Interesting that, in all the hysteria from the USCCB about ‘traditional’ marriage, this feature…‘temporary’ marriages is actually common in some sects of Islam. That’s ‘traditional’. So all the hyperbole about gays being ‘disordered’, etc is just so much nonsense compared to the ‘traditional’ views of marriage some religions have. It’s funny…gays actually have a more ‘traditional’ view of marriage than some ‘tradition’ based religions!

Yes, but who loses in the “traditional” Islamic marriage mentioned above? Women.
Protecting the lifelong covenant of marriage is (almost always) protecting the woman.

This may not sound very Catholic, but it becomes more & more obvious that the Church has less & less to gain and more & more to lose from her entanglements with the state on the matter of marriage. Starting with ez divorce and now including same-sex “marriage”, gov’t has become the vehicle for an ideology of marriage fundamentally opposed to the Christian and human institution. This false state ideology is clearly gaining ground rapidly, even among nominal Christians.
The current civil marriage is a de facto temporary arrangement, one that does not have the same binding force as a typical business contract. The Mexican proposal to own up to the weak nature of civil marraige has the advantage of simple honesty, but the disadvantage of going a step farther in state promotion of marital instability and infidelity. This disadvantage is mitigated in the case of a country like Mexico, however, where two separate ceremonies are required and everybody knows the gov’t is very anti-Catholic and not on the same page as the Church on anything.
We might be able set up a dividing wall between Christian marriage and the gov’t's pseudo-marriage by disassociating the two and encouraging the state to get out of the marriage business altogether. This is obviously far from the ideal of Catholic Social Teaching, but it may be the best we can do at the moment. It also dovetails with the libertarian approach of people like Ron Paul, who oppose SSM but who oppose federal involvement on Constitutional grounds.

For different reasons years ago I favoured leaving the State handle the marriage ceremonies to avoid the multiplication of annulments in Church Courts.  I asked a canon law global expert if today’s culture allowed a Catholic sacramental marriage and he said no. The culture for now makes it impossible for too many but we cannot decide whom ahead of time. The French bishops were refused a plan years ago to bless and then eventually declare a sacramental marriage, forget the steps. That concept makes sense pastorally. As noted here, the SSM and similar state approaches could work for whomever and we save our powder for a winnable battle and avoid being sued for not having the civil unions for them.

My mom told me an interesting story yesterday.  She has friends in their late 70’s who both lost their spouses and decided to move in together.  (They both helped the other with their respective spouses when they were in the final stages).  They did not want to live in sin, but definitely did not want to merge their two eventual estates and complicate the lives of their children. A complicated pre-nup was not worth the time. Solution: the local parish priest married them in their home and they never filed for civil marriage.

dch, what you propose is clandestine marriage, and it is usually very much frowned upon by the Church, and, as I recall, can only be done with the approval of the bishop for serious reasons. Perhaps that permission was obtained in this case.

In Nigeria, it is common for a couple to have three marriage ceremonies: Traditional, Civil and Church.
The Traditional highlights marriage as a union of two wider(extended) families and respects local traditions regarding dowries and exchange of gifts. It is not recognised by the Church as polygamy and divorce are traditionally legitimate. Those interested in a christian marriage will arrange for a church wedding as well.
Civil marriage gives marital status with respect to the law, and a civil marrage licence is obtained at a registry. It allows for divorce, but not polygamy.
It is interesting to see how all this plays out socially. Generally, a woman in a traditional marriage will aim for at least the legal protection of a civil marriage, and men in traditional or traditional/civl marriages hesitate before church wedding because they prefer to ‘keep thier options open’.
Marriage protects women, and their chilldren.

In response to drustee:
The Nigerian situation you refer to is very interesting, and something I have witnessed, as an outsider.
It does have a certain advantage. It appears to have sprung up as a de facto arrangement where the demands of culture and the demands of Faith were very difficult to reconcile. In that perspective, it might be relevant for Westerners today, in an increasingly hostile context.
It also has the strong disadvantage of leaving young African Catholics in a sort of limbo between traditional and Church weddings which sometimes lasts until death.
If we in the USA were to separate the civil and Church weddings in time as they do in Africa, the couples married at church after years of civil union would surely be more sincere in their commitment to the true meaning of marriage, but surely most Catholic couples would never make it to the altar.
Would it be a worthwhile trade-off?

The clandestine marriage above beats the common FL practice of older people “living in sin” when they do not wish to mess with SS, property and wills, etc. That priest is a smart man. The State’s involvement is strictly for property and civil matters which should rarely affect older people if they keep their civil business separate. That makes sense.

This was in FL. I have no idea if it was clandestine or not.  I just found it interesting to see how things get done sometimes. Her parish is filled with elderly widows so it must come up more often than most places.

I learned a lot from reading various comments as they ranged from misquoted Catholic teaching, various experiences in other cultures and some sound arguments re. traditional Catholic doctrine.We seem to be missing a more basic topic and that is the need to address two fundamnetal questions, the response to which will end the debate. These are: Are men and women capable of making lifelong commitments? and Does God even exist? and if the answer to this latter one is “yes”, why then do we doubt the “yes” in response to the first since He has freely entered into covents-the ultimate commitment- with mankind?

IRS tax returns are sometimes a challenge.  Of course the single parents are not a problem.  And the rule that “a married mother who has children but who has not lived with her husband for the last six months of the tax year” can file as “head of household” is not a problem.  The problem is people with no children that were married and never bothered to get a divorce.  Supposedly they should file as “married filing separately”, but the tax return wants to know the social security number of their spouse and most do not know it.  Fortunately, the IRS has no idea what the correct filing status really should be.  And the requirement that there be some kind of “coordination” between the husband and wife in a “community property” state like Texas cannot possibly be enforced.

Bottom line:  the US Government cannot possibly determine whether or not you are married and so effectively they don’t care.

“If it’s true that marriage is a contract that people are free to break as they wish”
Of course it’s true.  What can you possibly do about it?  The Shunning?

“The Catholic view of marriage is often derided as being punishing and inflexible because of the Church’s stance that divorce is an impossibility”
Amen.

“it seems that it’s only a matter of time until lawmakers start authoring similar bills here.”
Nah.  They have more important things to worry about.

A short-term, easy in/easy out marriage is a terrible prospect that completely undermines the point of the Sacrament!  There are enough situations in life that come up and make couples wonder how they’re ever going to get through something.  That would make it even easier not to try and work things out.  That’s precisely the problem with so many aspects of our culture today; people enter into relationships quickly, gauge their happiness, and think a quick, easy way out will make things tolerable enough until the going gets tough. 

In some ways, it’s like signing a pre-nuptial agreement.  You’re basically saying I’m committed to loving and being faithful to you as long as we both shall be content with this living situation, our finances, pets, children, jobs, and unless/until I find someone younger, more attractive and richer to run off with.

In response to ppeter:
In my experience, many young Catholic couples deal with the issue by having the Traditional and Church marriage ceremonies on consecutive saturdays, or the Traditional on a weekday and Church the following saturday. And so the years of delay you describe are certainly a personal choice.
Regarding your concern that many couples in the US would make just that choice, maybe look at it from another perspective: is the Church conferring this Sacrament on those who don’t actually want it/know what it is?
There is no easy solution, I agree, but we seem to have a problem at least in part because the meaning of Christian marriage has been lost.
The saying “if you want to get out of a hole, stop digging” comes to mind.

Trisha Niermeyer, spot on.  You’ve essentially summed up some of the fears I had before I got married.  But it was the Church’s emphasis on marriage being a Sacrament that forced me to look deeper:  that if God is truly calling me to marriage, then the Sacrament will provide the grace my husband and I need that is ours if we remember to ask for it.

Wow, it’s so sad when abject cynicism creeps into life and public policy.  Just….sad.

The increasing ease of divorce is insulting and condescending on the part of the state.  If I make a promise, the state should honor my word, hold me accountable to it, and make it painfully hard for me to get out it.  Instead, today’s laws assume very few of us are true to our word.

I pray that our country gains a higher regard for marriage and a better understanding of its purpose and its importance.  God bless all married people! 

Thank you Jen!

The ease of divorce is a secular matter. As I was told in another post, a marriage is forever in the eyes of the church. Why should it matter what non-Catholics do? Why not just expel homosexuals, divorce, but not annulled couples who remarry, and anyone else who chooses to act outside the church?

Con O Sullivan mentioned ipso facto excommunication when Catholics choose to do bad things. The divorce you are talking about is in the secular realm, not in God’s realm.

Heard about this last week and posted on my blog as well. (http://evangelizela.com/1832/) It’s like test driving your marriage. If he get’s tired of the nagging or she doesn’t like the smell of his dirty laundry, then they only have to live with it for two years! Ridiculous.

Seriously, getting a divorce is a painful experience and process. Why do you think people take it lightly? You seem to think non-Catholics just don’t want to be good and see everything as a convenience rather than a commitment. My sister is divorced and raising her son alone because it was impossible to tolerate her ex-husband’s mood swings and disappointment. He want nothing to do with her or his son. They had Catholic counseling and it did not help. Now she is much happier than she was before the divorce. Why should she have stayed and been miserable?

MBW & I married 56+ years ago.  We wanted to have children together and felt that, with God’s help, we could make lifetime commitments to each other.  We had good examples in this regard from our parents, and uncles and aunts who maintained decades of apparently loving marriages.
It helps if you have prayed together (hundreds of rosaries, in our case) before marriage; and if you continue to pray together when considering life-altering changes like husband accepting a new job a thousand miles away.
W/o grace and an active prayer life, it may not be possible.
When our youngest child became old enough to scavenge cereal & milk for herself on Saturday morning, we began going to Sat. a.m. Mass together, in addition to Sundays. 
We continue to pray for our four living adult children, twelve grandkids &  three great-grands.
TeaPot562

Jennifer, thank you so much for the link! :)

My daughters were quick to point out, when we discussed this, that having a man propose temporary marriage to you would be pretty lame.  And, of course, any such marriage would be invalid in the eyes of the Church.

@Ed…I think you may be missing the point. The Church (based on the teachings of Christ, in the gospel) is that once married sacramentally, a person is always married until one of them dies. They have vowed such before God. The Church acknowledges that there are times when spouses have to seperate, but that doesn’t mean there marriage is over - just in a new phase. They are called to continue loving (even from a distance) and praying there former spouse into heaven. As a married person (in God’s eyes, not just the Church’s) they are not free to re-marry. “Happiness” blows around like the wind; lasting joy comes from obedience to God. God Bless your family.

So, a life of unwilling celibacy because you married the wrong person? What if you want children?

I would love to just marry in the church, or just the sacramental marriage and not have a civil marriage, as most financial/personal considerations for marriage civily can be obtained by filing a legal doc, poa, trust, will, etc. plus they have domestic partner health insurance at my job, so nothing to lose there, But I am not sure if not having a civil marriage will be a protest against gov’t or sending a message that gov’t and secular society won by throwing in the towel.

Ed, there are a lot of things you don’t seem to get.  In your sister’s case, if she was married in the Church then she should have known what she was signing up for.  Even if she “married the wrong guy”, she knew that if she divorced civilly she would still be considered married in the eyes of God.  If there is evidence that her marriage was not valid in the eyes of God in the first place via the annulment process than she would be free to remarry.

Secondly, obedience to God is more important than our “wants”.  Single people are expected to be chaste and continent even they would prefer to be married and have kids.  Are they just being punished because they haven’t found the right person yet?  No, they are just being obedient within their situation in life….as we are all called to be.

“If there is evidence that her marriage was not valid in the eyes of God in the first place via the annulment process than she would be free to remarry.”
Hilarious “get out of jail free” card.
From Wikipedia: “In the Roman Catholic Church an annulment is the procedure, governed by the Church’s Canon Law and the Catechism, whereby an ecclesial tribunal determines the sacrament of marriage was invalidly entered into. An annulment determines the Catholic marriage to be void at its inception. A “Declaration of Nullity” is not a legal dissolution of an existing civil marriage, but rather a determination that the sacrament of marriage was not entered into validly.”
The husband was not thinking clearly when he married a Catholic?

So my sister is guilty of adultery in the eyes of the Catholic Church, and my sexual experiences also make me guilty because they were outside of marriage (as I said before, my current celibacy is based on inactive hormones rather than choice).
There are so many details that I don’t think I’d ever qualify to return to the church.
Its stuck in the Middle Ages when the church was at its most powerful. Catholic people must live in small communities because no one I know who goes to a Catholic church follows these rules.
I know several people who were married in the church and didn’t get an annulment when they divorced. I also know people are just “shacking up” and not getting married (yet).
I honestly don’t think it’s worth submitting myself to this kind of masochism just for a God or Pope who has no connection with the modern world.

I wonder how catholic minds in Mexico

I wonder how catholic minds in Mexico have become so perverted, unholy and anti-christian.  Let us pray for their understanding of Christ. May wisdom dwell in their hearts

The Bible and marriage ceremonies, as in the recent royal couple’s, proclaims that “What God has put together, let no (one) put asunder. The key is what GOD put together. There is a level of moral maturity, an awareness that is fully human, and a freedom from compulsion, addiction or underlying false motive demanded for a marriage in God’s eyes which as Galatians 5 says is like Jesus’ love for His Church. IF hyou accept the messy human legal system to decide property in marriage, the validity of other contracts, then why not accept the human more gentle method of an annulment process. That has one aim: to decide if this man or woman or both were capable of entering into a marriage that was open to children and to be permanent. No magic or mystery-  a human effort to seek the truth in a non-adversarial way that lawyers do in criminal trials or divorce court.

All these rules are as effective as Prohibition (of alcohol) the more they are forbidden the more people will want to do it. That’s why the church is loosing members. The Catholics I know who are using some kind of contraception because their families are big enough for them are all sinners according to this site. What did you expect?

A lot of people lie also, fornicate and commit adultery and hit their spouses and get drunk and drive drunk.  Jesus is LORD, also knows the heart we do not, cares not about opinion polls

Just read an older post and wish to 1. thank the post-er re the prayer and sacrifice for the long marriage, I see olympic hopefuls and ordinary people training six days a week or others for long hours on weekends and after school/work for a medal or championship.  Marriage demands no less. 2. As for the spouse’s mood swings he was not capable of a marriage contract spiritually emotionally. 3 A TEMPORARY marriage was not proposed, the idea was an effort to allow people time to see if their commitment to a civil ceremony for life would show that they were in fact in a union that GOD HAD PUT TOGETHER. Not shacking up, actual commitment.

If it gives them license to have sex during the temporary civil marriage, they will be sinners in the eye of the Catholic church and will have to go though all that repentance crap. Also, if they are not a union Got put together, they wouldn’t be virgins when they did marry in the Church. I guess there will be lots more ipso facto excommunications.

My error: the original idea was a church blessing, witness the marriage but not declare it sacrament until later IF it is clear God did the union for a “ready” couple. Very rare in today’s culture.See the post I did re athletes versus people working at their marriage and the post on here from the lady describing there.

Barbara C:
I think the case with my divorced sister is that both she and her husband decided to “not be Catholic” in the circumstances of their divorce. Living with each other was intolerable, as was living without loving someone else. I think the same applies to Catholics who use contraception, are homosexual, and have sex or live with a partner without getting married. The are simply being “disobedient” while remaining “Christian”. Anne Rice is similar in that she tried to return to her childhood Catholicism after she gave up atheism. After a couple of years, she renounced her Catholicism because she found devoted Catholics to be a hate group with doctrines and activities she could not accept.
Catholicism just asks too much from people and that is why it is loosing members.

Ww all need to find spiritual guidance from people who know the faith,  the Church’s laws and theology with a compassionate heart. It is a possible option if we search and discern. It is also not for any of us to judge others’ conduct - as the old Native American saying goes walk in the other’s mocassins before judging. MYOB Jesus says, HE sees the heart, we rip others apart often in the name of God or Allah and Jesus has His harshest words for such words and attitudes.  We of course are not off the hook. I referred to today’s athletes’ training regimen.  Paul uses the image of the athlete with the grass crown while we are too self-centred to do any serious work on our relationships.

If Jesus/God sees the heart, what is the point of going to church? Maybe fellow Catholics don’t judge, but the Pope and the Vatican certainly do. Did Jesus make the Pope his representative, or his dictator?

ED; Did you not learn the difference between objective and subjective. The former is what one sees externally- a women is driving way past the speed limit- crime. She is trying to bring her child to the emergency room of the hospital. Ahhhhh,
The Church teaches that if and if and if- that is objectively sinful, un-biblical, not WWJD. HE decides the guilt, we can examine, take evidence, ask witnesses and make the best judgment. Civil, criminal and Church courts. The Church does not use the adversial greedy lying lawyer approach. Truth, justice and charity prevail.

See my post on the “Why Virginity Matters” topic. I’ve had discussions with Sister Terese and others about my view of Catholicism and my trouble with it’s ideals.
The Catholic faith is looking less and less like something I can live with.

Ed Jesus told us His yoke- wooden piece that ties two animals together to plough/plow is easy and His burden is light, humanly speaking it is apparently not. He is the Son of the Abba/Daddy who sent Him to save and free us and the Holy Spirit gives the Grace to bear it. Sin of whatever stripe may be “fun” but it empties our souls and makes us sad and addicted for the next rush -  in the long run we die slowly.

HermitTalker:
In the long run, we die anyway. I understand addiction, sadly, But much of what is considered sin is not addictive—e.g. marriage after divorce, not agreeing with all the church’s demands, etc. I know many Christians (not all Catholics) that know nothing of the natural world because they spend all their time occupied with serving their church. The world God created for us should be enjoyed and preserved.
Maybe I just don’t have the grace to be part of the church.

But I say unto you, That whosoever shall put away his wife, saving for the cause of fornication, causeth her to commit adultery: and whosoever shall marry her that is divorced committeth adultery” (Matthew 5: 32) and, “9: And I say unto you, Whosoever shall put away his wife, except it be for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery: and whoso marrieth her which is put away doth commit adultery” (Matthew 19: 9)

Why are you posting passages from the Bible? Did you have a stroke or something?

The word porneia in the Greek of Mt 19 above is not fornication, nor the older word adultery. It is not “pornography” either despite the spelling but an illegal-moral union that had a specific meaning in Jewish law.

The absolute ban on divorce by Jesus was a restoration of the Law when Moses allowed exceptions which were so loose by Jesus’ time that burning toast - when women did all the housekeeping and the cooking! - was a ground for it. The porneia exception, which was misunderstood as noted above was totally mis-applied. St Paul allowed divorce for the spouse of an unbeleiver due ro major religious conflict. What God has put together as I said earlier is key, some men and women are emotionally incapable of committing to buying a car due to irresponsible immaturity which is why after a Catholic annulment a second marriage is not always recommended.

I probably should not,partly by way of correction of one post above,that divorce itself is not automatically banned by the Catholic Church unless a spouse is trying to avoid legitimate moral or financial support.
Re-marriage demands ethical and spiritual counsel, an annulment process if the marriage can be challenged. That happens if at the time of the ceremony one or both parties was incapable of a permanent commitment open to having children. From the beginning, important.

Tribunals are not getting tougher on granting annulments.  They are getting fewer petitions for annulments, probably due to divorced Catholics cohabitating and not bothering with annulments.  Since 1964 the tribunals have consistently ruled for annulment in about 97 percent of the cases they accept.  Seventy percent of annulments worldwide are accounted for by American marriage tribunals though the U.S. has a mere six percent of the world’s Catholic population.  So prevalent has been the granting of annulments, that they are often referred to as Catholic divorces.
This is why the tribunals want the civil divorce to occur first – the grounds for which annulments are granted are often so flimsy and the evidence tendered so laughable (often with no chance for the other party to rebutt this evidence), that should actual divorce lawyers in a civil case get access to it they could have a field day.  It would undermine the entire tribunal process.  Can’t have that - there are powerful incentives to keep the present tribunal system going,  so better to insist that people be divorced civilly, first.  Granted, civil divorce is also permitted for essentially no reason (no fault), so it’s not like anyone is being held to a high standard.

So, here’s the truly laughable part.  Most people pursue an annulment when they want to remarry in the Church.  Their divorce may have been many years ago.  So, these tribunals will grant an annulment stating that this person or that just should not have married, they didn’t know what they were doing, they have some problem, they aren’t marriage material, whatever.  Then, the Church allows that person to turn right around months (or weeks, or even days) later and get married again!  Wait…..I thought they had some limitation that made them unable to be married?  Oh…..I see….

Not accurate. The annulment process insists that the two or one of the two was incapable of permanent commitment and open to childrenm., not that he farted in bed or she watched daytime TV. Faults, irritating habits do not count. The civil divorce takes care of proiperty and children, the State’s concern as to that aspect of the original marriage(s) the couple has to be free otherwise bogamy is the charge if Mamma Church gets an annulment without it. As to re-marriage, the couple has to show enough freedom psychologically to re-marry, not always easy to poredict but the FOCCUS assessment instrument, Eng. Encounter and couples who are securely married counsel also. 1940-60s there was automatic marriage for pregnancy and a lot of GI marriages war plays hell with mind and marriage as we know today so imagine a farm boy and his g/f facing his going off to fight in Flanders Field, not much awareness of a permanent union. Many girls escaping from home, little education or no job opportunities. parents pushing them, so ...... Use common sense. “Grace builds on Nature.”

I’d guess anyone who got married and didn’t want children would automatically no longer be a Catholic. Yuck!

Christian: To cite Sarah Palan in another context “You betcha.” The Jewish Bible and the Catholic Church,  the Orthodox Church Evangelicals and Orthodox Jews and who else oppose barrier and chemical methods of birth control. Marriage is a sacrificial commitment. Human sexuality is a gift for the common good, not a personal playground. The abuse of that gift demeans women, hurts children and ruins a lot of lives of men and women and torpodeos many marriages. Check the stats., ignore the Planned Parenthood’s and extreme Leftists’ propaganda including the general media. Please,  I read it all and am so happy the Gospel of Life has growing support.

First of all, regardless of anyone’s interpretation, God knows your heart and God didn’t put people together literally or join them together except in a sacrament or civil union or union between two people who have chosen to be in a monogomous relationship and/or cohabitate.  People choose a relationship for all sorts of wrong reasons, sometimes its a huge mistake that nobody can recognize until the “marriage” takes place and then one discovers what they got into.  There is no way the God I know expects an abused (physical,emotional or otherwise) to remain in the relationship or marriage and He certainly does not expect the person who fled the abuse to remain single the rest of his or her life…..Pray and learn to discern what God speaks to you personally in addition to words that were spoken so long ago ... don’t you think God is smart enough to discern his own creation ?  Atleast consider that everyone’s prayers are answered and everyone can be connected and have grace to hear from God, not just the Catholic Church or the Pope or Billy Graham or any other know it all with word from the HOly Spirit.  I have the Holy Spirit in me and so do you and I pray you’ll all tap into that along with what you interpret from all the sources where we’re fed what the bible is REALLY saying to all of us sinners.  Use the gifts God has given you. It is after all a relationship between three right ?!

P.S.  THANK YOU GOD for the priest mentioned at the beginning of this conversation who married a couple in their home to avoid the agony of man created laws which cripples his people sometimes.

dlynn You sound infallible, ou listen in your heart and do that:  so to heck with the Pope, Jesus’ Church, Dr Billy Graham and other know it alls. So you area also a know it all. Suggest you join militant Islamists and see what extreme readings of the Ku’ran can do. Alternately you could read Jesus and Paul and 2100 years of reflection on marriage and zip your own private reading of the Bible with your own pet Holy Spirit as guide.  The POTUS of the USA who is a Christian favours same gender unions for the US and women killig their babies in the womb or turned around to have the baby half out of the mother by crushng their skulls. He is a know it all also,  law degree from Harvard and professor of law. As for me I stick with the 2100 Teaching of the Church AND the h. Spirit’s guidance of it.

The “temporary marriage” trend has been around for a very long time.  Divorce is a generational problem as well.  My grandparents divorced, my parents also divorced, most of my first and second cousins are divorced.  Marriage is work, it’s not easy, and to be so dependent on a “loving feeling” to make a marriage work is foolish.  Love isn’t just a fluffy feeling, it is a choice you make every day for the rest of your life.

It sounds like it would just be a huge hassle for those of us who still want to stay married.  Waste of time and money to have to “update” every 2 years!  Think of it this way, I am a young woman and have been married 8 years, I would’ve had to update it 4 times already.  I was planning on possibly a vow renewal at year 10 - but every 2 years?  How irritating! 

The more and more crap the government throws at us the more I wish that libertarians could break off and start their own country.  I know one rich guy who is trying to do it but I doubt he will have much success.

Katie: Every day we make a re-commitment to our promises and vows. Not a formal renewal as in 25 years or ten but nevertheless necessary through various gestures including praying together. The civil government’s role is to preserve the civil order which of course today is shattered by co-habitation. Then casual sex which is more or less common deepending on the fear of STDs.
For all of us, Paul uses the image of the athlete. You have seen or heard of or taken part in the intense discipline of a team or an athlete six days a week, constant practice and discipline so she can win a medal or the team a championship. When it comes to the spirituality of marriage or living a decent Christian life we are not as faithful so we have so much divorce, abuse, disease and broken heartds minds and bodies. prayer as a family more than the rushed meal prayer, but taking time to share at the heart level, then prayer as a couple at night time would help a lot. “The Family that prays together stays together” was Fr Patrick Peyton’s famous slogan which was valid then and still is.