"The only thing that could make our situation weirder is if my parents got divorced again," I half-joked to a close family friend while delivering the news that after nearly thirty years of being divorced, my parents were getting civilly married. Again. To each other. They had never received an annulment, so in the eyes of the Church, they had always been sacramentally married.
I grew up knowing no other kids of divorced couples when I was little, then a few families in junior high, and a number more in high school looked like mine. Often their parents had gone on to re-marry so they had either step-siblings or half-siblings. The fabrics of our families grew in sometimes unusual directions, with one friend whose parents had divorced and remarried, twice, to different people.
When the Sadducees say that Jesus has "answered well" and then they dare not ask Him any more questions (Luke 20:40), I have to squint a little longer at His answer. I don't quite get it all. The Lord of the living. The no marriage in the afterlife. What the coming age and resurrection of the dead look like. And, of course, I'm also not a scholar of the law like those Sadducees.
But what I do get is that God has restored, perfected relationships for us in Heaven. The messy relationships and confusing zig-zagging of sacramental marriages and civil marriages, the deep pain of divorce, are not part of His plan for us when we are in the beatific vision, worshipping in His presence for all eternity.
If your family has a story that's less than straight-forward, if you're neck-deep in the brokenness of broken people, if you've been the hidden victim in a family narrative that's equally hidden, I just want to offer this: take it to Our Living Lord in prayer. Find your way to the Sacraments. Talk to a trusted, faithful priest. There is also healing here in this life.
God has restored, perfected relationships for us in Heaven. // @WholeParentingClick to tweet
Read this blog post on myths about Catholic divorce.
Nell O’Leary is the Managing Editor for Blessed is She, an attorney turned writer, speaker, and editor while tending to her husband and five kiddos. She also facilitates our community groups as she loves helping women find sisterhood. Her undergrad is in English from University of Minnesota and her J.D. from Ave Maria School of Law. Notably, she can down a hot cocoa in two seconds. Find out more about her here.
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