Is sex... or lack thereof... a good enough reason for divorce?

[first timer]

Daughter brought the following passage(s) home from school:

Marriage & Love Relationship: A Complete Marriage.
There are four types of love that MUST be present at the same time in any marriage and love relationship to make a complete marriage. When ANY of these loves are missing, it leaves a gapping hole in the relationship. (Strive to keep these four types of love active in your marriage. It will keep it secure!)

A Complete Marriage

A marriage relationship is built over a lifetime. There are four kinds of “love” needed to make a marriage relationship complete. They are AGAPE, PHILEO, STORGE, and EROS. All are essential in a marriage.

The highest form of these types of love is agape. Agape love is an unconditional love. It loves when all other types of love quit, and cares when there is no apparent reason to care. This love comes from God into a person when they ask Jesus to come into their heart and to be their Lord and Savior. God is our example. He “...demonstrates HIS OWN LOVE [agape] toward us, in that while we were STILL SINNERS, CHRIST DIED FOR US” (Romans 5:8). He likewise commands all husbands to “...love [agape] your wives AS CHRIST ALSO LOVED THE CHURCH AND GAVE HIMSELF FOR HER” (Ephesians 5:25).

People make friends with others according to the kind of car they drive or what kind of clothes they wear, or their status in society. The agape love of God goes past the surface, enabling us to look deep into our mate’s heart and love them for who God has made them to be despite their faults and shortcomings.

Phileo love is the kind of love that makes agape love enjoyable. Phileo love is having tender affection toward your mate. Most friendships are built on phileo love. Phileo love is that “something” that you see in another person that draws you to be their friend. It’s one thing to unconditionally love (agape) someone who you don’t like to be around because they irritate you. It’s quite another thing to unconditionally love someone who is tenderly affectionate (phileo) toward you. THE TENDER AFFECTION OF PHILEO LOVE MAKES THE UNCONDITIONAL LOVE OF AGAPE ENJOYABLE. It’s the joy of the friendship!

It has been said that phileo love is a human love. If that were the case, then why does God the Father, who is NOT a human, but a Spirit, phileo love Jesus His Son and us? Jesus said, “For the FATHER HIMSELF LOVES (phileo) YOU, because you have loved (phileo) Me…” (John 16:27).

God’s desire for the husband and wife is that they tenderly love (phileo) each other while they overlook each other’s faults and failures (agape).

Another kind of love needed in a marriage is storge. Storge is a physical show of affection that results from a pure motive. It may be a hug, a kiss, or another expression of genuine affection. Because males are different than females, the wife usually needs this kind of love more from her husband. It is important for the husband to set aside his need of companionship and meet his wife’s main need, which is affection.

Eros love is needed to make a marriage. Eros is the fulfillment of the physical sexual desire that a husband and wife show toward each other. It’s when “...the two ...become ONE FLESH” (Matthew 19:5).

When all four types of love operate in a marriage, the marriage is complete. A picture of a complete marriage is a husband and wife who lay down their life for each other (agape love) no matter how many times the other offends them or causes them to have ill feelings. They both have tender affection toward each other (phileo love). They enjoy each other’s company because they’re best friends. Because they enjoy each other so much, they hug, kiss, hold hands and do nice things for their mate (storge love). Because their hearts are filled with agape, phileo and storge, a warm passionate desire arises within both of them to enjoy each other sexually (eros). Now, that kind of God-centered marriage will weather ANY storm.

We must nurture and protect ALL of these different kinds of love in our marriage. Negligence of any kind of love leaves a gaping hole in our relationship. To show you the significance and impact of this on our relationship, let’s remove one type of love at a time and see how incomplete the other three are alone.

The Missing Link

Let’s take out the highest form of love first, agape. Since agape love is unselfish the thing that will be prevalent, is selfishness. Human nature in itself is very selfish. Agape love influences and dominates all the other types of love. Selfishness will dominate phileo love. The friendship of the relationship will have a predominate undertone of “how can the friendship satisfy ME.” “If I act a certain pleasing way, I can get this.” Storge, that physical show of affection will diminish because “self” does not see it as important unless IT wants something. Eros, the passionate desire for sex, becomes one sided.

When phileo love is missing, the caring and unconditional love will still be intact, but there will be a lack of friendship in the marriage. That gooey show of affection of storge will not be as prevalent. The need for sex of eros love will be more out of honor or duty.

Storge, that physical show of affection, is normal when phileo and agape love are intact. Storge love is usually missing because of emotional or psychological problems. The wounds that were inflected from trauma, neglect or some other issue of the past must be worked through; otherwise, one partner may feel a measure of rejection because they believe that their partner does not want to be affectionate to them. It’s not that they don’t want to, but that their heart will not give them the liberty to express it. This, of course will affect the eros love. The couple’s sex life will diminish. Most likely sex will be a result of need, rather than the passionate desire that arises from the affection of storge love.

[billiechic]

That is some great information, though it is hard to understand. How old is your daughter?

[billiechic]

ahh.. no wonder. its from a website : Marriage and Love, What Makes a Marriage Relationship Complete? Four Kinds of Love!

Here is a better description: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Four_Loves

Storge – affection
Affection (storge, στοργή) is fondness through familiarity, especially between family members or people who have otherwise found themselves together by chance. It is described as the most natural, emotive, and widely diffused of loves: natural in that it is present without coercion; emotive because it is the result of fondness due to familiarity; and most widely diffused because it pays the least attention to those characteristics deemed "valuable" or worthy of love and, as a result, is able to transcend most discriminating factors. Ironically, its strength is also what makes it vulnerable. Affection has the appearance of being "built-in" or "ready made", says Lewis, and as a result people come to expect, even to demand, its presence—irrespective of their behavior and its natural consequences.
[edit] Philia – friendship

Philia (Greek: φιλία) is the love between friends. Friendship is the strong bond existing between people who share common interest or activity. Lewis immediately differentiates Friendship Love from the other Loves. He describes Friendship as, "the least biological, organic, instinctive, gregarious and necessary of our Loves" - our species does not need Friendship in order to reproduce. He uses this point to explain that Friendship is exceedingly profound because it is freely chosen.
Lewis explains that true friendships, like the friendship between David and Jonathan in the Bible is almost a lost art. He expresses a strong distaste for the way that modern society ignores Friendship. He notes that he cannot remember any poem that celebrated true Friendship like that between David and Jonathan, Orestes and Pylades, Roland and Oliver, Amis and Amiles. Lewis goes on to say, "to the Ancients, Friendship seemed the happiest and most fully human of all loves; the crown of life and the school of virtue. The modern world, in comparison, ignores it".
Lewis boldly asserts that few people in modern society appreciate true Friendship because few of them have experienced it.
[edit] Eros – romance

Eros (ἔρως) is love in the sense of 'being in love' or loving me. This is distinct from sexuality, which Lewis calls Venus, although he does spend time discussing sexual activity and its spiritual significance in both a pagan and a Christian sense. He identifies eros as indifferent. It is Venus that desires the sexual aspect of a relationship, while Eros longs for the emotional connection with the other person.
Lewis concludes that Eros can become a god to people who fully submit themselves to it. He says that it can be an extremely profound experience for people even up to the point of suicide pacts and furious refusals to part.
[edit] Agape – unconditional love

Charity (agapē, ἀγάπη) is the love that brings forth caring regardless of the circumstance. Lewis recognizes this as the greatest of loves, and sees it as a specifically Christian virtue. The chapter on the subject focuses on the need of subordinating the natural loves to the love of God, who is full of charitable love.

[first timer]

She is 20; I thought most of it was good information too; did not know it came from a website; thanks for the link.

[cbarker78]

....it's just me, but I tune out as soon as bible passages are noted...

[Pursuinghappiness]

lol..me too Cbarker.

[Mess]

The four types of love were discussed by the likes of Plato and Aristotle. The bible was written in Greek originally and used those terms, C. S. Lewis rewrapped the concept of four loves in Christianity and sold it.

[Karver]

I know a couple of my friends told me they couldn't stand their husbands always bugging them for sex and they can't beleive that I would end my marriage because of it. The physical act of sex itself is just a small part. Try no holding hands, no kissing, no sitting next to each other, no talking, the low self esteem that starts when you wonder why your man smirks and walks away when he sees you in new Victoria's Secret, the paranoid thoughts that arise when some people say he must be 'getting it' somewhere else. Forget it. Run for the hills.

[billiechic]

The four types of love were discussed by the likes of Plato and Aristotle. The bible was written in Greek originally and used those terms, C. S. Lewis rewrapped the concept of four loves in Christianity and sold it.

Yes!

I find it very sad that the english language has only one word for love.
It is important to know that there are different types, and yet the lack of different word makes it so hard to explain or understand.

Try explaining to a 4 year old how you "love" your toys in a different way than you "love" your pet. And that the "love" between a husband and wife is different than the "love" between a parent and child.

It might be quoted in the bible, but the concept itself is what matters, not the place it was mentioned.

[May_May]

I have a long time friend, who just separated with her husband. They have been married for over 10 years, and have always had a 'sharing' lifestyle/swinging. So quantity and variation won't always keep a marriage in tact. It needs to be complete at the source.