(AP) Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson told his “700 Club” viewers that divorcing a spouse with Alzheimer’s is justifiable because the disease is “a kind of death.”
During the portion of the show where the one-time Republican presidential candidate takes questions from viewers, Robertson was asked what advice a man should give to a friend who began seeing another woman after his wife started suffering from the incurable neurological disorder.
“I know it sounds cruel, but if he’s going to do something, he should divorce her and start all over again, but make sure she has custodial care and somebody looking after her,” Robertson said. [Source]
Mr. Robertson might not want to let Mrs. Robertson know you can get a divorce if your partner is brainless.
When it comes down to it though, how is Pat Robertson’s position much different from the view of divorce in Protestantism generally? Marrying after a civil divorce is pretty much totally accepted within Protestantism. If a Protestant want’s to get “remarried” there is pretty much no bar to going to any Protestant minister to perform a wedding. Their civil divorce could have been for pretty much any reason. Now of course talking about Protestantism in general means that there is bound to be one group or more that are an exception since practice is so varied.
Sure some will use scripture to defend divorce in the case of adultery, but pretty much once they had one exemption the reality is that there are no exemptions as practiced. There is no investigation into a marriage even for the supposed exemption.
One of the things that attracted me to the Catholic Church when I became a theist was the Church’s view of marriage. As an atheist I saw marriage as a “unto death” kind of thing even if I had nothing in atheist philosophy to build such and opinion on. While some might think that annulments are a form of Catholic divorce, they are founded on a valid principal even if the practice is not perfect. Only the Church treats marriage as seriously as is merited.
When you don’t have a Magisterium difficult cases are what drive the practice and the exceptions made open up endless exceptions. While we can easily see the effect in Protestantism it also applies to Orthodoxy where divorce is more and more accepted.
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I once expressed concerns to a Protestant friend about his plans to marry a divorced Catholic woman. He was assured, though, that it would be OK, since her previous divorce was “Biblical.” He, of course, decided this on his own. It’s easy to assume his objectivity may have been tainted.
It’s like Mark 10:1-12 isn’t in their Bibles.
How soon until we start hearing more use of the “a kind of death” argument?
I watched a Sunday Morning segment awhile back, where a reporter didn’t divorce his wife, but fell in love and moved his wife out (to a home) and his new love into their home.
http://oxyparadoxy.blogspot.com/2011/01/try-to-remember-vows-you-took.html
“Because of the hardness of your hearts Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so.”
An old friend of mine was an Episcopalian, divorced, and she and another divorced Episcopalian woman were very active in their church. According to her, the other woman’s husband had left her and their child for another woman. Lo and behold, after a while the ex-husband, his new wife, and their baby wanted to join the church (he had been a member before the divorce) and the priest let them! He said he wanted to “love everyone.” A church that does that has no moral compass. Not the “love everyone” part — the “come on hang out with the wife and kid yo abandoned, Mr. Adulterer! And bring the adulteress with you!” part. I never found out how that turned out…
So, so, so true
The Curt Jester writes : “Mr. Robertson might not want to let Mrs. Robertson know you can get a divorce if your partner is brainless.”
But since as you write protestants can divorce for any reason under the sun, then wouldn’t it follow that Robertson is actually limiting divorce?
The real repugnance appears to be the callous advice of it being acceptable to turn away from someone in need. And secondly the abrogation of duty taken on by the marriage vow.
A friend of mine belongs to a pentecostal denomination here in Canada that has followed the example of TEC. For the past few years his faith community has been voting out doctrine deemed too “harsh” for their congregations, e.g., teachings forbidding divorce and remarriage. For a “Bible believing” organization, his community seems to have turned a blind eye and deaf ear to its own creed. My buddy has expressed considerable confusion over changes which obviously contradict Scripture. He is not really dealing with the cognitive dissonance the doctrinal changes are creating, choosing instead to bury his head in the sand of a pipeline spirituality. For my part, when he does make mention of his concerns, I listen and propose the Catholic teaching presented in the Compendium of the Catechism.
Pray that he (Paul is his name) and his family may draw closer, not to other manmade organizations, but to the Church founded on Saint Peter by Jesus Christ, true God and true Man.
Praise and thanks be to God for the Magisterium of the Catholic Church!