I disagree. Most people have no clue on the responsibility of entering into a marriage as the New Testament understood it. Most just want the fancy bells and whistles that go along with being married in the Church, as if that will keep them together forever. Marriage requires a commitment level that few are truly ready for, especially in this day and age of serving oneself, rather than serving another. Most don't understand the concept of love - given to us ultimately by the Bridegroom, Jesus Christ, for His Bride, the Church. If a man is not ready to give of himself TOTALLY to his wife, he isn't ready for a CATHOLIC marriage. If a woman is not willing to do the same, neither is she. Both people must die to themselves! Through this death to self, the marriage will be unbreakable.
I am sure I will get flamed. But that's the truth of the matter. My wife and I counsel young couples preparing for Catholic marriage. As part of the process, they take a FOCCUS exam, over one hundred questions on numerous subjects to see how they agree with each other. In EVERY case so far, there is one question that is indicative of our society's disdain for the concept of the INDISSOLUBILITY of Marriage: "If your spouse was unfaithful, would you remain in the marriage". One or both ALWAYS says NO! If you would have asked that question 50 years ago, you would have found that people were not quite so quick to bail out of marriage. Don't you find it interesting that people who HARDLY KNEW EACH OTHER 100 years ago who got married AND stayed married for LIFE??? While people who "know" each other for several years, in many cases have LIVED together - get divorced after 5 years? No, brother, I will disagree with you.
The truth of the matter is that society has made divorce too easy. Couples don't truly try to work things out. Why should they? Everyone tells them about no-fault divorce. People are more interested in “getting out while the getting is good...” As a result, it is not surprising that the Church grants more annulments than it once did. There is NOT the full and free commitment to the indissolubility of the covenant as there once was.
Which is why in the Orthodox Church, we have ecclesiastical divorces. They exist for the same reason that they existed in Mosaic law -- the weakness of man and the hardness of our hearts. We face it and acknowledge that this particular marriage failed, and that repentance is called for.
Christ was NOT validating the Mosaic Law of allowing divorce, but the idea that men and women were to become one flesh. Christ sets a new standard. Have you read the Beatitudes? Have you read Christ's discussions on exceeding the Law with Love? That is Christ's intent - not the mere obedience of the Law, but going beyond the Law in Love.
Jo kus would have made a much better point had he simply said that it is clearly not God's will that divorce happen -- and yet it does, amongst everyone, Catholics included. Trying to favorably compare Catholics to non-Catholics in this regard is not particularly helpful in making the overall point that God's will is always good and never evil. It is man's rejection of God's will that creates the evil.
Perhaps. My intent was not to "favorably compare Catholics with non-Catholics". It was to show that people flaunt God's will - and it continues. Men DO have free will to disobey God. For His own reasons, God allows us to sin. It was always God's will that a man and woman become one flesh - and yet, God allowed Moses to issue divorce decrees, even though God knew that He intended something else when He created mankind. We of the NT Covenant have moved beyond that concept of issuing divorce decrees. A marriage entered upon by two people who commit themselves to each other first, rather than themselves, will invariably be successful, with God's grace.
Flame me if you like. But that's God's Word. Sometimes, it is not easy to follow it. We all fall short of God’s Will. But let’s not rationalize it.
Regards
So according to your logic, someone who has "no clue on the responsibility of entering into a marriage as the New Testament understood it" has grounds for annulment? Is this the historic criteria that the Catholic church has used for granting annulments?
I repeat my question/statement: if annulments are not Catholic divorces, and are granted only in those cases where no marriage ever took place because of it being illicit or invalid in some respect or another, then Catholic annulment rates should approach non-Catholic annulment rates rather than non-Catholic divorce rates (as is actually the case.) The alternative is that Catholics have a bent for entering into illicit and invalid marriages.
Part of the difference between Orthodox and Catholic approaches probably comes from our differing view of what happens at our respective marriage services. Catholic/Western marriage ceremonies center around an exchanging of vows, and have the characteristic of a contractual agreement. This is in keeping with generally legalistic Catholic views of Christianity. Since it is a contract, there are lots of reasons why one can look back and say that the contract is invalid.
In the Orthodox Church, there is no exchange of vows. At the very beginning of the betrothal service (which is separate from the marriage service, although usually performed in the narthex prior to the wedding itself), each is asked by the priest if they wish to be betrothed, and they are asked if they are betrothed to anyone else. The service then begins, and in neither the betrothal nor the wedding service are there anything resembling vows.
A marriage is something that the Church bestows upon the couple, not an agreement or contract -- even a spiritual one. Therefore, it wouldn't occur to us for the most part that any Orthodox wedding would be invalid. This would be tantamount to saying that the bread and wine at the Divine Liturgy didn't become the Body and Blood of Christ for a particular communicant because he didn't have any clue about what he was receiving.
I couldn't agree more about the sorry state of the modern world with regard to seriousness of commitment and an understanding of what Christian marriage is supposed to be. But to deal with this problem through the use of the technique of annulment -- saying that a couple who had a Christian wedding, who have lived together and been physically joined together for years, and often borne children together -- that this man and woman were never actually married (sorry, you bastard children), boggles the mind when one realizes that this is supposedly New Testament Christianity in action.
So, what do you tell the couples you counsel, if they do not meet your lofty standards for what constitutes being ready for a Christian marriage? A standard, which by definition would never result in a divorce or annulment, since "the marriage will be unbreakable."
Do you tell the couple and the priest that they aren't ready for a Catholic marriage, and if they want to get married, that they need to do so outside of the Church? And what exactly would that do for their souls? Would you argue that the many Catholics over the years who left the Catholic church and became Protestants so that they could remarry are spiritually better off from your perspective than had they been able to go through the penitential process of an ecclesiastical divorce prior to being allowed to remarry (in a more subdued ceremony) in the Catholic church?
For this is surely at the root of the ubiquitous easy annulments that take place throughout Catholicism. Most people are going to remarry, and the question is whether they are going to leave the Catholic church or not in order to be able to do so.
I stand by my assessment. Annulment is the practical equivalent of divorce in the Catholic Church. I will start believing otherwise when annulments are granted only for real things like genuinely coerced marriages and incest.
Finally, I would note that I have only personally known two couples married in the Orthodox church who have gotten divorced -- this over a nearly 20 year period in the Church. The fact that the Orthodox Church has a procedure for granting ecclesiastical divorces has hardly promoted the breakup of marriages.