Strange counsel on the dissolution of marriage

[Robert Hegwood]

I'm really hoping for some knowledgeable insight, esp from a priest if one reads this. An acquaintence of mine on another forum had a question about Orthodoxy that related to a situation a friend of his encountered a few years ago. The story he told sounded very odd to me, and I wondered (assuming the story is sufficiently complete as told) if this is standard Orthodox spiriutal counsel...or something else. Here follows what he told me. Can someone make any sense out of the spiritual counsel the priest he cites gave:


A little over 10 years ago a long-time friend, a believing Jew, who had been married for 20 years in a non-denom charismatic church went thru a real trauma. She was feeling "dry" in her walk (we all have been there) and started attending a womens bible study in their neighborhood. It was run by a woman from a local orthodox congregation (I am not sure which orthodox, there is a large greek and a smaller, either syrian or russian congregation near there) who took an interest in her and suggested she meet with a priest. She did. After a few sessions, the priest convinced her that she was living in sin and this dry period was God calling her back to Himself. Since she married a Jew, and they were married in a renegade congregation, she had actually been in fornication for 20 years. She was not married at all in the "eyes of the church." She must disolve this civil union and enter a convent to atone. After a year in the convent she could marry a good Orthodox man but must not have contact with her former husband or her children of fornication.

My friend talked to the priest and went up the chain to the national HQ of the denomination. No one would help him.

Would someone please explain to me what happened and why? Why would the church just break up an otherwise good marriage?

[Father David Moser]

The strange thing (to me) is that the woman in question wasn't even Orthodox - but a "believing Jew" and her only contact with the Orthodox Church was this friend who ran an independent Bible study. Now if this person had been a baptized Orthodox Christian who had fallen away - well then I could understand the advice, but not for someone who was not already Orthodox.

If this woman were not already Orthodox but decided to become Orthodox as a way of drawing nearer to God, well then that's fine - and we then must take into account the Apostle Paul's injunction that a person who comes to the Church but who is married to an unbelieving spouse should remain with that unbelieving spouse if the spouse is willing and that through the believer the spouse might also come to be saved. If that's the case, then all the stuff after that in the advice doesn't make sense.

OTOH, if this person was an Orthodox Christian who had fallen away and married a non-Orthodox person outside the Church then she would have cut herself off from the sacramental life of the Church. She would indeed (in the eyes of the Church) be "living in sin" in that she would be living with a man without the sacrament of Holy Matrimony. The only way to "make it right" would be to have a Church Marriage. The sticking point would be that she married a Jew, since such a marriage could not be consecrated within the Church - her husband would first have to become Orthodox himself. So she is basically "stuck" with two very difficult options - either she loves her marriage more than she loves God and remains outside the Church or she loves God more than her marriage and returns to the Church but is required to abandon her marriage.

The part about going to a convent and having no contact with her ex and her children falls into the category of pastoral direction and without being the spiritual father of this person and knowing all that he knew (including the prompting of the Holy Spirit) I would not dare to counter his advice - perhaps this is exactly what was necessary, I just don't know (although on the surface it does seem a bit on the extreme side - but then extreme medicine is sometimes necessary).

Fr David Moser

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

I agree with what Fr David has said about this including his hesitancy about judging what was pastoral direction. I would have a personal hesitancy about doing anything that leads to the break-up of a marriage. But not being the spiritual father it's impossible to know the details.
In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Robert Hegwood]

Fathers

Bless. Thank you very much for your insight. It was pretty much what I was thinking, but I wanted better authority on such things than my own very limited and perhaps poorly instructed experience.

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear All,

I am not a priest or member of the clergy, just an Orthodox layman. My mother is of Orthodox Christian Greek-Cypriot origin, and my father was an agnostic English Jew when he met her. They fell in love, and my father converted to Orthodox Christianity in order to marry my mother.

Had it been the other way around, had my mother married my father in a registry office, would I have been a "child of fornication"? Does God, the knower of human hearts, abandon people and stain children with abusive labels? Or is that more of a human pastime?

The Church has her rules for good reasons. I'm not arguing against them, or expressing an opinion (God forbid) on something I know nothing about, namely the counsel given by the spiritual father in Robert's posting above. What I am saying is that above and beyond Church guidelines there may be an order of things we do not understand, which are not ours to praise or condemn. Why are there Jews, Muslims, Hindus, heretics in the world? On one level we know they do not possess the protection of our One True God, and pray that they may receive clarity of sight and be saved; on another level perhaps, God only knows why, and surely there is space in His Heart even for "them"?

In humility
Byron

[Eleftheria]

Byron,
Some food for thought...
From the Parakleisis to the Theotokos,
"By the Holy Spirit, EVERY soul is made living, is exalted and made shining by the Threefold Oneness in a hidden manner."
Clearly, this phrase means that there is no distinction made between faiths or non-faiths, only that EVERY soul is cared for by the Holy Spirit.
In Christ,
Eleftheria

[David Waggoner]

I am the OP and it seems my post somehow lost a line in the quoted section. The Jewish friend was the husband. I met her in the dorms before they started dating and she was definately not "fallen away" in any sense. I do not know if she had been raised Orthodox. He was raised in reform Judiasm and had come to salvation in Christ in college. They were married in a non-denominational church.

[Father David Moser]

Byron,

"Had it been the other way around, had my mother married my father in a registry office, would I have been a "child of fornication"? " Only if your father had the very unfortunate chance of being named "fornication"

"surely there is space in His Heart even for "them"? " As we read in our scripture and repeat in our prayers frequently "(God) is the Lover of Mankind and desires that no man perish but that all be saved."

David,
"I do not know if she had been raised Orthodox. He was raised in reform Judiasm and had come to salvation in Christ in college. They were married in a non-denominational church."
It still comes down to the question of whether she was Orthodox when she was married? If she was and chose to marry outside the Church then she is still "fallen away" from the Church. In this case the only way to make the situation "right" is for the husband to convert to Orthodoxy and to have a Church wedding.

Fr David Moser

[Byron Jack Gaist]

Dear Eleftheria,

Thank you for your reply to my posting. It seems you understand well what I was trying to say.

In Christ
Byron

[Eleftheria]

oops, that should read,
@By the Holy Spirit, every soul is made living, is exalted and made shining, through purification, by the Threefold Oneness in a hidden manner.@}

[David Waggoner]

Perhaps she was raised Orthodox.

Any proposed "fixes" for that marriage are moot at this point as she spent her year in a convent and then married someone else afterward. To my knowledge, the option of him joining the Orthodox church and then restating vows was never brought up. Of course I am not privy to all the details of someone else's marriage, but knowing how much he loved her, how much effort he put into his appeal process and how devestated he was by what happened, I am sure that option would have been explored had it been brought to the table.

Thank you for your answers. It has been a help.