th spot due to him being told to restart on the not preferred low line. David Ragan lined up on the high side after making a pass on Keselowski under caution. Ragan used the lane and went on to win a race that is considered the biggest upset of 2013.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: After climbing out of his car, Keselowski gave a rant on Twitter accusing David Ragan of lining up improperly and NASCAR allowing a rule violation. Nobody agreed with him and Keselowski got jeered by fans and media; which further made Keselowski frustrated. However, after looking at a video of the finish Keselowski realized that NASCAR was directing fairly and that Ragan was fairly in his line; he apologized two days later.


title: Brad Keselowski

text: At Darlington, Keselowski finished in 32nd place after being involved in a crash on lap 313. At Charlotte in the All-Star race, Keselowski had one of his most heartbreaking races ever. On lap 2, he lost a transmission. He had to slide 15,000 feet back around the track to get to the garage. His car had broken down from steering problems that would take the rest of the race to fix. Keselowski also attended the Indianapolis 500 to cheer on and direct his Team Penske friend/teammate, Helio Castroneves. At the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte, though, on lap 317, Keselowski was wrecked by Danica Patrick after her off-track boyfriend Ricky Stenhouse made it three-wide. Keselowski subsequently retired from the race, finishing 35th, his first DNF since the 2012 Daytona 500. At Kentucky, Keselowski won the rain-shortened Nationwide race, but in the Sprint Cup race, he was tagged on lap 47 by Kurt Busch, causing a seven-car wreck, and he finished 34th. He then had a 21st-place finish at Daytona in the Coke Zero 400.