THE CHURCHES AND SOCIAL REFORM.

Otago Witness, Issue 3511, 28 June 1921, Page 5

THE CHURCHES AND SOCIAL REFORM.

MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE

AN APOLOGIA

By

J. MacGregor,

M.A., M.L.C.

The apathy and indifference of comfortably, if not happily, married people to the sufferings of tliose who have been less fortunate in their matrimonial ventures can only be paralleled by the fanatic cruelty produced by another superstitious belief mainly due to another text of Scripture: “Thou shaft not suffer a witch to live.” In a sermon preached by the (Anglican) Bishop of Dunedin last year, at the time of the agitation over the Divorce Bill and the legislation arising out of certain teachings and practices of the Roman Catholic Church, there was much that was calculated to justify sucli people in their indifference to the miseries of others. Here is one charming. passage : “ When in our marriage service the priest declares that the contracting paities are man and wife, in the name of the Father and cf the Sou and the Holy Spirit ; and when, using the very words of our Lord, h? says, ' 't hose who God hath joined together let no man put asunder,’ he says in effect that God has joined man and wife sacramentally through the Church; the union is indissoluble; the spiritual blessing is given. ' What words,’ says an -early writer, ‘can I find to express the happiness of that marriage which the Church knits together, and the Eucharistic Oblation confirms, and a Benediction seals? The angels report it in Heaven, and their Heavenly Father ratifies it.’ ’’ Well might the comfortably married women who listened to such a sermon appreciate the difference between their own marriages and those celebrated before a mere Presbyterian minister, who is not able to say that God had joined the parties together sacramentally through the Church. As for marriage before tiio registrar, they would regard it as not even respectable. Let us test this Sacramental conception of marriage by the experiences of an English vicar as related by himself recently : “As a vicar of a parish I have to publish any banns of marriage that may be put in, so long as they are legally right, though I may know of my own knowledge that they are morally wrong. Furthermore, I have to wed in their parish church all and sundry, provided they conform to legal requirements, athough I may again know of my own know-ledge that the marriage is not morally right—nay. more than that, namely, that cither or both of the contracting parties have no religious sense or idea of the spiritual side of the ceremony. Again, I marry a couple in my dual capacity of an official of the State and an officer of the Church. The first part of the ceremony, customarily taken outside the chancel, is the legal part, whilst the latter part, usually taken within the chancel, is the solemnisation of the marriage. Now, I am neither ashamed nor afraid to confess that on three occasions I have ‘ braved ’ any possible ecclesiastical wrath by taking the first part only of the service, and under the following circumstances: —Once when the man and the woman had already had four illegitimate children, and I induced them to allow me to put their cohabitation in legal order (for nothing would induce either of them to go to the registrar’s office). The othej two cases were when the man had ' got the woman into trouble.’ and I induced the man to ‘ make an honest woman of ’ liis paramour.” Now, one wonders whether the angels reported those marriages in heaven, and whether they were entered in t lie Celestial register, and, if not, why not? \\ as it because of the immorality of the parties or because the marriages were celebrated outside the chancel? In the passage quoted above from the bishop’s sermon two points should be especially noticed: (1) That be gave his hearers to understand that the words, “ Those whom God hath joined together let no man 'put asunder,” are the very words spoken iiy Jesus; (2) that the meaning of the service is that God has joined man and wife sacramentally, and that conse juently the marriage is indissoluble. Evidently the bishop s object was to show that Christ’s words were intended as a law declaring marriage indissoluble; hence his anxiety to make it appear that in that sentence we have the very words of Christ, a proposition that is in the highest degree disputable as the bishop must know, unless he is quite ignorant cf modern Biolical criticism Milton discussed the question in one of his tracts on Divorce, where he points out that a few casual words of Christ’s upon a Jcwisn custom submitted to him for observation were not intended to form a legal code. Many eminent divines from Cranmer to the pies, nt day have endorsed this view, mid yet the Anglican Church us a body continues to repeat the parrot cry of the iniquity of divorce and of the binding effect of a few disputed words, which Gibbon refers to as “ flexible, to any interpretation which the wisdom of a legislator demands.” Supposing that Jesus did intend to laydown a law for future generations, how are we to account for the fact that, whilst recognising the right of the husband to divorce his wife, He says not a word that would give to the wife a reciprocal right. Can it have been an oversight ? But, indeed, any such intention i- surely inconceivable, for, if anything is certain regarding Jesus, itis that 11c expected Ills own generation to see the end of all things. What, then, is the real foundation (I do not say the origin) of this dogma of indissolubility It is to he found in the Roman Catholic Canon Law which Luther burnt at. Wittenberg in 1520 and which was some years later (1563) finally reaffirmed and made positive law by the Council of Trent, when the whole subject of marriage and divorce was placed under ecclesiastical jurisdiction. As the canons relating to marriage were applied to New Zealand in ISOS by the promulgation here of the No Temoro Decree, which received so much attention during the parliamentary session of 1920, it may be worth while quoting a little of it. Here is a paragraph from the preamble: “The first parent of the human race, moved by the Divine Spirit, pronounced the bond of marriage ]>erpetual and indissoluble when be said: ‘This is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh : for which cause a man shall leave his father and his mother and shall cleave to his wife, and they twain shall lie one flesh.’ ” Now, outside of the Roman Catholic Church there are probably few clergymen who do not now admit that “the first parent of the human race ” is simply a myth, and the whole story of the Garden of Eden a

,aoiu. ai. canon ui vv esumnsler is itqyoiteu to nave saia a snort tune ago uidi, so lar aa iie was a ware, no iNOubOnioriiusc divine, no senoiar nor eminent man ox science, Xxas come ioruaru 10 assert mat me tan oi man is an nisioiicai lact. ine lVioaern touurcnxnau, tne organ ol tile p-uigncan) Guurclimen s union, says: “Dike canon i*irnes, tue modem cuurenpaan jiegarus me ran story as a mytn: tile arte oi ixiiowlecige, uie talking serpent, and tile seraph wnn the fiery sword are notion, not lact.” I ourect special attention to tue iact that the passage quoted nom tne Decree is a part ot tne preamble to a taw of the noman Catfioiie Oiiureh stating the reason and intent oi tflat law; and tiiat reason is that the (fictitious) first parent of the human race in the (fabulous) Garden ol Lden pronounced the bond oi marriage perpetual and indissoluble ! I have already referred to Pothier as having described the arguments in support of tiie sacramental idea of marriage as frivolous, and 1 leave it to the reader to form his own opinion on the reasons stated by the Council ot Trent for its law of indissolubility. But I may be reminded of the fact that only a part of the preamble has been quoted. Tile preamble proceeds thus: “And that by this bond alone cun two be united, Christ taught more clearly when quoting. He said those last words as if given forth by God: ‘And so already they are not twain but one flesh,’ and forthwith with these words did Christ confirm the fixity of that botid so long before announsed by Adam, ‘What, therefore, God hath joined together let not man put asunder.’ ” If the reader will take the trouble to refer to the passage in the second chapter of Genesis and compare it with the passage in the nineteenth chapter of Matthew- ho will find that the words referred to by Jesus as having been* spoken by Gcd are, in Genesis, put into the mouth of Adam. Now, we know for certain that Adam is a myth, and that the story of Eden is fabulous; but, in the passago of Matthew, Jesus is represented as replying to the Pharisees thus: “Have ye not read, that he which made them from the beginning rnacTe them male and female and said, “For this cause shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and the twain shall become one flesh !” It would appear, then, that if this text is authentic, Jesus accepted as historical fact what we know for certain to be mere fable, and that, on the strength of a fable and a myth which He mistook' for historical fact He proceeded to lay down a law binding for all time, and that Tie intended therein- to declare marriage to be forever indissoluble ! The probability seems to be tha.t the passage is an ecclesiastical interpolation, as verses 10, 11, and 12 of the same chapter are commonly believed to be, and as verso IS of chapter xvi must be believed to he by- Protestant theologians, although their unreasoning faith in the dogma of Scriptural infallibility may prevent them from saying so. How much better it would have been if they had long ago met the claims of Romo with a hold denial that Jesus ever uttered the fatal words: “Thru art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church” —words which consecrated sacerdotal despotism. and held Christendom bound in ecclesiastical fetters for more than a thou sand years, just as the text with which I have been dealing has barred for centuries the path of reform, and caused infinite misery. There is another consideration which should weigh with one in considering whether the passage in question is an interpolation or not, .and that is the mischievous nature of verse 5 (of chapter xix): “For this cause shall a mac leave his father and mother,” etc. I haven’t the least objection to this sentiment being attributed to Adam, as it is in Genesis, but when Jesus is represented as adopting it I say, “Interpolation !’’ In Genesis it may be nothing more than a reference to the Arab custom of the Beena that leads a man, when he marries a woman belonging to another patriarchal family, to leave his own family .and join that to which the woman belongs. But as attributed to Jesus it becomes a precept which probably millions of men have seized upon as an excuse for neglecting their aged parents. It is an interesting question by what amount it lias increased the sum required for old-age pensions in England. And yet, if the bishop is right, it follows that in this cabalistic text we have the very words of Jesus 1