Guilty Spouse Confessing Adultery

[Pro-Life_Teen]

The decision to remain married was made at the Altar, on the wedding day. “Til death us do part.” There is no “unless” clause in the marriage vows.

That’s what the Confessional is for; that’s what repentance is for. That’s where you get your clean slate from, to start over again and become the spouse you had intended to be, from the beginning. Once it’s confessed in the Confessional, it’s gone. There is no need to burden your spouse with it, unless they have a need to know - STD, out of wedlock child, blackmail, etc. - but apart from those sorts of things - what for? So you can hurt their feelings? So you can try to get to the root of what they did wrong that made you cheat?

The decision to remain together as one flesh and soul, as two halves of a whole. What one has belongs to the other, and vice-versa. An affair is a lot of information, a big event, for lack of a better phrase. It can directly affect many things.

You are forgiven before God in the Confessional, no one is saying you are not, and the sin is gone. But the event still happened- are you going to keep careful and silent for the rest of your life? Eventually it may fade, but in the beginning, assuming it was an intimate affair that lasted a while… there’s going to be a great deal of paranoia, guilt, odd lapses in thought and memory. The constant thought that you have to make sure this stays a secret won’t help it go away soon. Getting past it together will. Being open about it, telling them you are sorry so they know.

It would be a burden at the beginning. Of course there will be pain and a mistrust. But to be told out of free will shows there’s a trust of sorts still there. Your spouse did a terrible thing, but they trust you enough to tell you. They are vulnerable to your every whim- separation, divorce, filing for an annulment. Many are speaking of divorce if they knew-- your spouse probably knows this. I would want to know. If I ever did something so terrible I would want to be able to tell my darling that I am sorry. I would want him to know the truth. And I trust him enough to know that if I were to do that, he would stay. He knows me well enough to know I’d stay as well.

And I’m not even talking about a husband here. I realize there’s no formal bond, but we’ve spoken of marriage, my boyfriend and I. I assume whatever trust and love I have for him at this stage only multiplies with marriage… I can’t fathom turning someone away I care for so deeply because of an error they are begging me to forgive.

The thought process of “Shh, what they don’t know won’t hurt them” is in theory fine. But it’s lying. It’s cute when a child tries to fix the lamp they broke and keep quiet about it, but there are still cracks in the lamp. It may still work, but it won’t be the same. And if your spouse changes, even so slightly, because of this affair- isn’t it your job as the other half to know. To know why? And if the change is big? What if your wife had an affair, but her lover beat her one night… or your husband’s mistress aborted his child. These are grand and terrible things that your spouse may need you for.

Married couples are paired before God, one flesh and soul… they don’t have to confess everything to one another. But this is a huge thing, and I hope a wife who made a mistake knows her husband loves her enough that she can tell him anything. The only worse thing than feeling so guilty after an affair, is a fear that your spouse will hate you, or divorce you… you tell them because you made a mistake and want help. Because they are your other half. Because you choose them and them alone. They will be hurt, no doubt, but the goal isn’t their pain. The goal is to get through this together… you’ve strayed enough, don’t continue to lie.

 

[iluvmybabies]

iluvmybabies, I’m sorry to hear about your friend. However, she entered the marriage NOT being honest about her desire to delay children. If she wasn’t ready, imho, she shouldn’t have married him. Unfortunately she’s in a mess, and obviously needs to reexamine her ability to discern those she allows in her life, but she could have spared some of the hurt to herself and her ex-husband if she had just been HONEST before the marriage about not wanting children in the immediate and long term.

Knowing her I am sure she did tell him, he was always hard headed and hard of hearing…When they first started dating, he was with a partner and she lived with one as well…She was promiscuous with her partner until she met her hubby…She left that guy immediately and stopped having sex all together…She didn’t even sleep with her hubby until marriage. He kept braggin to everyone about a virgin future wife!! Even after she told him she had sex before!! After the wedding he came to me disappointed she wasn’t one!! I was like DUDE WE ALL TOLD YOU SHE HAD A MAN BEFORE?! DUH??? But he wouldn’t listen she was still this perfect untouched thing…WHATEVER!! Can you say DENIAL!! And after I had my kids he would be to her BABY PLEASE HAVE A BABY WITH ME!! And he would hold my kids as if they were his etc…she would tell him things like “you know what we talked about!” Or “soon baby please don’t rush me any more!” ANd I would look at her and pick on her, “oh wait she doesn’t want to get fat ok I see how it is!!” ANd her hubby would be like what I would love you to have baby fat!! ETC…But still he wouldn’t stop and wouldn’t listen…And plenty of times we would tell him to give her time and eventually she would have children with him…she was only like 19 when they got married…He was 27…so of course he wanted children but when she turned 23 or so was when things got bad and she screwed things up… Just because he was desperate and she felt pushed!!!

 

[Litcrit]

I think the problem is more when spouses have opposing views. It really doesn’t matter one hoot to me what any of you do in your marriages. But if I have an “honesty is best” policy and hubby carries around a “I’ll protect her from hurt as much as possible” mentality then if either of us ever strayed the other would be hurt by our different way of handling it.

I guess the big lesson here (other than Don’t ever cheat) is to make sure you know what you believe and what your spouse (or future spouse) believes. And if they oppose, how does it get handled? If I would want to know but hubby wouldn’t, do we do what we want, or what they want?

I think that’s a good way of approaching the issue.

Honesty is the most important thing for me. The other night I had a nightmare in which I accidentally lied to my husband when recounting an anecdote and somehow put myself in a situation in which, for some reason, I could never tell him the truth about it. It was torture! I was so relieved to wake up and discover it was only a dream…
Pro-Life_Teen;4409381:

The The thought process of “Shh, what they don’t know won’t hurt them” is in theory fine. But it’s lying. It’s cute when a child tries to fix the lamp they broke and keep quiet about it, but there are still cracks in the lamp. It may still work, but it won’t be the same

. And if your spouse changes, even so slightly, because of this affair- isn’t it your job as the other half to know? .

I agree completely and your comparison is very apt.

 

[chevalier]

It is manipulation. The cheater is witholding information from their spouse that is necessary to decide if they desire to remain married.

Not to mention living a lie withing one of Gods Sacraments.

Refreshed, they are and will always stay married, so long as they are married validly. The notion of seeking a divorce and living like there’s no marriage any more but just an impediment to a new one, is not correct.

For the “tell your spouse” side of the house… after Confession, do you tell your spouse every sin you confessed?

Not every sin affects the spouse. There’s a vast difference between cheating on the spouse and being mean to a co-worker the spouse doesn’t even know about, having a quarrel with your own family member or some such.

Yes I have to wonder this too…what about restitution? When you sin against someone especially in such a profound way, you owe a debt to them that must be paid. Sweep it under the rug and you’ll still have to make up for it at some point…purgatory anyone?

The not telling theory includes treatingt he spouse extra well as a form of reparation.

This is a valid question in the debate. What we are talking about is sin. Either spouses are advised ? expected ? required ? commanded ? to reveal sin to one another or they are not.

The fact that it’s a sin does not remove the fact that it has other aspects, which may be important.

Let’s say a person steals $500 from his employer. He goes to confession, he has contrition and a firm purpose of amendment, and recieves absolution. If the person goes and confesses to his boss, or if he pays the money back to his boss, he will be fired and will be unable to support his family. The Priest does not require the man to confess to his boss. The Priest can advise that he donate $500 to a charity as repairation, or that he work some extra hours for that boss without taking pay for it. The sinner is not required to confess to the boss and risk his livelyhood.

If a person confesses that they axe murdered 15 people, the Priest cannot make confessing to the families of these people or to the law a condition for forgivness.

This is a very valid question.

Are spouses required to confess every sin to both the Priest AND the spouse?

That is indeed a valid question and it matters in our discussion. There is some difference here in the fact that cheating is a different kind of thing from other sins we are discussing and comparing it against.

To add another example: I don’t think people normally owe it to the spouse to reveal sins committed in the mind, as long as we aren’t talking about a serious issue affecting the marriage as a whole which just needs to be addressed together. With cheating, it’s more complicated than that.

 

[chevalier]

**Obviously this makes sense to some, but not all… I agree with you 100%. **

I think the problem is more when spouses have opposing views. It really doesn’t matter one hoot to me what any of you do in your marriages. But if I have an “honesty is best” policy and hubby carries around a “I’ll protect her from hurt as much as possible” mentality then if either of us ever strayed the other would be hurt by our different way of handling it.

I guess the big lesson here (other than Don’t ever cheat) is to make sure you know what you believe and what your spouse (or future spouse) believes. And if they oppose, how does it get handled? If I would want to know but hubby wouldn’t, do we do what we want, or what they want?

Well. I can imagine myself respecting the choice that my hypothetical future wife made not to tell me, upon my later finding out. I can see myself living with the fact that it happened, although my levels of disenchantment would rise and I would probably become generally unaffected by anything around me for a time. What gives me a scare right at this moment would be that I could live a happy life, in what seemed to be a happy and steadfast marriage, without knowing of cheating that had happened. That’s what scares me more than being told of cheating right after it happened or the very finding out after years. The blissful unawareness scares me. This may mean something is wrong with me, it does not have to mean the not telling is automatically wrong. But what I am seeing here is that yes indeed there is a lot of living a lie involved. What I totally or near-totally reject, however, is lying when asked or making false assertions without even being asked.

After all the posts since the last time I said this, I still have to say I stand by my first decision - although perhaps refining it a bit now - that if she were truly repentant, I would rather that she told me, so that I could give her a hug, tell her I still loved her, help her heal and address what made her cheat in the first place. This is partly because I imagine that the kind of woman I would marry would be physically ill from cheating. This is not so much an attempted moral highground as a certain aspect of personality, so don’t call me sanctimonious.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

I hope anyone who could ever possibly consider cheating could read this thread.

Perhaps it is possible to make a desision about disclosing the sin of adultery that will not maximize the pain. It’s almost impossible to know what the right choice is. No matter what, someone will have to live with that pain. (I still maintain that the adulterer should be the one to live with it and not spread it around).

 

[TLDenmark]

If my future wife ends up being unfaithful, I would want to know the truth. The alternative is living on a lie, slowly destroying the sanity of my spouse and in the process poisoning the marriage. Instead I prefer working on the problems together, even if knowing would devastate me. Anyway marriage is supposed to be a sacrament; it is about fallowing in the footsteps of Christ. So what kind of spouse would I be if I wanted her to rot in her own misery or wasn’t ready to forgive, marriage is also about sacrifices, sharing bad times and forgiveness.

 

[Feanaro_s_Wife]

**It seems like people aren’t taking into account the power of GOD in a marriage as well. It takes THREE to be married. No matter what choice is made after a mistake, God will help the couple through it if they only allow Him to.

We can’t know that the guilty spouse would “rot” in their own misery. God can heal. We can’t know that the betrayed spouse could forgive or would resort to divorce. God can help.

Yes, marriage is a Sacrament (for some) and through that Sacrament God grants us the GRACE to deal with things we never could handle on our own with our fallen human natures.

I think it is awful for a spouse to assert that potential future cheating would lead to an automatic divorce. That sounds like some sort of emotional blackmail or bullying.

Don’t we all want unconditional love from our spouses? Don’t we all want to know that they want to forgive any sins we are sorry for? Don’t we all want to know that our spouse also believes that marriage is for life???

Unless we are a cheater or have been cheated on, we can only speculate how we would handle this type of situation. But what we CAN know for sure is if we would seek God’s grace and counsel or if we would stubbornly cling to our sinful pride.**

 

[chevalier]

It seems like people aren’t taking into account the power of GOD in a marriage as well. It takes THREE to be married. No matter what choice is made after a mistake, God will help the couple through it if they only allow Him to.

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You can’t make any choices if you aren’t told, so it’s just one spouse choosing.

**

We can’t know that the guilty spouse would “rot” in their own misery.

**

That’s likely - or possibly develop a skill in leading two lives or living a pretence.

**

God can heal. We can’t know that the betrayed spouse could forgive or would resort to divorce. God can help.

**

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That’s lack of trust in the betrayed spouse and possibly claiming a right that doesn’t exist (the spouse has that right to stop cohabitation upon adultery). I see a certain inconsistency in saying that we don’t know the betraying spouse will rot and that we don’t know the betrayed one will be able to forgive. It points towards making the betrayed one seem like a childish person and potentially a maker of trouble exceeding the one who cheated. While sometimes probably true, I can’t agree with that perspective in general.

**

Yes, marriage is a Sacrament (for some) and through that Sacrament God grants us the GRACE to deal with things we never could handle on our own with our fallen human natures.

**

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As well as the grace to handle the cheating spouse and the grace to deal with admitting it.

 

[Feanaro_s_Wife]

chevalier:
You can’t make any choices if you aren’t told, so it’s just one spouse choosing.

That’s likely - or possibly develop a skill in leading two lives or living a pretence.

That’s lack of trust in the betrayed spouse and possibly claiming a right that doesn’t exist (the spouse has that right to stop cohabitation upon adultery). I see a certain inconsistency in saying that we don’t know the betraying spouse will rot and that we don’t know the betrayed one will be able to forgive. It points towards making the betrayed one seem like a childish person and potentially a maker of trouble exceeding the one who cheated. While sometimes probably true, I can’t agree with that perspective in general.

As well as the grace to handle the cheating spouse and the grace to deal with admitting it.

**My post was to illustrate that no matter what is done GOD can help the couple. Do you not agree?

To say that we know what we would or would not do in a hypothetical situation kind of takes God out of the equation. Instead of getting hung up on our own needs (the need to be told or the need to not be told, to tell or not to tell) we should all be praying for our marriages to always include God and for us to accept the grace He bestows on us.**

 

[chevalier]

My post was to illustrate that no matter what is done GOD can help the couple. Do you not agree?

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Cannot God help the couple if the cheating spouse confesses to the other?

You say He can help the non-teller keep his sanity. I say He can help prevent the teller from being abandoned.

 

[Feanaro_s_Wife]

chevalier:
Cannot God help the couple if the cheating spouse confesses to the other?

You say He can help the non-teller keep his sanity. I say He can help prevent the teller from being abandoned.

**You’re missing my point entirely. I am saying that GOD can help in ANY situation. I agree with both of the above.

To expound a little more, you are a man who is convinced he would like/need to be told of any betrayal. But your future wife may not do that if a transgression were to occur. So, if you let Him, God can help you forgive her even though it is not how you would have preferred to find out if you were to find out some time after the betrayal occurred and she had been keeping it from you.

Likewise, I really don’t thin I would want to know if my husband betrayed me, repented, and was forgiven by our Lord. But, if he betrayed me and then told me, God could help me forgive him even though it’s not something I wanted to know in the first place.

Does that make more sense?**

 

[chevalier]

You’re missing my point entirely. I am saying that GOD can help in ANY situation. I agree with both of the above.

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As do I.

**

To expound a little more, you are a man who is convinced he would like/need to be told of any betrayal.

**

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Yes, though I understand reasons for the no-telling option if they’re genuine and I could understand the weakness of not telling because of fear, were it actually finally owned up. As long as a degree of care for me were involved - not hurting me, being afraid to lose me as a person rather than me as a good catch. This kind of thing.

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**

But your future wife may not do that if a transgression were to occur. So, if you let Him, God can help you forgive her even though it is not how you would have preferred to find out if you were to find out some time after the betrayal occurred and she had been keeping it from you.

**

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Absolutely and as I said, I’d rather she followed her conscience that she could trust than my preferences. The imperative to follow her conscience outweighs any need to comply with my wishes.

**

Likewise, I really don’t thin I would want to know if my husband betrayed me, repented, and was forgiven by our Lord. But, if he betrayed me and then told me, God could help me forgive him even though it’s not something I wanted to know in the first place.

Does that make more sense?**

Yes, it does. I don’t think it’s different from what you said in the beginning. I perfectly understand your point and I see your reasons as valid. I disagree with some of those, however, as I believe certain other things also matter, leading to my arriving at a different conclusion in the end.

 

[Feanaro_s_Wife]

Yes, it does. I don’t think it’s different from what you said in the beginning. I perfectly understand your point and I see your reasons as valid.** I disagree with some of those**, however, as I believe certain other things also matter, leading to my arriving at a different conclusion in the end.

I am not posting about what I personally believe right now. I am making a general statement to all of us on this thread that God is greater than any mistake we can ever make and can help us deal with either our sinful actions or how to deal with being sinned against. The thread was turning too much into a what would I do, what would I want, what would be best… only God knows what’s best.

 

[Consecrated]

** What if it made your spouse truly appreciate who you are and what you mean to them and they spent the rest of your married lives treating you like a king and showing you the love in their heart?

If they were truly repentant and wanted to repair the damage they would work on becoming the spouse you deserve, the one that reflects God’s great Love. If it guaranteed a better marriage, would you be ok with not knowing?
**

**This should be a given no matter if you tell or not :sad_yes: **

 

[Consecrated]

I’d want to know and then deal with it on my own time. Because when you’re married, the two become one body! If there was something wrong with my body, I’d want to know, so I could help fix it. I’d want my husband to let me know, because marriages shouldn’t have secrets.

Also, what if other people knew and didn’t tell me? And I found out years later? That stuff doesn’t stay secret! IMHO, I’d want to know and make decisions based off of TRUTH, not deceit!

yes yes yes
This is how I would want it, too. This presupposes all the other things that should go along with the confession by the cheating spouse: Firm purpose of amendment, with concrete ways of rebuilding the love and trust… etc.

 

[Consecrated]

TFor those of us married souls on this thread, we are just saying what our experience teaches us – and not the actual experience of cheating, but knowing our spouses and what it would do to them to tell.

i’m a married soul… of 6 years. I weigh in with Chevalier on this one.

 

[Feanaro_s_Wife]

i’m a married soul… of 6 years. I weigh in with Chevalier on this one.

**I think what KC was saying is that she has the opinion she does because she knows her husband. If she had a different husband her opinion might be different. Maybe?

It’s not a right or wrong blanket scenario. In some marriages telling would be better, in some not. And I would bet that many of us (married for almost 10 years here) really are only guessing and we may feel completely differently if anything were to ever happen:shrug:**

 

[Consecrated]

Oh, well those people don’t sin you see (nothing really nasty anyway). So they don’t have such problems.

now, that’s not fair. my Dearest husband has struggled with pornography in the course of our relationship, especially during our courtship… It wasn’t until he started sharing the struggle with me that our relationship, which was going down the tubes of sin, started to get back on track. He told me on the advice of his confessor. he still tells me, every time he even has a close shave (which is all it ever is anymore). it keeps him honest, and it makes me a true part of him. If I know he’s really struggling, I can make sure to up my prayer and fasting for him. it fills my heart with gratitude to know that he came and still comes to me in all humility to acknowledge something damaging that he has done to our marriage. He took the full blame for it, and went to great pains to make sure that I knew that the fault was ALL WITH HIM, not with me in any way. he is a Real Man, and I am so blessed to have him.

 

[proudnifi]

This is a valid question in the debate. What we are talking about is sin. Either spouses are advised ? expected ? required ? commanded ? to reveal sin to one another or they are not.

As far as asking forgivness from a person against whom you have sinned, that is not always advisable, and it is not required per se.

Let’s say a person steals $500 from his employer. He goes to confession, he has contrition and a firm purpose of amendment, and recieves absolution. If the person goes and confesses to his boss, or if he pays the money back to his boss, he will be fired and will be unable to support his family. The Priest does not require the man to confess to his boss. The Priest can advise that he donate $500 to a charity as repairation, or that he work some extra hours for that boss without taking pay for it. The sinner is not required to confess to the boss and risk his livelyhood.

If a person confesses that they axe murdered 15 people, the Priest cannot make confessing to the families of these people or to the law a condition for forgivness.

This is a very valid question.

Are spouses required to confess every sin to both the Priest AND the spouse?

The original post was directed at those who think a cheating spouse should be honest with the betrayed spouse; I’m in that house. Two thoughts spring to mind:

1st - The discussion is on the specific sin of adultery in terms of one spouse against another. Bringing “every sin” into the picture seems broad to me.

2nd - If Spouse A cheats on Spouse B and then engages in the marital act with Spouse B, Spouse A is exposing Spouse B to potential harm (ie, STDs). As I noted earlier, tests can be wrong or non-existent. Spouse B may be ok with accepting the risk - but it should be Spouse B’s decision. To withhold that information is wrong.

Yes, marriage is forever, but we are allowed to live apart if necessary or to live together without benefit of the marital embrace if that is necessary.