William and Kate

The recent news that Prince William and Kate Middleton are engaged is the perfect story for this hyped-up, celebrity-driven world. Three days after the announcement, I saw that there were over 8,000 stories about the royal couple on Google News. One headline appropriately read, "Middleton gets her man: Let the massive global overkill begin."


From the media I learned that:

• If my name was William and my wife's name was Kate, we could get free pizzas at Domino's.
• One of the most crucial questions for our world over the next few months will be what Kate's wedding dress will look like, and who will design it.
• I could help bring England's economy out of the doldrums by ordering souvenir plates and paperweights.
• Bookies were taking bets on what date the wedding will fall on, where they'll go on their honeymoon, and even what color the bridesmaids will wear.
• Since, in our world of social media, everything is really all about me, I could participate in a poll on, "Is Kate right for William?" and even pass on tips to the royals on how to have a good marriage.

The only notes of concern came from observers who were worried about whether Kate was wise to marry into the royal family. As one headline stated, "From Princess Diana to Sarah Ferguson, British royal marriages rarely end happily ever after."

Even those concerns, however, reveal something interesting about human character: In this cynical world of rampant divorce, people want marriages to succeed. As one writer said last week, "If any of you have ever stumbled across my ramblings before, you will know that I am not a big fan of our royals. So I found myself somewhat at a loss last night to understand why I (oh the shame) had a tear in my eye as I watched Kate and William talk of their engagement ... It was, I suppose, because we're all suckers for a love story. We had one, or so we mistakenly thought, with Diana and Charles. Now it's her son's chance to put it right."

Click here to read more from Dave Boehi on FamilyLife.com

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