Plea to Bishops Worldwide – re. No-fault Divorce

We are mailing pleas to bishops all over the world (list) asking them to uphold marriage against unilateral no-fault divorce.  Each envelope includes a handwritten personal note from a Catholic divorce defendant who is remaining faithful to his/her marriage after being betrayed by the other spouse.

Pope Leo XIV is gathering the presidents of the world’s bishops’ conferences from October 7 to 14 and the topic is proclaiming the gospel within families ten years after Amoris Laetitia.  

My letter to the bishops

Your Excellency,

I am writing as you prepare to participate in the October 7 meeting called by Pope Leo XIV, ten years after Amoris Laetitia. New challenges have emerged in territories where the culture has embraced the sexual revolution.

Historically, civil governments adjudicated cases of separation or divorce to protect the rights of the aggrieved spouse. However, with the advent of unilateral no-fault divorce, those protections were diminished, and in some respects reversed. An abandoning or adulterous spouse can obtain a civil divorce over the objection of the other spouse, without the civil court arranging reparation for the harm caused. Enclosed is a letter from «Voluneer» describing «his/her» experience as the respondent in a civil no-fault divorce. «HeShe» is remaining faithful to «his/her» marriage regardless of the other’s betrayal. Also enclosed is a paper by Franciscan University of Steubenville professor Dr. Donald Asci: “The Evil of Divorce and the Dignity of the Human Person.”

Amoris Laetitia says it is “common to think that, when one or both partners no longer feel fulfilled, or things have not turned out the way they wanted, sufficient reason exists to end the marriage” (AL 237). Many Catholics think civil courts should determine duties of spouses when an unfulfilled spouse feels things turned out poorly. However, respected Catholic writings show the Church is to issue a canonical judgment before a party in a marriage under the Church’s jurisdiction approaches the civil forum. (footnote) Separation itself, and the underlying obligations of spouses and parents, cannot simply be treated as “merely civil effects” of marriage (c. 1692 §3).

I ask the Church to intervene in marital crises both to facilitate reconciliation and, when necessary, to canonically determine—on a case-by-case basis—whether a legitimate basis for separation exists, and whether approaching the civil forum is tolerable. Amoris Laetitia calls for the establishment of specialized counselling centers for efforts at reconciliation and mediation (AL 242). I believe the Archdiocese of Valencia’s SAMIC is a good example. Also, in the USA, JPII Healing Center (Tallahassee), Souls and Hearts (Indianapolis), and The Alexander House Apostolate (San Antonio) successfully facilitate reconciliation.

Public scandal is given to the faithful when a party to a marriage under the Church’s jurisdiction petitions the civil forum for a no-fault divorce or separation—even though there was no prior legitimate reason for separation of spouses. Scandal would be minimized if a canonical judgment of separation of spouses made clear when there was malicious desertion, adultery, or the other canonical bases for separation.

I pray that Church leadership will publish principles explaining when temporary separation is justified, when permanent separation is justified, and under what circumstances approaching the civil forum can be tolerated. I pray that our leadership will establish principles for determining the obligations toward the other spouse and children of an abandoning or adulterous spouse, or of a spouse whose conduct gravely endangers the other spouse or children.

Such leadership could protect spouses and children while demonstrating concretely that the Church takes seriously the duties of spouses.

Respectfully yours in Christ,

Bai Macfarlane
Director, Mary’s Advocates

NOTE: Maragnoli, “La separazione personale dei coniugi …,” Quaderni di diritto ecclesiale 13 (2000): 169–191; University of Navarra Exegetical Commentary (2002), c. 1692; Chiappetta, Il Codice: commento (EDB, 2011), cc. 1152–1153 & 1692; Brown, “Legal Separation,” Studies in Church Law (Bangalore: St. Peter’s Pontifical Institute, 2008); Gramunt, Hervada & Wauck, Canons and Commentaries on Marriage (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical Press, 1987), p. 146; Diego-Lora, “Las Causas de Separación de Cónyuges Según el Nuevo Código,” Dilexit iustitiam (Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1984) 389–403, pp. 391, 399. Pope Pius VI, “Epistle, ‘Deessemus nobis,’ 16 September 1788,” in Migne, Theologiae Cursus Completus, vol. 25 (Paris: Apud Editorem, 1840), 694–700, pp. 694–695. An exception exists where canonical law at the diocesan, provincial, or conference level gives the civil forum jurisdiction over separation.