From the ironically titled site For your marriage, comes a pitch to use the annulment process to validate your decision to divorce even if you don’t plan on remarrying:
I do not plan to re-marry. Why should I present a marriage case?
Some people find that simply writing out their testimony helps them to understand what went wrong and why. They gain insights into themselves. Others say that the process allowed them to tell their whole story for the first time to someone who was willing to listen. A person cannot know today if they might want to marry in the future when crucial witnesses may be deceased or their own memories may have dimmed.
For contrast, compare the above, as well as the tone of the entire article, with the description of canon law in Defending Families Against Forced No-fault Divorce: American Annulment Mills. In the former, the tribunals stand ready to rationalize your decision to blow up your family. The tribunals are described as taking on the role of a sympathetic girlfriend, but with the power to declare that God is on your side. The latter recognizes that even in the rare cases that an annulment is actually warranted, divorce is a terribly destructive thing:
Whether or not the tribunal judges theorize that a sacramental marriage exists, the fact remains that a civil marriage existed. With rare exception, divorce from that marriage is wrong, has been condemned by the Church since the time of Christ, and has undeniably harmful consequences, particularly to children of the marriage, and should not be facilitated by compliant tribunals.
See both pieces in full for the stark differences throughout.
What strikes me as interesting about the annullment process and what it has evolved into is its striking, almost “flip side” to what happens in many Protestant/secular marriages (and indeed happened to me).
Trying to figure out, post hoc, if one of the parties didn’t really mean it (permanence or open to life) when hey said “I do” reminds me of the opposite conversation I had going through my divorce.
Me: Didnt you hear “until death do is part at the ceremony?”
Her: of course. And I meant it at the time.
Interesting the way that the Roman Church is more liberal than the State. That is to say of the six factors set out in For Your Marriage (my eyesight is not so good now; I read it as Four year Marriage) pleading numbers four and five would in a civil court be regarded as immaterial for the state is not concerned with ones private and perhaps fluctuating feelings. To recap, in England at least, what matters for divorce is not about your feelings but his (or her) spouses behaviour. Nullity is slightly different but if you are Oedipus and have married your Mother then no matter how hard it might be for any children of that issue the marriage must be annulled. On the basis of the six grounds set out in For Your Marriage I cant see that the Roman Church would be happy to annul the marriage of Oedipus. Strange.
Where is the hunky handyman who is also a millionaire, living in the garden cottage? If people are going to write rom-fic while pretending it’s some kind of relationship advice, shouldn’t they include the full experience? Is Liz Gilbert available to punch this “advice” up?
From another page on the “For Your Marriage” site (http://www.foryourmarriage.org/pope-francis-on-possible-changes-to-the-declaration-of-nullity-process/):
Apparently the nullity mills aren’t working fast enough for him.
For the Catholic commenters out there, is there a Biblical foundation for the 6 essential elements the RCC considers necessary for a marriage to be valid? I’m just curious.
@stickdude90
I’m not Catholic, but I think a Catholic would tell you you are asking the wrong question. You are applying a Protestant principle (Sola Scriptura) to a Catholic process. See the other article I linked to for a sense of the actual canon law involved, and where the tribunals have gone off the rails from that perspective.
I don’t think each specific element has a specific biblical basis…but the wedding at Cana where Christ performed His first miracle is where the citation is that Christ made marriage from a natural partnering of husband and wife to a sacrament.
https://www.thoughtco.com/the-sacrament-of-marriage-542134
And that’s one of the reasons why the Church and those partaking in the sacrament (should) treat the institution sacredly. It’s not just a civil union…it’s supposed to be a representation of Christ and the church. This is what the Cathechism describes about it.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c3a7.htm
My exwife would say something similar. She sees no contradiction between her Christian faith and filing for divorce. God would not want her to remain unhappy of course. This ignores the fact she created her own unhappiness by ignoring everything that did not fit that narrative. She did that to create the justification for pursuing her own desires instead (being with her mother, family, etc.) rather than her husband.
And yet some in the RCC would tell you that going Sola Scriptura is inherently flawed while the mother church is not.
Having the Scriptures as a base at least allows for strong correction. Other things just end up being the word of man.
Been thinking that it’s funny which ties of marriage survive divorce. Emotional and spiritual connections are severed, but financial connections are preserved via child support and alimony. Really tells you where some people’s priorities are. That a woman can get cash and prizes, in the name of a marriage, for unilaterally blowing up said marriage continues to flabbergast. It just so happens that “til death do you part” has an eerie truth to it sometimes.
We don’t say ‘Mother Church only’. It’s a three pronged authority.
Scripture, Magisterium, Apostolic Tradition
@BillyS
This amounts to an (unintentional in stickdude90’s case) change of the question from “What is the basis for this” to “Why are you Catholic”. One is a request to understand, the other is an invitation to re-fight the reformation.
Stickman-
Catholics (and Orthodox) do not look to scripture (alone) to justify the practices we engage in.
The canons are a continuum of church tradition which includes scripture.
Therefore a marriage is said to have canonical form if it meets the criteria that took several centuries to perfect.
My question was definitely just a request to understand, as this series of posts is the first time I’ve been exposed to what Catholics consider essential elements of a valid marriage.
Earl and Scott have both answered the question adequately.
I have no idea why my autocorrected to “stickman”
@Scott…
FWIW, I’d consider that marital fraud. I haven’t gone through premarital education to get married in the Church…but I think the point is to fully explain (I hope) just what you two are agreeing to get into.
Now that doesn’t mean it’ll stop marital fraud, some people getting married perhaps never wanted kids or thought marriage could be ‘open’…but it should get rid of the ‘I was ignorant’ excuse.
These American females formed an “international” organization they call ‘Roman Catholic Women Priests (RCWP)’ which “ordains” women (the vast majority of whom are divorced) to be Catholic priests. See: http://romancatholicwomenpriests.org/index.htm
Last I checked, only unmarried celibate men are authorized by the Catholic Church to be ordained to the episcopate, to the priesthood. For example, in his Apostolic Letter Ordinatio sacerdotalis (1994), the Holy Father Pope John Paul II, declared that “the Church has no authority whatsoever to confer priestly ordination on women and that this judgment is to be definitively held by all the Church’s faithful.”
See: https://www.ewtn.com/library/papaldoc/jp2ordin.htm Also see: https://www.ewtn.com/expert/answers/priesthood_men.htm
Yet these (mostly divorced) rebellious females simply ordain themselves as Catholic priests and then “act as if” misrepresenting themselves to the public at large as if they really are Catholic priests. Sure, and I’m a giraffe. Dalrock should do a post on this.
Here one fake female heretic usurper is “ordaining” another female heretic usurper to supposedly be a “Catholic priest” because rebelling against genuine Catholic orthodoxy in such an extreme manner makes them feel good. They do this despite the Vatican’s policy of excommunicating those who attempt “to confer a sacred order on a woman, and the woman who attempts to receive a sacred order.”
I wonder if they ordain m-f transsexuals
Dalrock
This amounts to an (unintentional in stickdude90’s case) change of the question from “What is the basis for this” to “Why are you Catholic”. One is a request to understand, the other is an invitation to re-fight the reformation.
Yes, endlessly re-re-refighting the Reformation gets old no matter who starts it up. It is tiresome noise that does nothing about any larger issue such as, oh, frivorce just to pick a topic totally at random.
Sometimes it almost appears that certain individuals are deliberately jamming the actual topics, in order to keep men from getting to serious subjects that might just include women’s bad behavior. It’s probably just my overly-sensitive feminist / White Knight troll detector, but that’s what it looks like: attempts at jamming by dragging a thread off topic down a rabbit trail.
By the way, Jeff Strand, that specifically includes your own very special self.
Scott
I wonder if they ordain m-f transsexuals
Interesting question. Some “girls only” music / cultural events specifically prohibit surgically mutilated men, and get away with it. Probably because Women are Wonderful or something llike that.
On the other hand, the usurper attitude seen in “Girls can be Catholic priests TOO!” above might dovetail in time with the whole LBTQMOUSE “gender is a surgical concept” mindset.
So SCott, my answer would be “Not now, not yet, but just wait…”
There’s a black-humor comedy waiting to be written about the ultimate White Knight who gets into a Catholic seminary, becomes a priest then sets out to prove women priests are OK by getting himself surgeried “I’m a WOMAN so THERE!” with the support of some liberal bishop…then hits the talk show circuit…gets in trouble with Baby Boomer feminists but adored by 3rd Wavers…etc. Any real writers want to take this and run with it, be my guest.
I am not completely sure I follow your point Dalrock, but I find the Scriptures to be a much firmer base than the decisions of men. We are seeing that with the hoopla (here and elsewhere) about Vatican II stuff, for example. Though I am not intending to refight the Reformation here, just note that claims the Mother Church is more stable are flawed. (Though I suppose even noting that has an element of that no matter what.)
Jenny Erickson? Slightly off topic: https://www.afp.com/en/news/206/french-star-deneuve-defends-mens-right-chat-women-doc-w392z1
Earl,
I was thinking more of Jeff Strands’ continuous swipes against Protestants than your replies. Though I would disagree at least slightly with you since tradition always trumps what the Scripture says in what I have seen even you post.
(That was one reason I stopped attending RCC Mass. I found the divergence with Scripture to be too large. Just my personal note.)
@Anon Reader
Right. If I were a troll who wanted to nuke the discussion, this is exactly what I would do. I would create a sock puppet account on one side or another, and do this very thing.
It is not entirely unlike what the Apostle Paul did to the Sadducees and Pharisees who wanted his head in Acts 23:6.
This is clever when it is done as deliberate trolling, and incredibly dense when done otherwise.
I should clarify. It is dense when the intention is to change the subject to “Why are you a Catholic”, not accidentally asking a question in such a way that others might perceive it that way.
“Been thinking that it’s funny which ties of marriage survive divorce. Emotional and spiritual connections are severed, but financial connections, in the form of child support and alimony,are preserved via the State’s guns.”
Fixed for clarity.
The tribunals are described as taking on the role of a sympathetic girlfriend, but with the power to declare that God is on your side.
I think we should all by now be beyond being surprised by the obvious fact that the World –more specifically, the FI– has to at least some extent infected and corrupted every single religious sect in the United States.
@earl
One of the biggest problems with “pre-marriage” classes given by the church is that the couple only begins taking the classes AFTER they have announced their engagement to family and friends. The marriage ceremony and reception are being planned and organized AT THE SAME TIME that the couple is supposed to be determining whether or not they are ready for marriage, and whether or not they should marry this particular person.
The fact that the engagement is already official makes it more difficult for people to admit that they are seeing various red, or perhaps pink flags that might warrant postponing or even cancelling the wedding.
Wedding plans have a momentum of their own, and as wedding gifts are received, and expenses are incurred, people can end up feeling pressured to continue down the path, even when faced with revelations about the prospective spouse concerning past behavior, current beliefs, on-going financial obligations, etc., that would have caused them to avoid entering into an engagement.
That’s a good point, Laura. We’ve built weddings up so much in this country we don’t care what marriage is actually about.
I’m not sure what you are referring to…they aren’t supposed to trump each other.
Unrelated, but funny nonetheless. So there’s this article from Canada where they claim Bitcoin is sexist because more men are investing than women, and they quote some stats where apparently women are better at investing than men. Now I didn’t bother to read the numbers, but I’m calling bullshit. In my experience, women tend to be horrible at investing. Don’t believe me, just look at any household where the woman has taken over the bank account. She has got to have the new shoes, the new living room set, the new car, the kids gave to have new outfits for Easter, etc.
http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/business/bitcoin-s-gender-divide-could-be-a-bad-sign-experts-say-1.4458884
Pingback: Do it for the validation. | Reaction Times
Well of course they are bad at investing…what they like to do is spend,
@Anonymous Reader
Right. The most infuriating thing is that THERE ARE WEBSITES FOR THAT. In my opinion, it’s a waste of time: I have never seen anybody changing his mind because of these debates, which go on and on for years. But if you disagree and want to re-re-re-fight the Reformation, you can go to these other websites instead of hijacking every thread with your pet topic.
Timely subject matter for me – my wife ran off a year ago after having got in touch with an Italian boyfriend of 25 years earlier (after finding him on the internet), and declaring her immediate love for him without the tiniest fight for her incredible loving talented happy and supportive family (me and four kids). This guy had rarely been mentioned in the last 20 years.
She initially revealed it all to me with an assertion “I have NEVER loved you” with such suddenness and such cold spite that I thought I was hallucinating.
I kept calm and asked, “Then why did you marry me?”
Wife: “It was too quick”
Me: “Three months is too quick but it was three years before we married”
Wife: “I didn’t want to let your family down” (which is a complete joke!)
So, nearly a quarter of a century after meeting she confesses to never having loved me, despite the fact that I open my wallet and show her one of the many reminders of her professed love for me, a note from her saying “I will love you always” – she had said as much just shortly before this awful day but now it was all over, she was claiming it was all a big lie.
I realise now that although she had meant those words of love at the time she had given them, her sudden change of heart was a form of intense gaslighting to destroy me (she turned into a person I just didn’t recognise after this awful exchange, which made me wonder whether the whole thing was an act and had been all along), that I was something better than nothing at the time and until she found something better than me then she was ‘in love’ – however, when I asked her repeatedly on that first awful night of revelation her answer was brutally repeated umpteen times and ever so clear “I have NEVER loved you”.
So, I wondered, what was the status of my marriage? – was I the victim of a massive fraud? or is this just the way things are now that she’s met this person and has decided to rewrite history to support her hamster brain whilst gaslighting me to the hilt to help further justify her treachery by making me the foolish victim, a cuckolded idiot worthy of scorn for not sussing this out for myself?
As a Catholic I know the Church is in tatters (not its Doctrine but in the destruction brought about by infiltration by people who worship their own agendas) – you simply cannot trust the Church at the moment, it is that bad, although still paradoxically the only hope for us all. I’m quite sure I could ‘get’ an ‘annulment’ as it appears to be anything goes on that front. I’m a manly man and would love to re-marry and do it all again this time without the sudden outbreak of entitled self-worshipping hypergamy and cluster B/malignant narcissism cocktail hour. However, the temptation, which the Church brazenly dangles in front of me, is evil. My marriage existed, it still exists, and will do until one of us dies. This is a fact! It’s what I signed up for. I suspect I’ll never see my wife again or hear from her (I bring up the kids, she didn’t even glance back at them, and we don’t even know where she is, there is no contact) – I crave other women, it is a total joke that since this has happened I have been propositioned by women half my age, it is like I’m being deliberately and hilariously tested. But I’m chaste and no matter how red blooded you are guys it IS possible.
I love the Lord, I love Christianity, I love the Faith and the Church – BUT the people destroying (or trying to destroy, we have God’s word that they’ll never ultimately succeed) it from the inside, who are literally trying to contradict the words of God, deserve immediate punishment – it requires us to imitate Our Lord when he whipped the money changers out of the Temple. It requires righteous anger – those annulment panels are a scandal to all Christians, they are an obsenity to Truth, Justice and the Church’s mission.
PS. I want to state what a great help this site has been to me – Sir, you do good work and I am deeply grateful that there are people like you, clear-headed and unafraid.
In another part of town, some women are speaking out against #MeToo campaign.
I think we should give credit where it is due.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/movies/celebrity/catherine-deneuve-signs-letter-blaming-supernumbermetoo-for-spurring-‘puritanism’-unfair-punishment-of-men/ar-BBIazgf?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp
These women wrote that….
@Original Laura
Exactly. A girlfriend of mine recieved an annulment after 7 years of marriage (6 years separated at his request although he came home for dinner every night). He had revealed his two other girlfriends, desire not to remain faithful etc. to both his cousin and mother a few months prior to the marriage. They encouraged him to go through with it to “not ruin the wedding” but conveniently told neither the priest nor my friend of his double life. The various children he fathered outside the marriage were also not revealed.
Her case was simple as she had multiple witnesses to his state of mind during the wedding regarding fidelity, contraception etc. as well as the testimony by the man himself. She would have preferred to remain married, but her husband was uninterested in any kind of committed relationship. Sad situation that could have been simply resolved with a bit of honesty.
Hey, this took longer than I expected :
CBC : Cryptocurrencies are sexist.
Gee, an advanced technology that is very, very mathematically complicated. 97% of the participants are men. Hence, women show up and demand an extortionary cut.
Ray Manta will like this.
If anything, this is another example of how women are increasingly become obsolete. Whatever you think of cryptocurrencies, they are not ‘sexist’ unless you think mathematical rigor and technological complexity is ‘sexist’.
More and more examples of women complaining about technology will occur, as women become more obsolete*.
*Mangina/whiteknight/cuckservative men are also obsolete.
*Mangina/whiteknight/cuckservative men are also obsolete.
Looks like you really wanted to rub it in, just in case….
Anything linked from the CBC is left wing trash. Cost Canadian taxpayers over 1billion$ per year. No one hardly watches that network or listen to it. Though they do have the occasional decent non political programs when they are not talking about homosexuals, global warming, rape culture.
Chairman maio?
Here’s a question for you. How much did you care as this very same thing happened to hundreds of thousands, nay, millions, millions, of other men before you? How much did you care?
That’s exactly how much everyone else will care about what has happened to you.
Chairman Miao—having gone through a similar situation, allow me to advise.
Your recovery from that traitorous woman will begin when you start to consider fulfilling your own needs that have gone unmet for so many years (any wife who runs off must have been shirking her other duties for many years as well). Don’t spend the rest of your life trying to be faithful to an idea (lifelong, sacred marriage) that no longer exists in the developed world. While today a man and woman can lead a life of faithful marriage together, it is simply a choice that each of them makes every day, independently. There is no longer any effective structural force that enforces the traditional notion of “sacred lifelong marriage.” Once we face the true nature of marriage as it exists in the world at present, we should see that it is folly for men who have been massively screwed over by traitorous women to “be the better person” and retire to the monastery until the end of their days, forsaking themselves in an attempt to live up to what is perceived as God’s law. This is akin to waiting for all eternity at a broken stoplight in an abandoned town, refusing to move forward until the light shows green. After all, that’s the law! You ought not cross that intersection until the letter of the law is satisfied. To do so would make you a lawbreaker.
This is something that occasionally bothers me about this site. On the one hand it shines a light on the depravity of feminism and the havoc it has wrought on all of our lives, but on the other it attempts to enforce antiquated notions of how marriage is a sacred trust. It simply is not. It may exist as such in an ideal form, and within the framework of Christianity in a doctrinal form, but if the leadership of the state and various Christian sects refuse to uphold this ideal (as this site has helpfully demonstrated time and again), then it simply does not exist. Our dollars or whatever fiat currency you have in your wallet is utterly meaningless without a government’s and people’s accord that it be “accepted as legal tender for all debts, public and private.” So on what basis can you claim that sacred, lifelong marriage exists (apart from your own personal, anecdotal account, or an appeal to a non-enforced principal of Christianity), if it is not also supported by the state, the people, or the church in any significant number?
In sum, my argument is that marriage, as it was traditionally understood, no longer exists today, and thus any man who faithfully executes his marriage duties until he is betrayed by his wife is no longer beholden to the traditional constraints marriage once carried (“until death do us part,” or any other religious claim that prevents a man from moving on with his life after a divorce). Christian men are being put between the rock of family court divorce rape and the hard place of cowardly Christian leaders who were too scared to enforce sacred marriage but happy to tell men that they aren’t allowed to remarry until certain conditions are met.
Chairman Miao says:
January 9, 2018 at 7:09 pm
Brother, you have my sincerest sympathy. There is, however, a blindingly bright silver lining to this dark cloud, one I know from experience, and that is that the Italian Stud blyfriend from the Past is almost certainly NOT going to commit to your wife. He might “pump and dump” her, but he will NOT try to wife her up.
Sooooooo many delusional women think that they can “trade up” after 20-plus years of marriage, but then learn the hard and ugly way that the world doesn’t work that way. Your wife thinks that her SMV and MMV are what they were decades ago. She’s in for an ugly awakening. She’s a “cat lady” in the making. You, on the other hand, can probably l land a woman a decade or more younger than yourself if you’re inclined to pursue such a future.
@snowdensjacket0x0x0
I didn’t know what I could do about others situation apart from try to make sure my own situation was impregnable. We were ‘all in’ in our lifestyle – we took risks, we lived a charmed life, we took our kids out of school, we were/are doing up an old ruin in France, my job is in the arts, our life was full of laughter, things we did together and strong Faith – we were a great unit (others outside were totally stunned by what happened – we were a blueprint it seemed of how it IS possible). What more can you do?
However, I didn’t really understand the perniciousness of this Feminine Imperative – I didn’t really foresee what a nuclear bomb it is and that we are all in a battlefield. Sometimes I saw other relationships fail because they lacked many of the things that we had and that reinforced my purpose. I have been giving a thorough schooling.
I found my way here (and to Rollo etc) because of the damage done to me and my purpose now is to try to help my kids avoid basic mistakes. I now realise that the damage my wife had at childhood was a big red flag (terrible messy life) but had been given a false idea about what was possible – I was indoctrinated I suppose by the culture and my upbringing that women at the very least are prepared to be crucfied for their children. If I’d have known then what I know now I would have definitely have not got involved with this person.
@feeriker
Thanks and I think you are 100% right.
Regarding divorce/annulment: the State has defined marriage as a contract (not even exclusively between a man an a woman) which can be unilaterally dissolved. We are bound to these contracts by law. However, the Church is entrusted with God’s word, which defines marriage otherwise, especially for New Testament believers. Churches around the world have many differing opinions on how to deal with the tension between so-called civil marriages and church weddings. As men that usually means that not only technically does civil marriage offer no benefits, only disadvantages, but for believers you will NOT be backed by Church leadership to live out a biblical marriage (a life-long monogamous treaty between husband and wife). Technically it is possible that although wives are legally allowed to divorce, divorce would be condemned by the church, effectively creating a barrier to divorce. Unfortunately churches miserably fail men in this regard.
These churches fail to fulfill Heb13:4a “Let marriage be held in honor among all”, and fail to uphold the second part “and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.”
I have the strong belief that not only should you not divorce, but remarriage after divorce is adultery which is a damnable sin.
Mt 19:6 So they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore what God has joined together, let no one separate.
1 Cor 7:10 To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord): A wife must not separate from her husband.
Luk 16:18 Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery, and the man who marries a divorced woman commits adultery
1 Cor 6:9-10 : Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God
I was a lapsed Catholic for over 30 years and a not-frequent attender before that. During the time I was lapsed I married (my first) a woman who is not a Catholic and who was divorced (husband left her for another woman) several years before we met. Her home life growing up was rather miserable and she married to get out of the house.
We have been happily together for nearly 24 years. I do not know what kind of woman she was in her previous marriage, but we bring our fault and virtues along with us. She can be a hard taskmaster on occasion, but she’s never been cruel or unfair or immoderate or dishonest to me.
Recently I decided to return to the Faith and joined an FSSP parish to attend the Tridentine Mass. I want to participate in the Sacraments but cannot do so until my wife’s previous marriage is annulled. Had I been practicing at the time I met her I would have done things differently and if I knew I would be returning to the Church I would have done things differently, but here we are. Every alternative is worse, as far as I can see.
We have decided to go through the annulment process for her previous marriage, not because I think marriage is some temporary thing but because it’s the only way for me to participate fully in my Faith. All we can do is put the truth on the table and let the Tribunal decide. I understand that our petition may be denied; I will have to live with that.
It’s good you recognize that. Sorry about your wife going off the rails…she’ll be sorry she gave in to temptation.
@Chairman Miao: Christ does not always turn water to wine. Let the dead bury their dead.
@Chairman Miao
A lot of us got sent off into adulthood with the old field manual. I’m also a guy who takes seriously his responsibility to send his young people off with the new one. I’m glad to hear that you’re keeping a level head and standing by your kids as you are.
I thought about dealing in with the Catholic Church two years ago. From what I knew about their historic doctrine and standards, I figured there would be a lot of support for a divorced family man needing encouragement in dealing with the necessity of staying chaste and focused on his kids. It ain’t so any more…meaning the clear necessity generated by a commitment to the biblical standard for remarriage after divorce. I guess the catholics held out for longer. They still preen themselves on the quirks of their system for sanctifying this sort of action. Not to be cracking exclusively on the catholics, but I can’t see that they’re any better than anyone else in this regard.
The divorce scourge (social normalization of it) has remade society for the worse. I think that the churches were the only institutions in society that had the power and authority in 20th century to impede or shut down this agenda. Instead they endorsed it. Maybe that’s how they threw away the prestige and authority the society used to consider their due.
Woman are now posting donation requests in the personal ads section:
Like most women, I’m trying to achieve a look that is easy on the eyes and boosts self confidence. At this time, I’m looking into breast implants. They can obviously be costly, so I’m seeking someone who can assist me in covering some of the costs.
https://losangeles.craigslist.org/wst/w4m/d/breast-augmentation/6454354269.html
Woman are now posting donation requests in the personal ads section
As far as I can tell, this is just a euphemistically-phrased prostitution ad.
donation requests
Yeah, like tkatchev said, this is basically saying if you give me money for my boob job, I will …. XXX.
Bob Smith,
The failure of people to live up to the truth does not negate the truth. It just shows people or horribly flawed.
My own experiences have caused me to think on this more and I no longer believe in the false prohibition of any remarriage many falsely pull out. It may still not be a good idea for other reasons, but I no longer see a Biblical prohibition just because someone, most likely the wife, decides to nuke a marriage.
Chairman Miao,
Very true. Early experiences have far more impact than most realize, especially since we no longer help women resolve those and change their actions for the future, but instead allow women to blame men for all their failures.
Feeriker,
My wife didn’t have a past flame show up, but instead wanted to return to her single state where she could do whatever she wanted, with a chunk of my money and ongoing (3 years it turns out) of monthly support for this choice of course. She said she married me because I “had potential,” but has apparently decided that my failure to provide enough of the stuff of life (we were far from poor, but did not have the vacation home, etc. of her other family and some friends) was unacceptable. That and she wanted to simply party with her much older mother most of the time.
Ironically she is now their bitch rather than serving the husband she committed to serve. I have had coworkers tell me they always thought she was lazy (she did not work outside the home, and very little inside for that matter), so she is likely for a much rougher life than she planned in a few years, especially after my monthly extortion (spousal support) ends.
I have been told she looks really bad in her pictures already, even though she is “having fun” in those photos. I would be she doesn’t see her own decline yet, if she ever will.
Paul,
I didn’t divorce my wife, it was forced upon me. I am not obligated to pay for the sins of my exwife forever. Even what is written does not indicate ongoing adultery, just a one time event. Note that the woman at the well was told she had been married 5 times by Jesus. He acknowledged that all the marriages were just that, marriages. We have to take the entirety of the Scriptures, not our own pet points.
@Paul,
1 Cor. 7:15 “But if the unbeliever leaves, let it be so. The brother or the sister is not bound in such circumstances; God has called us to live in peace.”
If your wife believed in no-fault frivorce then she is definitely an unbeliever.
I think the Orthodox Church has it best. From there website –
”Orthodox Church recognizes the sanctity of marriage and sees it as a life-long commitment. However, there are certain circumstances in which it becomes evident that there is no love or commitment in a relationship. While the Church stands opposed to divorce, the Church, in its concern for the salvation of its people, does permit divorced individuals to marry a second and even a third time.
“The Order of the Second or Third Marriage is somewhat different than that celebrated as a first marriage and it bears a penitential character. Second or third marriages are performed by “economy”—that is, out of concern for the spiritual well being of the parties involved and as an exception to the rule, so to speak.”
https://oca.org/questions/sacramentmarriage/divorce-and-remarriage1
Chairman Miao: if the Catholic Church is willing to give you an annulment, take it in good conscience and remarry. And be grateful you have the kids.
lzozozozzl
Chairman Miao,
I think dpmonahan said more sucsinctly what I’m about to say. ;/ OH well.
If you are not Catholic, then the following will not makes as much sense as it comes from a catholic perspective. If you reject the premis, you auto reject the conclusions.
1. If you are Catholic and beleive in all that means, then one of those things is to trust that the Church has the right and ablity to judge if your bond was a bond, if the sacrament was a sacrament.
2. If you think you might wish to remarry, then seeking an anullment is the right thing to do.
When I did so, I looked long and hard at the process and all the things it might say. For instance, as every Catholic should know, a sacrament is valid if it has the right form and matter. In the case of a baptism the matter is an unbaptized person and water. The form is “I baptize you inthe Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit” while pouring water over the head. For a marriage, the form is the wedding vows with an audience- even if that is just the priest, the matter is adults of oposite sex, who are free to consent, and who are not co-sangine. This means no cousing marriages, no kidnap marriages, no poligamy – ie if your spouse is married you are not free to consent, you have other obligations, etc.
I am at times uncomforatable with anullments for my looking at it said basically there would be no logical stop to “this is valid, this isn’t” OTOH, being a son of the Church means trusting her judgement.
I know we are here saying “The church gives out to many anullments, it is assiting in destroying the culture.” Yup that is true. It is not “did she love you” for marriages don’t have to have love, although it is prefered. But it is a question to ask. One reason for the uptick in Anullments is the uptick in divorces because we come into them with the wrong ideas.
A reason why the church say’s no divorce comes from Ephesians (I think 5, and I’m not looking it up) where St. Paul compares the relationship of Jesus to His Church as a Man to his bride. Neither Jesus’s coming to earth, nor the Church make any sense without the other. And if the married couple is a sign, a reminder of this union, then neither do they make sense if they can be seperated. – in our modern times we are out of touch with the symbology around us that points to things. Like the pomel and cross guard on a knights sword being a symbol of the cross.
Anyhow the thing is to find where we are called to be. And what each of us is called to do.
@Original Laura,
yeah precana is to short and a joke. I mean even the RCIA process is a several month process with weekly meetings (again to short). We Catholics should be looking to a way of starting at 2nd or 3rd grade and going until end of HS about marriage. About what it is and what it means. Things like.
“you won’t always love your spouse”
“no matter what anyone says, it is forever, so choose wisely”
“it is between a man and a woman and they must be open to having children”
etc etc.
As well as talking about seeing red flags either in our, our children’s, or our friends relationships.
I’m not sure about that link, Damn Crackers. A quote from there:
“I have seen quite a number of couples seek divorces. I have never seen a case that did not involve adultery—whether it be a case of giving oneself over to another person, or to another thing, such as alcohol, drugs, work, etc. One can surely put their spouse in a secondary position as a result of becoming infatuated, obsessed and/or controlled with/by another person; one can also surely put their spouse in a secondary position as a result of becoming infatuated, obsessed and/or controlled with/by power, wealth, addictions, careers, etc.”
It sounds like a great way for a woman to divorce her husband and explain it by saying “Yes, I had to divorce him because he cheated on me ( … by working late at the office one day a week).”
@Reluctant Neo-
That quote that follows was from an Orthodox priest who was asked a question about divorce. You can say that the feminized priest is making excuses for Eat, Pray. Love women to get divorced, but the other quote encapsulates the Orthodox manner of treating second marriages as an unfortunate necessity. Some sins are worse than others, and denying remarriage to the faithful in REAL unfortunate circumstances can be worse than the sin and suffering caused by not allowing it.
Understood, thanks.
Scott says:
January 9, 2018 at 10:22 am
Trying to figure out, post hoc, if one of the parties didn’t really mean it (permanence or open to life) when hey said “I do” reminds me of the opposite conversation I had going through my divorce.
Me: Didnt you hear “until death do is part at the ceremony?”
Her: of course. And I meant it at the time.
-Unfortunately this is the standard go-to response that a huge number of women have. It is estimated in one Australian study that up to 30% of women go down the aisle knowingly marrying the wrong man. This is a man they aren’t attracted to, don’t want, don’t care about. Think about it: She is lying, to her family, his family, her friends, his friends. If she is Christian, she is lying to God.
The only correct response to “I meant it at the time” – which I’ve also heard – should be:
”In other words, you lied”
Oh, crud, Cr*ppy TV For Poufters is back. Dalrock, I thought this complete waste of bandwidth was banned? (Suggestion: when ANY word in a post contains more than two “ZZ”s, the whole post should be prevented from ever being visible on your great forum even for a second. I suspect this would be easy to automate.)
@ Bob Smith III
You make your argument well and it makes me think.
However, I’m not making myself a foolish martyr to an idea that has gone, and I’m certainly not waiting at broken traffic lights. I’m actually relieved and joyful that I have survived a hellish time intact. Practically, my four kids need me to help them heal from the ordeal and strengthen for their own lives. The wedding vows we made were not just abstract, they resulted in human life, which wouldn’t have happened were it not for the vow and its fulfilment. The children are the actualisation of the vow and I can’t pretend they aren’t. Neither can I go through life complaining about the spilt milk of my wife leaving me – she doesn’t matter now (although I do dread any contact from her).
In amongst learning about the ‘manosphere’ and it’s fantastic wisdom (a wisdom that gives me both dread and hope), I have also been reinforced in my faith by listening to people like E Michael Jones and Jordan Peterson and their thoughts on the Logos, and accepting my vows are part of that ‘plan’. Whether that plan is over and I can start anew or whether I have to live them out now just for myself and my children I am on the side of living them out (unless a miraculous full repentance happens which I think unlikely because of the nature of the personality disorder involved and the reality of it’s ongoing harmful effects which would be stupid and morally wrong, I believe, to allow into our lives again because without full repentance it will all happen again, and the effects are violently horrific to us all).
I can’t judge any man who makes different decisions in this environment but it is a huge crisis that the Church cannot be a rock for us in this situation (Francis is teaching error, the Church is in disarray) – the only hope for me are the traditionalist orders like the FSSP and the proper Mass – they will surely prevail because they have truth on their side.
We have to make our individual decisions on whether this easy annulment process is right (part of the Logos) or a falling away from what Christ intended. I also don’t think my kids need a stepmother at least at this stage in their lives – they need me to be certain of my course and I can only say at the moment that my vow to my wife and to God were real and I still have to fight for them (although there is no point in pursuing my wife – it is in her hands now).
@Spike,
“In other words ‘you lied'”
While an effective against men, calling them liars. It is not effective against women. Historically men have survived and passed on their genes and gotten those genes to adulthood by being loyal and courageous. Think of the hoplite in the line. Thus being a liar is a bad thing for men.
For women however, they’ve often promoted their offspring through deceit (think of the woman in a harram and her son becoming the next sultan. Heck look at king David and all his children and wives). So for the woman, being deceitful at times is required and thus not as big of an issue. No women feel being called a slut, or loose. Which is why there has been so much done to remove the bit of these and similar words. I’m talking things like the SF slut walks.
I don’t know what is the insult to use on a woman that would cause her to react in away that would get her to behave.
@GunnerQ
Of course an unbeliever can divorce you, and it’s horrible. Unfortunately, as taught by many churches a believing wife may think she acting properly by divorcing you, but I believe it is sin based on the texts I mentioned. If your wife sins against you, it’s awful, but you’re still responsible to God for your own behavior. It does not give you a free pass to sin yourself.
Look at ALL statement papers of Churches that defend remarriage after divorce; they either do not address the relevant biblical texts at all, or make it a “pastoral issue”, meaning eventually they will allow for it. If you’re a man whose wife want to divorce you, you’re left in the cold by these churches.
I do recognize that in case of severe and immediate threats to personal health you should seek safety. I do recognize that help is required to restore the health of a marriage, and that it might require counseling. But for a Christian, we should strive to love each other and be able to forgive. How can you say you want to do that, while divorcing your spouse?
How often do you hear from the pulpit that in case of (temporary) divorce, you should strive for reconciliation?
1 Co 7:11 but if she does leave, she must remain unmarried, or else be reconciled to her husband
Two options for the wife who leaves you:
1. Remain unmarried
2. Reconcile to your husband (he is still called her husband!)
Which Church teaches this?
@BillyS
I’m very sorry to hear your wife divorced you, it is awful.
Luk 16:18a Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery
” Even what is written does not indicate ongoing adultery, just a one time event.”
That has been the interpretation by Luther, but the Greek verb (Present Active Indicative) might indicate an ongoing action. To me it is not logical that marriage itself, as one-time act, is called ‘adultery’. Adultery is about having sex with someone not your wife. By marrying another woman every Jew at the time would have recognized that the man could legally have sex with her, and not be called an adulterer. Being called an adulterer makes in this case only sense if somehow the marriage to his (first) wife still is binding. This is in line with 1 Co 7:11 : either stay unmarried, or reconcile.
I understand other people think differently about this. I also fully understand that that has made divorce and remarriage an (relatively new!) option supported by the Church. See what it’s effects are on modern families, it’s heartbreaking.
Paul,
The writings of the Apostle Paul indicate we are not under obligation if we are abandoned by an unbeliever, that would undermine the claim that it is adultery for someone who is abandoned to remarry. Nothing in the Scriptures indicate that you must wait for someone who has left. The case of a spouse who leaves who claims to believe is not directly addressed, but taking the same principle of a true unbeliever would seem accurate since they are acting as an unbeliever, whatever their internal state.
Note also that the woman at the well was told, by Jesus, that she had 5 husbands, so clearly here 2nd to 5th marriage were really marriages in his eyes. Thus remarriage is at least allowed, even if divorce should be discouraged, as it should be.
@BillyS,
I understand your position, it is held in many churches, but I do not believe it, and you can decide yourself if you believe my position or not. I came to it only after much study, and it’s not a very comforting position, I’m fully aware of that. It makes me all the more furious that churches are not defending men against divorces.
Paul’s remark we’re not under obligation does not contradict my statement that I believe you should not remarry after divorce. To me it is not logical that his clear command ‘do not separate, if it has happened stay single or reconcile’ is somehow made irrelevant by a much less clear statement that we’re ‘not under obligation’ a couple verses later. To me “we’re not under obligation” means we’re not under obligation to try and uphold that marriage. But it does not grant the right to remarriage in my view. And yes, 1 Cor 7:10,11 do indicate you wait for someone who has left you. I don’t say I like it, but I think it is that way. That’s why divorce sucks big time and it’s horrible. I think it also explains why the disciples were horrified in Mt 19 and Jesus responded with the parable of the Eunuch (i.e. someone who stopped having sex).
Note that the position I’m defending here has been the historic position of the Church for the first 15 centuries, as you can check for yourself. Note that the number of divorces during that period was also extremely low. “Till death do us part” has survived in our marriage vows, but unfortunately it has become to many people one big lie. And churches are silent about it. We will probably live to see that it will be removed from marriage vows.
About the woman at the well; she was indeed probably married 5 times according to Old Testament law. I do think that the New Testament teaches something different in that respect.
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