Cardinal outlines possible paths to Communion for divorced, remarried

[rug]

German Cardinal Walter Kasper, right, speaks with cardinals as they arrive for the afternoon session of a meeting with Pope Francis in the synod hall at the Vatican Feb. 21. Also pictured are Cardinals Roger M. Mahony, retired archbishop of Los Angeles, left, Carlos Amigo Vallejo, retired archbishop of Seville, Spain, and Giuseppe Betori of Florence. (CNS/Paul Haring)

by Cindy Wooden , Catholic News Service | Feb. 28, 2014

Vatican City -- The Catholic church needs to find a way to offer healing, strength and salvation to Catholics whose marriages have failed, who are committed to making a new union work and who long to do so within the church and with the grace of Communion, Cardinal Walter Kasper told the world's cardinals.

Jesus' teaching on the indissolubility of sacramental marriage is clear, the retired German cardinal said, and it would harm individuals and the church to pretend otherwise. However, "after the shipwreck of sin, the shipwrecked person should not have a second boat at his or her disposal, but rather a life raft" in the form of the sacrament of Communion, he said.

Pope Francis had asked Kasper, a well-known theologian and author of a book on mercy as a fundamental trait of God, to introduce a Feb. 20-21 discussion by the College of Cardinals on family life. The Vatican did not publish the cardinal's text, but Catholic News Service obtained a copy.

The Catholic church needs to find a way to help divorced and remarried Catholics who long to participate fully in the life of the church, Kasper told the cardinals. While insisting -- for the good of individuals and of the church -- on the need to affirm Jesus' teaching that sacramental marriage is indissoluble, he allowed for the possibility that in very specific cases the church could tolerate, though not accept, a second union.

http://ncronline.org/news/cardinal-outlines-possible-paths-communion-divorced-remarried

[Manifestor_of_Light]

1. Why do Christians fetishize a piece of paper?

A marriage certificate does not have magical properties. It does not automatically make your economic standing higher, as the government has been telling poor single women on welfare, who are skeptical.

It does not make your spouse love you or respect you, or make them work on having a good marriage. If your spouse won't do any of those things, you can't force them to, and the only solution is divorce.

Some people stand up in front of witnesses and promise to love, honor and cherish, and are telling a big fat lie. Spouse figures this out much later.

[rug]

2. The answer is simple: they don't.

It's the lifelong commitment that is a big deal.

Agree or not, Catholic teaching on it is pretty well developed.

BTW, do you know you're in the Catholic Group?

[Manifestor_of_Light]

3. But then why would premarital sex make God so mad?

You don't have that magic state-issued (NOT church-issued) piece of paper that allows you to have church-sanctioned sex.

My point was that if one person is NOT really committed to the values of marriage, love, honor and cherish, you can't force them to be committed.

So you're supposed to stay committed to a hellish, loveless marriage because commitment is more important than keeping your health, your life itself or your sanity? Because you were misguided by this devious person who had no intention of loving or respecting you, and didn't find this out until after the wedding?

Is that what you're saying?

[rug]

4. You're anthropomorphizing.

Do you know the RCC does not oppose civil divorce and suggests it in some circumstances?

[Manifestor_of_Light]

5. But you can't take communion, right?

If you didn't get a church annulment, just a regular civil divorce?
A church annulment says that one of the elements of a valid marriage is missing. Is that right?

Or if you had premarital sex and confessed it to a priest?

That's adding another layer of voluntary subjection to authority.

We have to follow the state laws on marriage and divorce. Otherwise we can be charged with the crime of bigamy, for example. Utah had to outlaw polygamy before it was allowed to join the Union and become a state.

People willingly subject themselves to religious restrictions on marriage and divorce (or not).

Those are two different forms of authority. One is mandatory, the other is voluntary.

I'm asking this because I have been subjected to some horrendous mental and emotional abuse (not physical) in prior marriages that I would never tell anyone about. The mental and emotional abuse and divorce maneuvers I have told people about was enough to make them gasp in disbelief.

I had to learn the hard way what a healthy relationship is about, because I never saw a real healthy marriage when I was a kid.

[rug]

6. No, the problem is remarriage not the divorce itself.

You're right about the annulment, it's a finding the original marriage was invalid due to a specified ground. A Catholic who remarried without an annulment is considered still married to the original spouse and is therefore considered to be in a state of sin. No one who is aware of being in a state of serious sin is expected to go to Communion.

Therein lies the problem. Part of Confession is the intent a desire to sin no more. That's hard to do if you're happily remarried but that second marriage is considered invalid. It's one thing to confess a one night stand. It's another thing entirely to say you will no longer sleep with the person you now love.

I hope they can resolve this conundrum in an authentic and humane manner. Obviously the theology that can sort through this has a direct impact on religious same sex marriage.

I'm sorry you've had bad experiences. I hope you're in a good place now.

Personally, I'm in a second marriage so I don't go to Communion. I understand the present rules and hope they'll change but I don't think they are inherently evil, backward or vicious. In the meantime, whenever my kids ask me why I don't go to Communion, I just blame it on their mother,

[olegramps]

7. What do you think was Jesus' intention?

It is my understanding that Jewish men could use the most frivolous of reasons to divorce their mate. Just simply wanting a younger wife could be justified and they just had to say " I divorce you" three times and throw her out on the street. If Jesus was addressing this rather common practice it would be far different than addressing a situation in which their was physical or mental abuse. I don't know if he actually addressed that situation. Another question that I have did he even consider women divorcing their husbands? Considering the patriarchal society that he was dealing with is it therefore reasonable that this wasn't a concern? He certainly allowed divorce if their was infidelity. Is it possible that he could have considered abuse to be a form of infidelity when you consider the Jews were instructed to be caring and loving of the wives? The bottom line is that I have, possibly incorrectly, come to the conclusion that he was only addressing the abusive common practice that I have noted.

[rug]

8. Who knows, but what you say makes sense.

He did emphasize the importance of marriage, which would be a good corrective to the situation you describe, but he never talked about the legalistic system that's in place.

I hadn't heard about that method of Jewish divorce. That's how I've heard Islamic divorce described but I've never looked into it.

The problem of patriarchy in divorce continues. In New York it's required in a divorce complaint that each party swear to do all in his or her power to remove any obstacle to a religious remarriage. I haven't seen any other state routinely require that. I think it stems from some nasty cases where the husband refused to consent to a get, a rabbinical divorce, as leverage in the civil divorce.

I hope Francis knocks some heads together until a more humane view of marriage emerges.

[CountAllVotes]

9. My very Catholic mother was divorced

She received an annulment from the RCC. She married my father some 5+ years later.

Seems the first man she married was one of these off to war deals and I'll likely never see you again sort of arrangement best I could tell.

Mother never had anything at all to do with her first husband (she swore she never had sex with him).

She divorced him when WWII ended and the reason for just annulment was "Extreme mental cruelty". The Church stood by her and comforted her best they could as it was apparently a horrible situation (she was mixed-blood Indian and was basically "sold" to this man by her foster father and yes, things like that were still going on in the early 1940s). Makes me sad just thinking about it really.

My father was not a very good Catholic admittedly but she married him anyway and their marriage lasted for 47 years; 'till death do us part indeed.

[rug]

10. Kudos to your parents. That's becoming a rare achievement.

[CountAllVotes]

11. I've been with my husband since 1978

However, we did not marry until 1985. We wanted to be sure that we did not end up in divorce court. We are still together today, both of us in failing health and himself some 20 years my senior and no, I wouldn't change him for anything because I love him.

He was raised staunch Irish Catholic from the Old Country and still practices the religion in his own way which is his choice, not mine. I have no regrets and I would not change anything even if I could.

Today I find us still together and holding on to one another as the years pass and we both age and have our ailments. I would never marry again if he were to die.

To me, marriage is a sacred thing and it should not be taken for granted.

Said foster father to my mother I mention above had a daughter that was married/divorced about seven times best I can remember. She had two sons and their lives were a living hell best I could tell. It was a sad situation and no, she was not Catholic, she too was mixed-blood Indian and not a religious person but hey, I loved her anyway!

[rug]

12. I was married in 1978. Sadly, divotced in 1999 but happily remarried.

[CountAllVotes]

13. Had you waited, do you think you could have avoided divorce?

Just curious as I lived with my husband from 1978-1985 when we finally eloped and married in Nevada for a whopping $45.00. I remember confessing this to a priest and I got hell for it but they did not tell me not to come back -- no one in the RCC has EVER told me not to come back!

We got our simple gold band wedding rings at J.C. Penney's in Carson City a few hours before we got married. Everyone was saying it would never last. We were married by a minister in one of those tacky chapels in Nevada and the minister's wife was the witness!



Needless to say there was not a lot of "family support" for my marriage to him but in the end when my parents were dying they said they had changed their opinion of him and had decided that he was indeed a fine man.

I'm glad you found another person to be with in this very lonely world in which we live.

[rug]

14. I doubt it but you never know.

[goldent]

15. That's a great story

Thanks for posting it - I really enjoyed it.