Faith, Trust & Doubt In Your Marriage

It doesn't take something as dramatic as an affair, or losing several thousand from the savings account in a gambling casino, to erode trust in your marriage.

It can be as simple as a couple of broken promises. A few commitments not met. The last minute cancellation of a date again. A failure to ever redeem the "rain check" you promised last time.

Maybe each is a separate incident. Maybe each is followed by an apology, and a promise to forgive. And yet...even as they forgive, the injured spouse sees the pattern. And wonders: Can I count on them?

This Sunday's Gospel gives us one of the most human moments in all of scripture. Thomas refuses to believe his friends' testimony that Jesus has risen. He knows what he needs: to see for himself, to touch the wounds. And rather than condemning him, Jesus appears and gives Thomas exactly what he asked for.

Doubt, it turns out, is not the opposite of faith. Fear is. When doubts creep in, we need to be brave enough to tell our spouses what we need to trust them again.

Thomas was not afraid to name what he needed in order to believe again.

Our marriages ask the same clarity of us.

When Trust Has Been Eroded

Every long marriage passes through seasons when one or both partners quietly wonder: Can I still count on you? 

The erosion rarely comes from dramatic betrayal. More often it accumulates through small, repeated disappointments: promises not kept, commitments quietly abandoned, apologies offered without any visible change in behavior. We forgive. We move on. But something settles underneath.

What research shows is that the partner who has been let down usually is quite specific, internally, about what they would need to trust again. Like Thomas, they know what they are waiting to see. But they haven't said it out loud.

What the Research Shows

Psychologist John Gottman and his colleagues at the University of Washington have spent decades studying how trust is built and damaged in marriages. One of their more striking findings is that trust is not repaired through grand gestures or sweeping promises. It is rebuilt in what Gottman calls "sliding door moments": small, ordinary opportunities to turn toward your spouse rather than away.

A sympathetic look. A pause before defending yourself. A question asked with genuine interest rather than deflection.

Repeated consistently, these moments reconstruct the sense of safety that eroded in the first place. Gottman's research found that couples who regularly seized these micro-opportunities reported significantly higher levels of trust and relationship satisfaction over time.

The implication is direct: rebuilding trust is less about dramatic change and more about daily, deliberate attention.

A Practice Worth Trying

This week, ask your spouse one honest question: Is there an area of our life together where you don't feel fully confident that I have your back? 

Then listen without defending yourself. Don't explain. Don't contextualize. Simply hear what your spouse tells you, reflect it back so they know they've been understood, and ask what one small change would help them trust more in that area.

Then make a concrete plan, not just a promise.

This is harder than it sounds. It requires the willingness to sit in discomfort rather than retreat into self-protection. But it is also, research suggests, where real repair begins.

A Closing Word

Jesus did not shame Thomas for his doubt. He met him where he was and showed him what he needed to see.

In our marriages, we are called to that same patience with one another: to ask what our spouse needs in order to trust, and then to show them, consistently, over time.

Faith without works, as St. James reminds us, is incomplete. So is love without evidence.

To learn more about faith, trust, and vulnerability in marriage, see the chapters on Forming Faith in our book Climbing the 7 Story Mountain.