Law and Divorce

Surely nothing is more certain than the condemnation of divorce in the New Testament. Jesus is shown to rebuke Moses on this point for having given into the people of Israel in this matter and not sticking to what had been expressly mandated by God himself (Matthew 19:8). The exceptions to the rule are made by the disciples of Jesus and are to designed to soften the immutability of this law, as it seems (Matthew 19:9). They were doing the same thing that Jesus had rebuked Moses for doing.

Now Jesus is not speaking of divorce as something forbidden so much as rather something which is entirely illogical given the concept of the marriage in the first place. The marriage is to be a commitment of two people, in this case a man and a woman (the proper meaning of marriage), to live in a world of a single, shared consciousness, much like the shared consciousness between each individual and God. In this context (and perhaps alone and solely) it is possible for the human to become ideally human. We are individuals and we are a species, and we as members of a species become our true selves. But in a polite public we must hide ourselves with fig leaves and so cannot be our true selves. In order to make this possible we entered into a special relationship where we can remove our fig leaves and express ourselves with unbridled abandon that we must have in order to be individual humans. Now it is clear that if there were the least possibility that this union were not sacred in the sense just indicated, then it would be impossible to find there the total communality of consciousness, i.e., a single consciousness (like a single flesh), and so it would defeat its own purpose. And so of course divorce is an impossibility and should not even be talked about.

And so this is not a law, but a natural necessity for the human being to achieve to his or her highest expression, i.e., a true and unfettered spontaneity in a society.* **

[* And unlike the demon, Narcissist, who was so taken with himself that he preferred solo sexual endeavors over any company whatsoever.]

[** This sort of openness of spirit should also characterize our consciousness with Christ both now on earth and later face to face. With friends, i.e., people we can trust to love us, we can be ourselves in a society, and that is our highest calling as human beings. The marriage, like all monasteries (see below), provides a facsimile of our union with Christ.]

And so this concern does not touch love directly at all, for the marriage seeks to enhance love and sharing. But love touches the marriage and so those cases where the marriage can be determined in truth and goodwill to be wrong, they can be dismantled, although this must be done under the supervision of the church.*

[* The case of the divorce of the new Episcopal bishop of New Hampshire is such a stunning expression of this love and understanding on the part of the church as to make a person feel ashamed, sort of like witnessing the iconic acts of Saint Francis and wanting to weep in shame as the pope did at Francis' feet in the masterpiece film "Brother Sun, Sister Moon"!]

A matter of some interest. The Scripture-is-authority Christians are wont to engage in a very curious excercise in my eyes. In their eyes the scripture speaks equally against divorce and homosexual activity, and yet they excuse the one and condem the other. I have not yet discovered the link that provides the appellation of consistency. Let me try to make this very plain, for it is a very curious matter. I will offer a definition for the sake of brevity in argument based on the several NT scriptures

A Prohibited Marriage is a marriage where one member was married earlier in a Christian marrage (where both members were Christian), and which ended in a divorce which was not predicated upon adultery and where the other member of that earlier union is alive, and regardless of whether remarried or not.

Now I argue that such people, who are Christians and are part of a Prohibited Marriage, are living in continuing sin, according to the understanding of the scriptural meaning of sin by the Scripture-is-authority Christian, no less than two homosexuals in a Christian monastery, and so according to this same understanding, and yet these Prohibited Marriages are thought of by the same people as proper Christians with only tongue-clucking at the sad "necessity" of divorce in the modern culture. What is good for the goose is good for the gander, and so consistency requires either an expulsion of the Prohibited Marriages from the congregation or an admission of the male and female monasteries. I am still waiting to hear the inconsistency explained by my brothers and sisters who are Scripture-is-authority Christians. It's like using the words of the American Declaration of Independence while being waited on by slaves. If it had said, "all while men are created equal" that would be a different matter.

How are we to deal with divorce in a world in which there is still a suppressed sexuality and other, unconscious suppressions?

Idea! We shall copy the Mormons (and inteed consider them justified in this wise, namely in their service to the Church of Christ for a concept). We shall take their “time and eternity” and call it “betrothal and marriage” even as we change the meaning slightly. The betrothal shall be for a period of time necessary for the members to get to know each other thoroughly, in sickness and in health, i.e., to see each other in full nakedness in order to know that they have been destined by God for each other, i.e., that they fit, as it were. We might let a civil ceremony of union constitute the betrothal and have the religious ceremony produce the marriage.

Then for what to do if still there is a call for divorce, we must appeal to the 2nd Love, as Paul instructed us to be led in all decisioning, and seek to discover the most loving way for the marriage to be annulled. In the annulment we admit we have failed to recognize the will of God and we all ask for forgiveness and we all convey forgiveness to each other, and sanction the members of the "union" to separate and to begin again older and wiser.*