Divorced and "remarried" relatives: what to do?

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JamesTheJust

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Hello. As some of you may know, I am a young (just recently turned 15!) Catholic living in a nominally Catholic family. We’re having a family reunion very soon, and it just occurred to me that two of my dad’s eight siblings have been divorced and civilly “remarried”. How should I go about dealing with this situation and interacting with them, knowing that they are in a state of objective mortal sin? Do I call their new “spouses”, “Aunt”/“Uncle”? If not, what do I call them? I have so many questions. Please help!
 
Call them aunt and uncle and stop fussing about it. It is their issue not yours.
 
JamesTheJust said:
Hello. As some of you may know, I am a young (just recently turned 15!) Catholic living in a nominally Catholic family. We’re having a family reunion very soon, and it just occurred to me that two of my dad’s eight siblings have been divorced and civilly “remarried”. How should I go about dealing with this situation and interacting with them, knowing that they are in a state of objective mortal sin? Do I call their new “spouses”, “Aunt”/“Uncle”? If not, what do I call them? I have so many questions. Please help!
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What do you do? You acknowledge the fact that you are only 15 years old and that what you don’t know about life in general and marriage in particular could fill the Library of Congress. Then, when you get to the reunion, you treat these people with courtesy and respect and you keep your mouth shut about the way in which you regard their “marriage.” In about ten years or so, after you’ve grown up a bit, when you look back on this occasion, you should fall on your knees and thank the good Lord that you didn’t make a spectacle of yourself by sharing your adolescent opinions about things you know very little about.

Or…you can go to the reunion and inform your adult relatives that they are in fact not married, and consequently, fornicating their way straight to hell every time they have sex with their “spouses.” Then, in about ten years or so, you’ll still the the punch line for every family reunion story your relatives tell.
 
Respect your elders. Haranguing them about it will get you nowhere.

I have an older female relative who is in a “live-in relationship” with a divorced man. I’ve expressed my discomfort about the situation to them, as tactfully as I could, a couple of times, but other than that I’ve kept my mouth shut about it and tried to treat them with respect.
 
Thanks for the advice, all of you. I overstepped my bounds. Ouch. I’ll keep my mouth shut. 😊
 
JamesTheJust said:
Thanks for the advice, all of you. I overstepped my bounds. Ouch. I’ll keep my mouth shut. 😊
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You may have overstepped your bounds, but your view of marriage matches up quite well with that of Jesus, and that’s a good thing. Just be nice to the relatives. It’s not your problem to figure out. But continue to take Jesus’ words about marriage and divorce quite seriously. The fact that many no longer take him seriously has led to big problems in families and society.

PS–See this article for a further discussion of divorce and remarriage:
firstthings.com/article/2014/08/divorce-and-remarriage
 
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