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Jimmy_B
Guest
You’re right but you have to admit, it’s better than the alternative, which is, little or no standards when it comes to marriage and divorce. It ain’t a perfect world we live in…
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Jimmy_B
Guest
Lol… Oh that’s just great BW, see what you started…Maybe you can fly to Iceland and you two can get hitched. That lesbian president and her “partner” could officiate! LOL
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beehumble
Guest
The canonical rules on this issue are tough though. Basically, if one ends up divorced and does not get an annulment (it is denied or they don’t go through the process ) the persons can no longer have sexual relations with others for the rest of their lives.
Should they have such relations, it is a mortal sin. It can be absolved, but not if the person intends to have sex again. If one finds a steady partner, or visits houses of ill-repute routinely, or whatever, then the sin is no longer absolved because there is not the intent to amend. Most people do not intend to, or cannot, control, the passion to engage in sexual relations. Most divorced 30 year old men and women have no desire to live out the rest of their days in their physical bodies as monks and nuns.
So all in all, it seems the rules on divorce basically mean most divorced people are destined for hell.
Is this not the result that follows if one reasons it all the way through?
Sure seems like it. So this is tough one.
Should they have such relations, it is a mortal sin. It can be absolved, but not if the person intends to have sex again. If one finds a steady partner, or visits houses of ill-repute routinely, or whatever, then the sin is no longer absolved because there is not the intent to amend. Most people do not intend to, or cannot, control, the passion to engage in sexual relations. Most divorced 30 year old men and women have no desire to live out the rest of their days in their physical bodies as monks and nuns.
So all in all, it seems the rules on divorce basically mean most divorced people are destined for hell.
Is this not the result that follows if one reasons it all the way through?
Sure seems like it. So this is tough one.
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Jimmy_B
Guest
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beehumble
Guest
Why is that a thumb up? Is it a good thing that divorced people end up in hell?? Christ came down from Heaven and was nailed to the cross for those people too. Mind you, one partner can divorce against the wishes of the other in our society, but it seems both end up either chaste or in hell?
So if you have any children, friends or other relatives who are divorce jimmy b, I guess they’re headed for hell. I don’t get the thumbs up on that.
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Jimmy_B
Guest
No, I just thought that it was a well written post and that you made some good points …That’s all…
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beehumble
Guest
I don’t know if th epoint was a good one. It troubles me that someone who brutally murders 100 children but then repents and is absolved and then dies will make it into heaven, but someone who ends up divorced through no fault of their own, or even through their own fault, basically from the logic I outlined above, ends up in hell. Seems unjust, but more than that, it seems unmerciful.No, I just thought that it was a well written post and that you made some good points …That’s all…
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Jimmy_B
Guest
You’re right, it’s a tough one. I completely understood the point that you were making. I’ve told all of my children, as they were growing up that there are going to be times in your life when it is easier to be a good Catholic and it is easier for some people, than it is for others to be good Christians, based on their current station and circumstances in life but that doesn’t mean that the Church is wrong, because they have high standards, the Church doesn’t set the standards, God does. The Church simply defines them. We have to have God on His terms and not on our terms. Nobody ever said life was easy. I hope this helps.
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beehumble
Guest
I understand the Church on this. That is not the point. Catholics know the saying ‘one must carry their crosses’.
It just seems like something is off on this though, so I’ve always wondered of the understanding of what Jesus said is off or something. I know of infallibility, i know of the Holy Spirit always and forever guiding His Church. I know all of these. But something seems amiss on this point. Every other sin, even brutal murder, get absolved and is ‘done’, but the penance for the sin of divorce lasts a lifetime, EVEN if one is not the divorcing party.
I always wondered of the idea of a finite forgiveness being the culprit. I wonder sometimes if the Church has missed the mark on that.
The sin of divorce actually encompasses or includes within it the sin of the upcoming future adultery-due-to-divorce. So I always wondered if the absolution for a divorce should not include within it , as part of it, the absolution for the upcoming adultery-due-to-divorce. Absolution is not finite afterall, it is spiritual and eternal and all encompassing, so I wonder if the Church misses the mark on that one. (Note I did not say adultery - I said adultery-due-to-divorce – notice Jesus said divorce leads to an adultery - so God Himself says this and knows this - so if He knows it, as the words of Jesus indicates, perhaps Jesus is saying the two (the divorce and the resultant adultery) are tied together as one sinful mess and thus absolved together as one sinful mess as well. And somehow over time this point got lost on it.
Anyway, that is something I ponder and it is how, I feel, makes the confession of divorce and its penance equal to other mortal sins’ confessions. Otherwise there is no point in confessing divorce, because you’re going to hell anyway. And that in a sense is tantamount ot making divorce an unforgivable sin.
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Nine_Two
Guest
In fairness to the Catholic Church, they do make you come up with something better than irreconcilable differences.
But I agree, while in theory the Catholic Church is strictest, the fact is they often call it something else. I was looking through sites on the subject and was surprised to find you can get an annulment if a spouse is abusive. While I’m certainly not advocating allowing an abusive jerk to run your life, saying the marriage never existed sounds like overkill.
It also seems to me that the Church, if quite a few marriages aren’t valid, should be more proactive in making sure the marriages it consecrates are valid. How many people out there think they are married but are really just engaging in fornication with their supposed spouse? Why is it only investigated when people want out? If it isn’t just another form of divorse the Church needs to be investigating them while people are still together, so they can get them properly married.
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Jimmy_B
Guest
Air, Water, Food, Shelter and Clothing are the basic necessities of life. These are a human’s basic needs. Everything else is a luxury. You notice, sex is not on that list. To put this in context; We have young men and women, soldiers, serving in Iraq and Afghanistan, right now. While deployed, they are not allowed alcohol, sex or even contact with their own families and yet we still have a million man, volunteer army. Why, because of sacrifice…that’s why. These people are making a sacrifice for our country and for all of us. That’s what Christianity is all about, sacrifice. The early martyrs didn’t give-up something as trivial as sex, they gave up their own lives… You understand what I’m saying here. Here is some more context, If you were dying of prostate cancer and the doctor said, I can save your life but you’re going to be impotent as the result of the life saving surgery… do you still get the surgery? Yes, it’s tough but not impossible, And God understands that. We just need to look towards Christ as our example. I hope this helps.
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Nine_Two
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That is generally my take on it, and that is why I support the Orthodox position on marriage. I can’t believe that a God who is supposed to be just and merciful would institute a rule in such a way that many people would break it, and they would be very likely to go to hell for it.
Jesus certainly taught that divorce is wrong, and is something to be avoided at almost all costs. But all sinful things are like that, and if the mistake of a bad marriage is going to damn a person, why doesn’t the mistake of, for example, theft? Are kleptomaniacs damned as well? Are alcoholics, and others who have a tendency toward a sinful behavior?
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Nine_Two
Guest
While true, St. Paul also said that though he didn’t advise marriage, those who could not live without a companion should do it so that they didn’t endanger their souls.
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beehumble
Guest
God said be fruitful and multiply. Take your point out to an extreme to see if it is valid: if everybody stopped having sex, the human race is over 100 years from now. Sex is part of God’s plan for mankind. Th desire to have sex thus is part of our nature. As Paul said, not all can be celibate (obvious point really - if we all could be and chose to be, there would be nobody left in 100 years.)
Think about this:
if your daughter comes home crying on your shoulder and says her husband told her she has gotten older and is no longer attractive to him so he is leaving her for another woman, ** you better start crying too because basically your daughter just told you she is going to hell.** Jesus said a man who divorces his wife forces her to commit adultery - meaning Jesus who knows everything knows the woman will again have sex (she married in the first place after all so never intended to give herself to the temple). So, can she confess this adultery? Not if she thinks she’ll in all probability have sex again after the confession. No absolution for that.
Or did Jesus mean the whole mess is to be treated as one messy sin - the divorce+the-adultery-that-follows-on-from-it that He Himself identified in the same talk - and the divorce+adultery-from-it gets absolved?
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Jimmy_B
Guest
There aren’t very many “divorced” situations that can’t be straighten out, if the person involved wants to do what they need to, to get right with the Church.
The Church never told anyone to get married multiple times. It’s not the Church’s fault that people ended up in this situation. It is because of free-will and because of their own decisions and it’s wrong to shift that blame to the Church.
Moreover, It isn’t necessarily the divorce that’s the sin… it is the sex outside of marriage, after an invalid marriage or invalid divorce.
In other words, if a person was divorced three times and over time, all of their spouses died, they could go to confession and return to the Sacraments. If a person has an invalid marriage, get it validated. Go to RCIA, get married in the Church, if you can have a previous marriage annulled and come back to the Church, do that.
Where is humility and personal responsibility is all of this?
If you are un-married or have an invalid marriage then you have to decide what is more important, sex or your soul.
Single adults that are not married, are not allowed to have sex, should the Church change the rule on fornication, because that’s tough too? It’s hard but it’s not impossible.
All of this stuff is in the Bible people… If you got a beef with the Catholic Church on marraige, then your beef is with God.
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Vico
Guest
There is mercy, because God give us grace and will forgive those who ask for it with contrition, even if the contrition is imperfect. If you become unrepentent in the end, you have rejected God at last. If you become repentent in the end, you have accepted God at last. Remember the thief at the crucifixion.
You wrote the logic as:
“Basically, if one ends up divorced and does not get an annulment (it is denied or they don’t go through the process ) the persons can no longer have sexual relations with others for the rest of their lives. … Most people do not intend to, or cannot, control, the passion to engage in sexual relations. Most divorced 30 year old men and women have no desire to live out the rest of their days in their physical bodies as monks and nuns. So all in all, it seems the rules on divorce basically mean most divorced people are destined for hell.”
That includes three qualities, not mutually exclusive:
- no intent to control the passion
- cannot control the passion
- no desire to abstain the rest of their lives
CCC 1857 “Mortal sin is sin whose object is grave matter and which is also committed with full knowledge and deliberate consent.”
So only those with quality 1 are hellbent. They do not follow these teachings:
Matt 19:8-9 He said to them, “Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. I say to you, whoever divorces his wife (unless the marriage is unlawful) and marries another commits adultery.”
Mark 9:43 If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter into life maimed than with two hands to go into Gehenna, into the unquenchable fire.
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gurneyhalleck1
Guest
An excellent analysis to be sure. A ton of annulments is tantamount to an admission of a lot of poorly-done invalid marriages! Divorce is a tricky thing.
I’m gratified to see that the Anglicans are becoming more strict on divorce in the ACNA. It was one of the topics addressed early on. My bishop here, +John David Schofield, requires anyone wanting to divorce or marry a divorcee to go through him, sit down and explore the divorce/background of it, and they must receive his blessing to continue. I think that is a bit more like Orthodoxy, which I think is a prudent setup.
I’m gratified to see that the Anglicans are becoming more strict on divorce in the ACNA. It was one of the topics addressed early on. My bishop here, +John David Schofield, requires anyone wanting to divorce or marry a divorcee to go through him, sit down and explore the divorce/background of it, and they must receive his blessing to continue. I think that is a bit more like Orthodoxy, which I think is a prudent setup.
In fairness to the Catholic Church, they do make you come up with something better than irreconcilable differences.
But I agree, while in theory the Catholic Church is strictest, the fact is they often call it something else. I was looking through sites on the subject and was surprised to find you can get an annulment if a spouse is abusive. While I’m certainly not advocating allowing an abusive jerk to run your life, saying the marriage never existed sounds like overkill.
It also seems to me that the Church, if quite a few marriages aren’t valid, should be more proactive in making sure the marriages it consecrates are valid. How many people out there think they are married but are really just engaging in fornication with their supposed spouse? Why is it only investigated when people want out? If it isn’t just another form of divorse the Church needs to be investigating them while people are still together, so they can get them properly married.
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Jimmy_B
Guest
So, are you advocating that the Church allow, non-married adults have sex because, using your words, “the desire to have sex thus is part of our nature”? And , as far as confession goes, there is no rule as to how many times you can go. God and His Church know that we are all sinners, that’s not a big surprise.
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beehumble
Guest
Let’s not speak nonsense here. No the Church should not change the rule on fornication, and no the Church should not say Jesus never died and rose, either. Get a grip. There is a remedy for fornication called marriage. Paul says so, even, in the Book. But that remedy is removed unwillingly from somebody who ends up divorced through no fault of their own -so they lose the remedy and fall into adultery (fornication for married people).
In other words, if a person was divorced three times and over time, all of their spouses died, they could go to confession
Yeah, my point exactly - they can go to confession and its all good again, and their adulteries are forgiven. Divorce is a sin. But confession does not seem to get it resolved.
This is one area that Jesus words about divorce seem to have been missed - as I said already he speaks of divorce and adultery that stems from it in one breath - He is God - He knows one follows the other and He even says it - it seems then the absolution from Him is supposed to be understood to cover the whole thing since it is all part of the same sin, but somehow they got separated into two sins. Yes, adultery can be a separate sin, I know that of course. But in the case where Jesus spoke of divorce He tied future adultery of the divorced person to it as if the tow are tied together.
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Jimmy_B
Guest
Great post! Thank you.
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