Secured Retirement Benefits

That is a need for your mind to go to what life will be like when you retire from your regular source of income. In Nigeria retirement age is placed at 65 currently. Alternatively if you put in 35 years of service you are expected to proceed on retirement.

The benefits for retirement include gratuity and pension. The gratuity is a bulk sum that will be paid shortly after retirement. The pension comes in monthly, the sum is split into smaller amounts. So you can establish a business with the bulk that will come as gratuity and use the pension to keep yourself busy running the business. With this arrangement you will only pray that unforeseen chances will not come up. It is expected that at one’s age of retirement majority of responsibilities of childbearing an upbringing would have been taking care of. Unfortunately this information does not go down well with everyone. For some, it’s a possibility for others it is unachievable.

The best retirement plan anyone can imagine be you man or woman will be factoring the retirement age and benefits into one’s marriage.
Marriage in the Catholic Church, also known as Holy Matrimony, is the “covenant by which a man and woman establish between themselves a partnership of the whole of life and which is ordered by its nature to the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring”, and which “has been raised by Christ the Lord to the dignity of a sacrament between the baptized”.

In the catechism of the Catholic Church the above is the best definition that has been provided for marriage. This edition was produced in 1968 and no one has been able to counter this definition of marriage. First of all, it is for the interest of the couple. Secondly for procreation and thirdly for the education of offsprings. The results is of the indication that this coming together will be for life.
So this implies that every marriage has an assurance of its own; of taking care of those who are in it into good old age. It takes care of all the benefits for life. Any other form of retirement benefits that is not embedded in family life will fail.

No man who is a family man in totality will live a life of loneliness or a life of rejection after retirement. The wife will ensure that he is properly taking care of when he can no longer cater for himself. The only caveat there is that the said man must be seen to be a complete family man. Being a family man means first of all that you love your wife unconditionally. Be ready to make sacrifices for her above every other person. Those you will always have around as family members; siblings, children – no one in this list should be considered more important than your spouse.

So if you pay attention to the protection, care, provision and love for your wife you will be assured of her respect all through your lifetime. At old age, you be a burden to every other person except the wife you loved. Some people will make the mistake of entrusting their care in the hands of their children forgeting that these children on their own have their lives to live. Some of them will live in continents very far away from you.

Investing in your spouse both love and respect will ensure that you properly taking care of him/her and every of your interest will be protected. It might seem an unimaginable condition to ask that men should love their wives when they have not done this before now. You are being encouraged to go back to the drawing board if your life has not been centered on the love of your spouse. Your spouse is the only one who has taken a vow at the altar of God to live with you in both good and bad times; every other person has not gotten the commitment that your spouse has to stay with you for life.

So when the going gets tough, such a one is free to leave because no vow is keeping the person in the relationship with you.
You may not have understood entirely what I am talking about in this write up, I pray that the grace of God will open your eyes to this discussion. If there are situations in your own marriage and you think you need help, do not hesitate to ask for help from trained marriage facilitators.

I have seen men who invested in training their children some of them got married and relocated outside the country, they in turn invited their mother over and no one will bother about the man. A woman who had been shown love by the husband will never consent to staying a day away from her husband. So in such situation she will insist that the trip will be made with her husband or not trip.

No one is assured of tomorrow. Being at peace with your spouse makes that tomorrow attainable with hope. Whatever it is that you can do to secure this peace in your home with your spouse – please do make effort to make it come through.

Most men who do not have peaceful homes because they’ve not shown enough love to their wives are scared of getting old and retiring. May this not be your portion in the name of Jesus. Amen.