Whenever there’s a piece on the harms of divorce in The Catholic Weekly, I always find myself defending separation and divorce.
This is very mysterious, because I don’t like divorce any more than you do. I like happy marriages and stable families.
Recently our own Fr Flader’s column touched on this painful issue. I always enjoy his columns, and he’s right in what he says.
But the lopsided Facebook discussions afterwards always get my goat.
So I’ve decided to spend my precious 750 words this week on this topic.
Divorce harms children. You know what else harms children?
Staying together in a high-conflict marriage “for the sake of the children.”
Ironically these marriages tend to fall apart after the last child has fled the family home.
You know what else harms children? Having to spend years walking on eggshells in your own home.
Hiding in your room all through high school while your parents fight.
Having to live with an addicted father who is in denial and refuses any kind of help.
Having to live with a personality-disordered mother who lashes out at everyone from the deep wound gouged by her own childhood trauma.
You know what else harms children? Weaponising them in your war of attrition against your spouse.
Pouring out all your marital woes to them when they can barely cope with their own emotions, let alone yours.
Showing them that marriage means never having to say you’re sorry.
Teaching them that their future spouse is the one person in the world they can speak to as rudely as they like.
And making sure they know that divorce is such a terrible sin that it’s better to endure constant mistreatment from a spouse than to leave them.
You know what else harms children? Socially shunning their divorced parent, because divorce is so displeasing to the Lord that you might get sin germs from just talking to them.
I have had a ringside seat to some awful Catholic marriages and divorces. I have seen all of the above, and more.
I’ve also watched newly divorced parents and their children struggling to find their place in a Catholic community which should be welcoming and supporting them.
We know what we need to do about divorce. It begins with far more incisive and demanding pre-marriage counselling.
We need Catholic counsellors and clergy who will believe the evidence of their eyes and ears and will recommend that the couple don’t proceed to marriage.
I had a friend who was engaged to a man who, when they were arguing one day, warned her that if she ever divorced him, she could never receive Holy Communion again.
This isn’t true. But the fact that he decided to threaten her with this before they were even married spoke volumes.
She broke off their engagement a couple of months later when it became clear that this was part of a pattern of abusive and controlling behaviour.
But that was after a lot of second-guessing herself because her good Catholic pre-marriage counsellor had told her in front of him – after one session – that he was a wonderful man and she was so lucky to have him.
The priest who they’d asked to marry them waved off problems with, “Oh well, they’re both good Catholics – they’ll figure it out.”
We need individual and couples’ marriage counselling that’s trauma-informed and starts early, before the marriage is beyond repair.
We also need to stop sending abused spouses and children back to their abusers because Jesus said that you’ve made your bed, and now you have to lie in it.
This is another one of those #ThingsJesusNeverSaid. It’s also why we have canons 1151-1155 in the Code of Canon Law.
It only takes one person to destroy a marriage beyond repair – infidelity, abuse, or addiction.
It takes two people, actively working together, to maintain and save it.
You can’t expect just one spouse to repair all the damage, do all the forgiving, and universally save the day “for the children.”
Unfortunately, this is what many good Catholics believe, and what they are told by other good Catholics.
None of us really knows what’s actually gone on inside any marriage.
A lot of abuse can take place which is later rationalised, explained away, or just plain denied.
So spare these poor separated and divorcing couples your rash judgement, and pray for them instead.
Including the children – who may be wishing that their parents would divorce as soon as possible, because they can’t stand it any more.
