www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Catholic Perspective on Orthodox Divorce

Divorce is occasionally permitted in the Eastern Orthodox Churches, I believe, out of consideration for oikonomia. What is the Catholic position on a divorce granted by an Orthodox bishop? In other words, does the Catholic Church view an Orthodox person who has obtained an ecclesiastical divorce as "no longer married" or "still validly married"? My guess is that the latter is the case...

Thank you!


Peace,
Alex NvV

I can't answer the question, as I don't know, but I do remember once reading an article by an Eastern Catholic priest who said that Catholicism should allow divorce again. I tend to agree for two reasons: 1. an annulment says the marriage never existed. The only way this could happen is if the man or woman was already married (and the person didn't reveal this before the "marriage"). Otherwise, just because the husband, lets say, becomes abusive, does that mean the marriage never existed? I think it did exist, it just went rotten (thus, Orthodoxy has divorce, but also has annulments for cases like the above, where one is already married, and the other didn't know that beforehand, rare case I'm sure though). 2nd reason: divorce existed in the early Church, why not allow it today? Rome had no problem with it back then, why do they now?

Anyways, in the end, I support the views of that one EC priest. I don't think its an issue of doctrine, but I do think divorce should be allowed again (just like no married priests isn't a doctrine, but married priests should be allowed again).

Who says the Catholic Church ever accepted divorce? Please provide details, as I would like to know more on this.

If a person has a still existing valid, sacramental consummated marriage out there somewhere, they are not free to marry anyone and the Church can't permit this marriage to be dissolved.

The priest may be making reference to his Church when it was still Orthodox and came under a different code of Canon law.

ICXC
NIKA

Want to know the Catholic position on Annulments then I recommend.

Annulment: The Wedding that Was.

How the Church can declare a marriage Null.

By Michael Smith Foster. 1999 Paulist Press and it carries a Nihil Obstat and an Imprimatur.

It will straighten out a few misconceptions and provide some clarifications.

ICXC
NIKA

Drew,

The Catholic Church cannot just "allow divorce again," (assuming one believes divorce as defined as dissolving a marriage ever existed, which I, as a Catholic, do not). How can She? That would be saying that Her constant Teaching on the impossibility of dissolving a marriage unless by death, has been wrong. As we know, the Church cannot teach error, and will certainly never admit to such.

If the Catholic Church began to teach that a marriage can be dissolved, I'm pretty sure I would leave the Church because she would've proven Herself to be a false Church, with changing winds of doctrine.

Logos Teen

The church in the east had been allowing divorce (for serious reasons) since well before the schism that has separated us. I am sorry but I do not know the details and history of the practice, but anyone curious should be able to determine the earliest approximate date.

If (as is often claimed), the Eastern churches were part of the Catholic church and under the Pope at that time, then yes, the Catholic church allowed divorce under the Popes of Rome.

Now I am one to readily admit that this is a spurious argument, because I do not believe that the Eastern churches were ever actually under the Pope of Rome. But if you can prove that the East was in fact under the Pope and I can prove that the East has allowed divorce and remarriage since well before the schism then we together must admit that the Catholic church allowed divorce and remarriage at one time.

This may be the position of the certain EC priest who wrote the article.

+T+
Michael

I think what we have here is a difference in terminology. I don't know the particulars, but in most of the cases like this where there seems to be a difference, it is usually due to the fact that East and West have been speaking different languages for over 1500 years.

This is a delicate issue. There is a new book out by Fr. Saba Shofany Ph. D, STD. It is titled"The Melkites at the Vatican Council II: Contribution of the Melkite Prelates to Vatican Council II". In it is provided documentation that the Melkites tried to in some way reconcile the Eastern Orthodox tradition with the
Roman Western Church's current understanding. They were not successful.

It is my opnion that it was for the better too.

That said, I don't think that all arguments from tradition are necessarily valid arguments. I think the arguments for "divorce" and the abandoned spouse arguments are not.

That said, I understand the reasoning. There is indeed a great danger to the soul of the abandoned spouse.

All in all though, Christ said that what God has joined together let no man put asunder and that though Moses allowed it, from the beginning it was not so.

Not only will I pray for those who find themselves in such situations, I ask that everyone would as well.

I found the following web page interesting and helpful (ignoring, for the moment, its anti-Catholic bias): http://www.geocities.com/trvalentine/orthodox/divorce.html
(The page has exceeded its transfer limit, so see http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:www.geocities.com/trvalentine/orthodox/divorce.html .)

This person, quoting Joseph Martos, writes that a "second marriage is recognized as a real marriage but it is not regarded as a sacramental marriage". This implies that the Orthodox Church recognizes civil divorce as having some sort of "de facto" effect, but not as dissolving the original sacramental marriage. If I understand that correctly, then it leads me to believe that the Catholic Church would not hold that an Orthodox-recognized divorce has any effect whatsoever.

Does that make sense?


Peace,
Alex

So you're saying that that the Orthodox believe a civil divorce does NOT end the sacramental marriage and that the person may be civilly married a 2nd time while being sacramentally still married to the 1st spouse? I thought they simply believed the civil divorce ended the sacramental marriage. But I'm not an expert. I'm really hoping they wouldn't marry someone who was still sacramentally married to a 2nd spouse...

An interesting argument. Though I suspect that Catholics see what the Catholic church "officially" taught as being equal to what Rome did/taught regardless of what the East did.