Divorcing Love and Marriage from Organized Religion

Nov 3, 2023

Marriage, family, and domestic bliss are popular topics of discussion and debate in the United States. Thanks to the battles about marriage equality, the nuclear family, divorce rates, the rise of feminism, and conservative Christian insistence that traditional marriage is the bedrock of society, the discourse around intimate relationships is fraught with social, religious, and moral notions of love.

Further, conservatives such as the new Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson in particular, have used scriptural views of family and marriage as cover for homophobia and transphobia.

Now, clinical psychologist Enrico Gnaulati brings decades of experience, both professional and personal, to readers in a new book about sustaining long-term relationships while rejecting organized religion’s view of morality. Gnaulati spoke with YES! Racial Justice Editor Sonali Kolhatkar on YES Presents: Rising Up With Sonali about Flourishing Love: A Secular Guide to Lasting Intimate Relationships.

Sonali Kolhatkar is currently the racial justice editor at YES! Media and a writing fellow with Independent Media Institute. She was previously a weekly columnist for Truthdig.com. She is also the host and creator of Rising Up with Sonali, a nationally syndicated television and radio program airing on Free Speech TV and dozens of independent and community radio stations. Sonali won First Place at the Los Angeles Press Club Annual Awards for Best Election Commentary in 2016. She also won numerous awards including Best TV Anchor from the LA Press Club and has also been nominated as Best Radio Anchor 4 years in a row. She is the author of Bleeding Afghanistan: Washington, Warlords, and the Propaganda of Silence, and the co-director of the nonprofit group, Afghan Women's Mission. Her forthcoming book is Rising Up: The Power of Narrative in Pursuing Racial Justice (City Lights, 2023). She has a Master’s in Astronomy from the University of Hawai’i, and two undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Texas at Austin. She reflects on her professional path in her 2014 TEDx talk, “My Journey From Astrophysicist to Radio Host.” She can be reached at sonalikolhatkar.com