Free Republic

Should Parental authority be terminated (for both parents) when they divorce? In a forty page bill, sponsored by the Louisiana State Law Institute - effort led by retired family law professor Spaht. The law is difficult to read to see what has changed because she is erasing all of the existing law and rewriting and reorganizing it. So all the text is marked as new, even the parts that are existing. This is long standing law that has not been revised in decades. Of all rhe bad parts of the bill, the one change I am highlighting is this. Under...

The latest apologists for the Sexual Revolution – that great swamp of sewage backup, human misery, family breakdown, squalid entertainment, and lawyers – have been saying that the most radical anthropological breach ever known to man, the detachment of marriage from childbirth and the plain facts of nature, will have no effect (none at all, not to worry) on marriage and childbirth and family and community life. To which I reply, “Haven’t you said that before?” About what exactly have the sexual revolutionaries been right? Which of their non-predictions has been confirmed? They told us that liberalization of the divorce...

Choice and Consequences By: Msgr. Charles PopeThe themes of early Lent are pretty basic. The ashes of Ash Wednesday announce the simple truth that we are going to die and  thereafter face judgment. Hence, we need to repent and come to believe the good news that only Jesus can save us.Another early reading from Thursday after Ash Wednesday featured Moses laying out the basic reality that all of us have a choice to make. He says to us,Today I have set before youlife and prosperity, death and doom …I call heaven and earth today to witness against you:I have set before you life...

The "Halachic" Pre-Nup is Not Halachic and Destroys Marriage By Yomin Postelnik The sum total of all of the recent discussions about gittin from a halachic and moral standpoint is that while everyone should strive to alleviate suffering and seek to resolve marriage disputes so that both can move on peacefully, we must first do everything possible to save the marriage. Gittin are a hard process halachically, largely in order to minimize their number.  Civil jurisdictions that have a one year waiting period before divorce (a concept that originates with MFaimonides), such as Canada, have seen 60% of petitions withdrawn....

<p>Bored after 18 years with her husband, Robin Rinaldi placed an ad seeking casual encounters with new men and women. She tells what happened on her yearlong sex odyssey in her memoir "The Wild Oats Project."</p> <p>I broke the news to Scott that I wanted an open marriage in early 2008, a few months after his vasectomy. “I won’t go to my grave with no children and four lovers,” I told him repeatedly. “I refuse.”</p>

Muslim call girl weds and beds UK men before DIVORCING them after sin-free sex sessionsA MUSLIM call girl is marrying British men for an hour at a time to have sin-free sex sessions and rake in £350 a romp, it has been reported. The Arab escort, known as Fairuza, is offering the service to promiscuous punters in order swerve strict Shia Islamic principles. The 25-year-old reportedly performs the quickie service by reading a religious text in arabic and takes the money as a "dowry". Then once the deed is done, she divorced the two of them from their temporary...

In a wide-ranging, at points jaw-dropping interview with Aleteia, Archbishop Charles Palmer-Buckle of Accra, Ghana, signaled his openness to finding a way for remarried Catholics to be readmitted to Communion--and suggested the church might reinterpret Scripture to allow the "unbinding" of marriages. Palmer-Buckle, who is sixty-four years old, was selected by his brother bishops to represent Ghana at this October's Synod on the Family. Early in the interview, the archbishop makes it clear that he takes seriously Pope Francis's call for open discussion of the challenges facing Catholic families today. "There are people in polygamous relationships, who were involved in...

The wording of the judgment is brutal. An appeal court judge has effectively told the ex-wife of a wealthy veterinary surgeon to “get a job, love” (my abbreviation). It is imperative, said the judge, “that the wife go out to work and support herself”. Tracey Wright, a 51-year-old former legal secretary, riding instructor and mother of two, has lost her appeal against a family court ruling to reduce the maintenance she receives in future from her former husband. The case is seen as a landmark ruling for ex-partners of wealthy spouses. The gravy train has come off the rails.

(Bishop Schneider. Image Courtesy of Diane Korzeniewski) Editor’s Note: Following his strongly-worded interview with Polonia Christiana in the wake of the first part of the Extraordinary Synod on Marriage and Family, we reached out to Bishop Athanasius Schneider to seek his guidance on concrete actions Catholics can take during this time of turmoil within the Church. We specifically requested his advice on what the faithful could do to resist heterodoxy and address the errors (or at least obfuscations) that seem to be issuing forth from some of the highest prelates in the Church. Though his counsel is brief, it is deeply...

RALEIGH, N.C.- A North Carolina woman who bought a cockatoo from a divorcing couple said the bird keeps reenacting its former owners' arguments. Elaine Sigmon said she and her husband, Don, recently obtained Peaches the Moluccan cockatoo from a couple who separated and the former owners apparently weren't shy about having arguments in front of the bird. Sigmon said Peaches reenacts her former owners' squabbles "once or twice a day."

Many Have Reduced Love to Kindness, and Kindness to Mere Affirmation – A Further Reflection on the Moral Troubles of our Time By: Msgr. Charles PopeIn yesterday’s post, there was a critique of a flawed moral perspective that sets up a false dichotomy between mercy  and moral teaching, and between love and the law. As noted yesterday, well-ordered love and mercy must be rooted in truth. The greatest mercy is to keep people out of Hell and to save them from all the suffering that comes from sin.Jesus exhibits this in His person, for He who is love insists on moral...

A Lowly Pastor Comments on Troubling Developments in the “Divorce Debate” By: Msgr. Charles PopeIt is sadly evident that the Church is currently divided into two camps over the question of divorce and remarriage, this in the aftermath (confusion) of the recent synod in Rome and in the rampup to the synod this coming October. Please pray a lot!If you read the blog here often, you know that I am strongly opposed to any notions that would seek to set aside what I regard as the ipsissima verba Jesu (the very words of Jesus) in this matter, words that are,...

The divorce rate isn't 50% - and the divorce rate has been falling for two decades.

A few weeks ago, psychologist Randi Gunther discussed the fact that women still initiate the majority of divorces, even after men dutifully followed women into the new millennium. It wasn’t supposed to be this way. We men learned how to change diapers and cook risotto. We learned to watch for barely perceptible nods of approval before opening doors for women. We even learned to manscape, for goodness sake. Women were supposed to be happy with the new variety of men. Yet they are divorcing us just like they divorced our insensitive forefathers. Professor Gad Saad reported that American woman initiate...

EXCLUSIVE: 'I Wanted A Wife... So Did She'. Ex-Husband Of Megyn Kelly speaks out about his marriage to the FOX News star and reveals he didn't CHEAT on her - and it 'bugged' him that she hinted he did on air Dr. Dan Kendall and FOX anchor Megyn Kelly were together for eight years, married for almost five He speaks for the first time about his marriage to star of Fox News network. Kelly has twice publicly alluded to the man who cheated on her - saying it's not her current husband Doug Brunt. Dr. Kendall says they had a...

Marriage was instituted by God, not invented by man (cf. Catechism of the Catholic Church, n.1603). The Creator has built it into human nature, even into the human body, in its two complementary forms, male and female. ‘Male and female He created them’ (Gen.1: 27): man for woman, and woman for man, united in marriage as ‘one flesh’ for the procreation of new life: ‘Be fruitful and multiply’ (Gen. 1: 28). God has given marriage its essential characteristics and proper laws: unity (one man married to one woman); indissolubility (nothing but death can end a marriage); and openness to procreation...

A trial surrounding Rep. Alan Grayson’s wife’s alleged bigamy has been delayed due to an unlikely medical reason. Lolita Grayson filed court papers this week saying she had been suffering from chest pains. When she went to a hospital to find out the cause, she was told she needed emergency surgery to remove her leaking breast implants and scar tissue, according to the Associated Press. The surgery was Monday; the trial had been scheduled for Thursday in Orlando and has now been rescheduled for March. "Due to this medical emergency, wife is unable to prepare for or attend the trial,"...

Facebook unwittingly provides evidence of infidelity and new relationships, helps track people’s movements and records expenditure on everything from cars to holidays. Facebook is now cited in a third of all divorce cases, research has shown. A survey of legal firms’ caseloads revealed the social network is increasingly relied upon as proof of inappropriate behaviour. Facebook unwittingly provides evidence of infidelity and new relationships, helps track people’s movements and records expenditure on everything from cars to holidays. Leeds law firm Lake Legal said many cases revolved around social media users who got back in touch with old flames they hadn’t...

U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson will be in court next week for a half-day trial to determine whether his 24-year marriage was valid in the first place, or if his wife was still legally married to another man when they wed. **SNIP** Lolita Grayson filed paperwork accusing her husband of failing to pay her credit cards, refusing to provide financial support for their children. She also said, in an interview with WFTV-Channel 9 , that she had been forced to apply for a food-stamp card.

I’m an older O.C. divorcé with a young Filipino wife I met on the Internet, and I know what you’re thinking. Can’t say I blame you. But you’re wrong.I’m pouring drinks for my guests when the police arrive. It’s 3 p.m. on a Saturday and we’re hosting a friend’s baby shower in our open garage. The two officers survey the scene carefully before striding toward me with bad news. “We got a complaint from your neighbor,” one of the officers says with a nod. After they sort it out and determine we’re not committing any crimes or posing a public...