While the battle rages to protect society and the institution of marriage (and the children!) from the political movement for “Gay” Marriage legalization. It is certainly time for Traditional Marriage advocates to look at various strategies for strengthening the marriages between “One Man and One Woman”. It looks like the organization Americans for Divorce Reform http://www.divorcereform.org/index.html is working hard to get some good things accomplished.
I would only add a short bit from the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church for some more perspective:
225. The nature of conjugal love requires the stability of the married relationship and its indissolubility. The absence of these characteristics compromises the relationship of exclusive and total love that is proper to the marriage bond, bringing great pain to the children and damaging repercussions also on the fabric of society.
The stability and indissolubility of the marriage union must not be entrusted solely to the intention and effort of the individual persons involved. The responsibility for protecting and promoting the family as a fundamental natural institution, precisely in consideration of its vital and essential aspects, falls to the whole of society. The need to confer an institutional character on marriage, basing this on a public act that is socially and legally recognized, arises from the basic requirements of social nature.
The introduction of divorce into civil legislation has fuelled a relativistic vision of the marriage bond and is broadly manifested as it becomes “truly a plague on society”[497]. Couples who preserve and develop the value of indissolubility “in a humble and courageous manner … perform the role committed to them of being in the world a ‘sign’ — a small and precious sign, sometimes also subjected to temptation, but always renewed — of the unfailing fidelity with which God and Jesus Christ love each and every human being”[498].
The American Catholic 
First, we ban abortion.
Love is a verb. Love is not something you feel or receive. It is what you a constant/unwavering commitment to do for/give to another. It is when the other person is more important to you than you are.
I had not known “conjugal” is synonymous with “marital.”
When things would get “testy”, I can’t say how many times a day I silently said, “Forgive all injuries!”
We are not meant to be completely happy here. We are “poor banished children of Eve mourning and weeping in this vale of tears.”
Anyhow, I am doing my part: married 32 years; a testament to human endurance; and three of the best weeks of my life.
Nice thought.
It has to start with each person and be fully supported by the Church, which is not going to happen.
There would be less abortion with stable families. I don’t know many people staunchly against divorce who support abortion but I have met many, the other way around. But I am not going to argue the point here.
I wish this article were correct, but the Americans for Divorce Reform page hasn’t been updated in four years.
A very good point.
I preface this by assenting that I agree wholly with Church teaching on this matter:
Perhaps I’m cynical or perhaps I lack hope or perhaps I speak still wounded from divorce in my own family, but when “traditional marriage” advocates insist that marriage is terribly endangered by the specter of legal recognition of same-sex unions… at this point, the horse is already out of the barn thanks to the stupidity and selfishness of so many heterosexuals.
T. Shaw,
“married 32 years; a testament to human endurance…”
Your spouse’s, I assume you mean. 🙂
The concept of “covenant marriage” raises an interesting question for Catholics: would a couple marrying in the Church be expected or obligated to obtain a covenant marriage license in order to prove that they really intended for their marriage to be permanent?
Or to look at it another way… if a Catholic couple got married with only a “regular” marriage license and later split up, could the fact that they didn’t get a “covenant” license provide grounds for an annulment?
I’ve asked myself the same Q about “covenant marriage” and intention. Perhaps a judicial vicar in one of the few Southern states to have the institution would be the person to ask.
Wasn’t Huckabee a proponent of it in Arkansas? Has he said anything about it on the national stage, or does he have too many powerful polygamous friends now?
I recall seeing a Rick Santorum speech where he was admitting that the future for “Gay Marriage” was looking certain- but he spent much of his time blaming those who made traditional marriage into a casual bond easily broken. With such low standards among heterosexuals, it makes for a tough sell to say that homosexuals are ‘undeserving’ for marriage- if the quality of one’s affections and ability to stay together as a couple are the standards by which we judge marriages.
Here’s a link to an article about the Louisiana covenant marriage law:
http://www.smartmarriages.com/hawkins.html
The author (a Mormon) notes that only about 3 percent of engaged couples were choosing covenant marriages from the start; however, significant numbers of couples already married were “upgrading” their marriages to “covenant” status, especially after having children.
Actually this idea isn’t new; a guy by the name of Judge Lindsey back in the 1920s proposed a two-tier marriage system of “companionate” marriage (easily terminated) for childless couples and “regular” marriage for couples intending to have children.
would a couple marrying in the Church be expected or obligated to obtain a covenant marriage license in order to prove that they really intended for their marriage to be permanent?
I hope not! We ended up not getting one, b/c we didn’t have time with everything else to get the documentation that we had gotten the counseling. For us, the sacrament was more determinative of our marriage’s covenant nature than the legal status.
I live in Iowa and we just booted the 3 judges that rammed gay marriage down out throats. It’s made national news because this was unprecedented. Hopefully the message reaches the masses!?
Michael-
Add me to the hope not; when Elf and I were trying to get married, the only way to try to talk to a priest about it was by phone. (You could waylay a Father after Mass and you’d be told to call the line.)
We did, left messages, etc… never got a call back.
Really didn’t help with Elf’s view of the Church. >.<