Over the last month or so I have been involved in and/or watching the goings on at the Of Christian Women Blog and MzEllen.
The latest started last week and involved a comment by MzEllen that
Barbara’s advice included looking outside the Roman Catholic church for food and roots.
I would join her in that advice (I’d love it if that single mom were to find this post and contact this single mom).
The reason is simple – support for single moms.
If a divorce person came to me and asked about churches, I would not recommend a church that condemns all divorce. This divorced mom has had a rough walk already and itÂs going to get tougher. It doesn’t sound as though she had a husband who “washed her in the Word” (a Godly husband leading her).
I certainly would not recommend being (staying or finding) a church (any church) that will hold a divorce against her for the rest of her life.
The Roman Catholic church is not the only church that holds a “divorce debt” against a person for life. This is not about the Roman Catholic church and whether they have right or wrong doctrine. This is about divorced parents (or divorced non-parents) looking for forgiveness in a church (and there are many churches) that holds that debt against them
.
Then when it was pointed out that the Catholic church is pastoral towards divorced people. A commenter, Moonshadow observed:
You cannot recommend a church that condemns all divorce. You say the RCC holds a divorce debt against a person for life.
Tony gives us the loopholes that lead you to the flipside: the RCC is too accommodating of divorce.
That’s what I hear let me know if you are not saying that.
Sure enough this week we have a post on why the Catholic Church is too lenient with annulments.
Personally, I don’t think it matters much what side the Catholic Church teaches, MzEllen et al are going to be against it.
But this was the real eye opener to me that neither MzEllen or the remaining Catholics who engage her are going to be satisfied or reach any sort of resolution because they are not speaking the same language.
This is illustrated perfectly in this exchange between MzEllen and jswranch, a Catholic from Phatmass
JS: The Catholic Church strongly believes and teaches these things. Based on scripture, can we agree marriage is indissolveable?
Mz ELlen: no. We can’t, because it’s not Biblically accurate.
JS: As God designed the world, man and woman become one body, one flesh. (Gen2:20-24) A body cannot be split back in half while remaining alive.
God designed marriage.
Mz Ellen: As for the second half of your statement, you’re wrong, Biblically.
JS: 1 Corinthians 6:16
Or do you not know that he who is joined to a prostitute becomes one body with her? For, as it is written, “The two will become one flesh.”MzEllen: (throwing in a famous red herring) Are you saying that every Jew that visited a prostitute was married to her for life?
JS: We are joined in covenant to our spouses (Mal2:14)
MzEllen: Covenants can be broken.
The two points that I found very enlightening in this post is that in MzEllen’s POV, covenants are not binding – they are more like contracts that can be broken, and also that she sees marriage as perfectly able to be dissolved, and in fact such disolution is biblical! Of course this is not how Catholics or orthodox or even many Protestants see marriage. If we can’t agree on those two basic points there is not much point in discussing the merits or lack of annullments.
Now this is HER view from how SHE interprets the scriptures that she knows.
Other protestants, of course, feel differently.
See also here:
The Protestant Reformers, claiming to return to biblical teaching, rejected both the sacramental nature and the absolute indissolubility of Christian marriage. According to the Bible, they said, marriage is certainly holy and is in principle indissoluble, but there are certain acts that break the marriage bond and hence permit divorce and remarriage. The Reformers could not agree, however, on the legitimate grounds—scriptural or otherwise—for divorce.A strong advocate of faithfulness as a chief Christian virtue, Luther was not always sure that the Catholics were wrong about indissolubility, and he once said half seriously that bigamy might be preferable to divorce. He came to see divorce, however, as a permissible last resort in cases of infidelity, impotency, refusal of marital relations, and desertion. He strongly supported remarriage for the offended party. Melanchthon, Luther’s colleague, limited the grounds to two, infidelity and desertion, on the basis of the “Matthean exception” and “Pauline privilege.”Similarly, Reformers John Calvin and Theodore Beza allowed divorce only for adultery and, more hesitantly, for desertion on grounds of irreconcilable religious differences. In 1561, the Calvinist city of Geneva enacted a law permitting divorce, as a last resort, for these two reasons.The Radical Reformers, such as the Anabaptists and Hutterites, recognized adultery as legitimate grounds for divorce on the basis of Matthew 5, but they were divided on the Pauline privilege. Unlike the Lutherans and Calvinists, the Radical Reformers generally forbade remarriage following divorce.More liberal attitudes to divorce came from Zwingli in Zurich and Martin Bucer in Strasbourg. Zwingli believed that the cause of adultery in Matthew 5 was intended only as one example (and not the most serious one), to which could be added other legitimate causes, such as abandonment, endangerment of life, and insanity. Bucer went further still, becoming the first Christian leader to permit divorce by mutual consent.Largely in reaction to Protestant leniency, in 1563 the Roman Catholic Church, at the Council of Trent, made the indissolubility of consummated Christian marriage a matter of canon law. Divorce and remarriage were thus officially banned even in cases of adultery, though long-term separations were permitted.
Repercussions of the Reformation
Perhaps the most significant aspect of the Reformation attitude was the inadvertent secularization of marriage and divorce that resulted within Protestant churches. Luther, for example, believed that marriage—though holy—was primarily a civil event. As both “Lutheran” and “Calvinist” countries established marriage and divorce laws based on their religious preferences, the Protestant churches as churches no longer regulated divorce and remarriage. As these countries, and the West in general, grew more and more secular over the succeeding centuries, marriage was understood primarily to be a civil contract, and divorce and remarriage laws became increasingly liberal.This process culminated in the second half of this century, leaving most Protestant churches where they are today: with almost no binding internal policies on divorce and remarriage for church members, and often not even for leaders. Civil law functionally regulates Protestant Christian marriage, divorce, and remarriage.It is perhaps ironic that the Reformers’ attempt to return to biblical teachings on marriage and divorce has led to this quite secular situation—the continued existence of church ceremonies notwithstanding. It would not be surprising if a renewed Christian community found it necessary to be more selective than the civil courts, both in whom it marries and in what it recognizes as legitimate grounds for divorce.This article originally appeared in the December 14, 1992 issue ofChristianity Today.
Based on this and MzEllen’s comments I don’t believe that a Catholic speaking about marriage with a non-Catholic cannot assume that they are talking about the same thing. One paradigm is spiritual and the other purely civil.
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