Well, this is a bit embarrassing to talk about, but it seems my 19-year-old nephew, a Grove City student, has gotten his girlfriend "in trouble." The shotgun wedding is slated for early March in California. They plan to begin college again in the fall at a new school.

What baffles me is this: he was raised overseas by missionary parents and even went though the special ceremony that 15-year-olds have in Latino churches. At this ceremony, the teen puts on a wedding band and promises chastity until marriage.

His older sister also fell into marriage very young. She dropped out of college after 1 semester in the US and ran back to Guatemala to marry a young man from her church. They had a baby about 15 months later.

So what is going on here? Are these kids just dealing with culture shock--choosing the Latino life of early marriage, or is it something else propelling them to marry so young? One of my sisters-in-law thinks that the whole chastity ceremony and constant talk about of sexual purity gives kids an inflated idea of how great sex is. (It's nice, but not the be-all and end-all of our existance as the media would have us believe.) She compared it to how some teetotaling families end up pushing their kids to drink by making alcohol so incredibly taboo that they are compelled to find out about it.

She might have something there. Wisdom and balance are really important in steering kids to make right choices.