Divorce

Humans are social animals, but they are also rational animals. If the social context leaves no room for reasonable "personhood", where compromise, negotiation and solutions are met, then inevitably, relationships are dissolved through divorce.

Although divorce is a personal relational term, the issue plays across other types of relationships, whether they be business contracts, treaties, or community rules. Sometimes "peace and goodwill" dissolves before personal desires and necessities.

I think the Christian community and liberalism, in general, is living in denial, when it comes to many of these situations. Divorce happens and the long-term implications are many. Those who have never experienced divorce in their families are clueless as to how this affects the whole family system. But, they may be attempting to "protect society" from the inevitability of divorce, or other social ills.

The Christian community has a "pie in the sky" attutitude where the stereotypical "1950's" family is the standard, while the social liberal has their "ideal" as "peace and goodwill" in a globalist context. How can people continue to believe in a "ideal reality"? This is absurd!

Conflict is inevitable in this world and reconcilliation is not possible in some cases, either because of the situations involved, or the parties' lack of desire for reconcilliation. People all have their reasons for divorce. A childish hope for the "ideal" will not bring solutions to the real world.

Dr. Chris Smith, the sociologist from Notre Dame alluded to the Church being a solution to these kinds of problems, when he suggested a kind of "family intervention". I wonder how he imagines this being a solution, when the Church is full of those who are ill-equipped to deal with the realities in life, either through their "idealistic mentality" or their lack of education in the psychological or sociological fields.

Social ills are the real world of social problems and they will not be resolved through spirituality. "Spirituality" separates the ideal from the real and life is lived in the real realities of social contexts, personal problems and irreconciable differences.

No Church or liberal agenda is going to eradicate the issue of divorce, but they might continue to stigmitize the issue and distance themselves from divorced people. And this would be the worst of all possible "sins".