We should be doing everything in our power to protect and nourish the family.
“So take heed to yourselves, and let none be faithless to the wife of his youth. ‘For I hate divorce,’ says the LORD the God of Israel” (Malachi 2:15-16). Despite this precept, every diocese in America requires a civil divorce before a hearing at a marriage tribunal.
In recent media interviews about my new book
Betrayed Without A Kiss, I have illustrated this contradiction between what we Catholics
professand what dioceses
practice. After I mention this, interviewers ask a very natural question:
Why does the Church mandate civil divorce?
It’s a terrific question. During my research, I asked it a lot. It’s a question we should all be asking. So what’s the answer? The short answer is this: There is no justifiable reason. But if you ask a marriage tribunal member, he or she is likely to give you one of two answers.
Alienation of Affection?
Continued below.
We should be doing everything in our power to protect and nourish the family.
www.ncregister.com
All I can say is, oh Boy, where do we start?!?!
Thank you for posting this article, Michie, not because it was great, but illustrates the great problem we have with marriage in the Catholic Church in the 21st century. The author displays a complete lack of understanding of what the Catechism teaches regarding marriage and civil divorce. Most Catholics don’t even know what the sacrament of Matrimony entails in matter and form, which is required for a valid and licit sacrament to have taken place.
Most people think that the marriage is the ceremony and once you say “I do” and kiss the bride, you are sealed for life. Wrong wrong wrong. This thinking makes me so mad that it is like arguing popular culture with a donkey
The real Catechism is simple to understand but hard to accept as evidenced by the current state of matrimony in the Church. The sacrament of marriage is not performed by the priest, rather the couple performs the sacrament, with the priest being their witness before God. After the marriage ceremony, the marriage is considered valid but not consummated. The marriage is consummated when the couple with full knowledge and consent, fully gives themselves to one another in the marital act. Oh, you mean sex? Yes but not in the 21st century understanding of the act. A Catholic marriage requires the couple to fully give themselves to each other in the marital act. Contraceptive sex does not consummate a marriage as it is mortal sin and cannot be blessed and sealed by the Church. A contraceptive marriage is annulable, not because it existed and can be erased, but the marriage never existed at all.
How many women believe that you give your sexuality as a gift to your husband at the altar as a promise and on the wedding night you seal the marriage? Ok, once you have done that, do you know that it is now an obligation for you? A woman can not refuse a reasonable request for the marital act under the pain of mortal sin. Did you know that?
Guys are like what!?! I got her now! Not so fast.
If she does refuse you and is therefore in mortal sin, you cannot have sex with her until she goes to confession, as she is spiritually dead, and a Catholic man will not abuse the dead for his own pleasure. A catholic woman also will not put herself in mortal sin, just so she does not have to have sex with her husband.
Most Catholics do not understand this and most modern people profane the sacrament of matrimony. The writer of that article seems to think that the Church has gone lax on her doctrine and increased the number of annulments. No, most Catholics have shunned Church teaching and have enter profane relationships they call marriages which are not. Yes and the Church is lax on catechesis on marriage also.
A lot of Catholic couples follow the modernist track and say we are open to children but we don’t want to have kids right away, so we will use natural family planning for the first four or five years we are married then we will try and have kids. Meanwhile a woman’s fertility slips away and the chances of a successful pregnancy are exponentially decreased after age 30, so what was once a potential fruitful marriage is now hit with the pain of miscarriage and/or sterility. Come on, if you use the excuse that you are not ready for children, then you have no business getting married.
The Catholic Church teaches that a woman is old enough to enter marriage at 14 and a man can enter the same sacrament at 16. But, neither of them should enter marriage until they are properly catechized and demonstrated mastery over their libido. Popular culture teaches us, as I heard Robert Deniro say in a movie once, never let a hard on go to waste. That is in complete opposition to Catholic teaching in that every sexual urge of a man should be brought under the control of will. Unless it if for a consecrated marital act, it is sin to pursue sexual pleasure and abuse oneself.
Still think there are too many annulments? It would be a difficult search to find a Catholic couple in the modern world where they follow that teaching. There should be many more annulments, and yes children are suffering, my own included. If I had this teaching and believed it in faith, I would not have left my second wife even though our marriage was profaned and annulable. I would have stayed for the children, but I would not have had sex with my second wife until she went to confession and was confirmed and submitted to the teaching I just described. Most likely I would have had to live a chaste life as did St Joseph, never knowing my wife again, yet not divorcing for the sake of my children, it that didn’t happen.
My first “wife” and I had no children and was a completely contraceptive marriage and it was annulled for lack of form.
My third marriage, I have accepted Church teaching in all areas of my life and my third wife is not Catholic, but the Bishop has granted me a radical sanation, which means cleansed to the root. This makes me permanently sealed to my third wife without the possibility of annulment even by the Pope. The believing husband by the grace of God will sanctify his unbelieving wife and I pray for her conversion
Peace be with you
