For Better...and For Worse

I recently had a discussion about marriage with a coworker and remembered my promise to cover that topic in my "evangelization" of the Catholic Church.  Unfortunately, divorce is part of the discussion as well.  If only divorces were not so common.

Our discussion had started over the topic of annulments and why they were important for Catholics and why we were the only church who really cared about them.  The start of the conversation thus began with us discussing marriage as a Sacrament, a bond entered into with the blessing of God.  It is not a simple civil contract like you get when the Justice of  the Peace marries you.  You are professing, in front of God and your witnesses that you will take your spouse forever.  No conditions, no escape clauses...forever!!  In the Catholic Church, a marriage is considered a covenant between the husband and wife, much like the covenants God made with His people. 

"But from the beginning of creation God made them male and female. For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. Therefore now they are no longer two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man put asunder" (Mark 10:6-9). In other words, man has no right to break the covenant.  Marriage is the religious and legal bond uniting husband and wife for mutual help and assistance, for the begetting and rearing of children, and, after the fall of our first parents, for the regulation of the sexual instinct in accordance with the dictates of reason.

So even should a man and woman divorce, they are still considered married in the eyes of the Church and cannot, therefore, participate fully in the Sacraments if they were to remarry without an annulment.  If a couple simply divorces and does not remarry, there is no harm done as far as the Sacraments go.  Years ago, divorce was considered a great sin.  That belief has changed, however.

Marriage, in the eyes of the Church, is meant to bring a man and a woman together to become one and to bear children.  That does not mean that if the marriage produces no children it is not blessed, but the idea is to bear children.  This is one of the reasons the Church defends marriage between a man and a woman so vehemently.  Contraception and fertility treatments where an outside party is needed to become pregnant are not in line with the teachings of the Catholic Church.  Medicinal treatments or fertility drugs are acceptable as they are meant to assist the couple without there being an unnatural action necessary to conceive.  Contraception is covered in an earlier blog.

So what happens when a marriage ends in a divorce?  What if the couple did everything they could to make it work but just couldn't do it.  Why is it necessary to get an annulment and what is an annulment anyway?

Quite simply, an annulment is a process a couple must go through in order to be allowed to remarry in the Catholic Church and be able to participate fully in the Sacraments.  It involves showing that at the time of the wedding, a sacred bond was not made.  Therefore, the Church states the marriage annulled and wiped from the books.  An annulment does not mean that the Church makes null something that was valid. An annulment in the Catholic Church_more properly called a decree of nullity_is a declaration that there was not a true marriage from the beginning, even though it may have had all the outward appearances of being one.

Many people find this annulment business a bunch of foolishness and completely unnecessary.  However, when you look at it, you see the beauty and the genius behind an annulment.  The Church puts such a value on marriage that they do not recognize divorce as an easy way to get out of a marriage.  The Church expects a couple to do everything they can to make it work.  With these purposes in mind, the Church requires prenuptial instructions, investigation of freedom and intention, publication of bands, and marriage before a priest.

The annulment process can be a healing process as well.  It requires a couple to look back over the marriage and tell the story from beginning to end.  If done honestly, a couple will be able to identify shortcomings and faults, not only for their spouse, but for themselves.  Often times, revealing things about themselves that they did not realize.

If all marriages were treated with the level of importance and respect as the Church does, the divorce rate would be much lower.  Unfortunately, society treats marriages as a contract that is easily broken.  Add to this the now acceptable practice of having children out of wedlock, same sex marriages, and the killing of the unborn, you can see how the sanctity of marriage and the importance of the family is in danger.  When we allow our values to be attacked and derided by society and we do not stand by them, the domino affect on our lives is devastating.  The family is the linchpin that holds society together and marriage is the cotter pin.  If we continue to allow marriage and the family to be attacked and weakened, we dare not be surprised when our society has problems.