The Question is Coming

Living Faith 8.2 and 8.3

We rarely stop and give thanks to John Calvin, one of the founding theologians in the Presbyterian tradition, for the gift of divorce. We should. After lying dormant for centuries, blanketed in Roman Catholic sacramental theology, Calvin reintroduced divorce into law. Long before divorce was legally available to most Canadians, Calvin brought it to 16th – century Geneva.

It may seem strange to celebrate this fact. Living Faith certainly doesn’t. It takes a more negative view of divorce. “When a marriage is shattered beyond repair, it is sometimes better that it be dissolved than that the family continue to live in bitterness” (8.2.5). The end of a marriage in divorce is painful and while at times necessary it is only justifiable to avoid even greater pain. No couple willingly and knowingly enters into marriage so that they can divorce; divorcees recognize both the necessity and the pain of the end of their marriage. We all recognize, along with Living Faith, the genuine suffering caused by divorce, and therefore celebrating Calvin’s reintroduction of it seems odd, maybe even wrong.

Living Faith, in line with thousands of years of Christian tradition, captures at least three aspects of marriage. These three aspects, or more traditionally “goods,” may compete with each other and we may have to make difficult choices to privilege one over the others at different times. Calvin privileged one aspect of marriage and by doing so attempted to alleviate economic hardship and relieve suffering.

The first “good” of marriage is children. While the New Testament has an ambivalent relationship to families, and Living Faith recognizes that “marriage is not God’s will for everyone,” (8.2.2) the Christian tradition affirms the important role that parents play in the lives of children. It is a good of marriage to be “the means of creating new life” (8.2.3) and for parents “to raise their children within the covenant community” (8.2.4). Second, marriage is for companionship, an emotional connection that provides “mutual joy and comfort” (8.2.3). However, Living Faith is silent on the third good of marriage. Traditionally, marriage has been for partners to help each other economically. Secular society recognizes this by enshrining it in the tax code where married couples file differently than single people. Living Faith does not recognize this good, which is a shame since it was the main reason Calvin reintroduced divorce.

Historically, a largely agrarian subsistence economy depended on large and strong families. It was an economic necessity to bind yourself to another, and given the patriarchy of the time, it was even more important for a woman to do so. In Calvin’s time, to be officially married a couple needed to have sex and exchange vows but the order was not set. Unscrupulous men would woo women, sleep with them, deny it publically and disappear, leaving their “bride” to face the consequences of shame and possible pregnancy.

Because a child made it obvious to all that the woman had sex and was therefore married, the woman bore the brunt of the economic deprivation. She neither had a husband around nor could she remarry because there was no way of ending her consummated marriage. Calvin recognized this conflict and re – introduced divorce to help women who had been duped into sex and were therefore economically marginalized. He took the command to look after the poor, the widows, and the children seriously and needed a legal way to let women remarry. Divorce was his solution.

Studies show that even today we do better economically as a couple, but Living Faith’s silence on the matter mirrors our broader culture; few people today get married for economic reasons. People generally marry because they love another person, because they feel a deep emotional connection to them. Divorce denies the second good of marriage—companionship—in the deepest way.

I highlight divorce even though it is not the main thrust of Living Faith’s understanding of family because it may point the way forward for the Presbyterian Church. Neither Calvin nor Living Faith with their different emphases are wrong about what marriage is. Both stand within a broader theological framework tied to our understanding of God and our lived experience of family. Both start on theological grounds but come to different practical conclusions.

Calvin’s view may challenge our implicit theological understandings of what marriage or family are. Today we have lifted up one good of marriage over others, like Calvin lifted up economic justice, and this fact should force us to acknowledge that our practice and our theological understanding of family changes over time.

I am not making an argument for or against any particular position but we would be naïve not to note that Living Faith contends that marriage is between a “man and a woman” (8.2.3). At some point in our future together as the Presbyterian Church in Canada, we will once again discuss and debate that formulation. We will ask, “Should we change Living Faith to include same – sex couples?” The question of same – sex marriage is coming. Before it does we would do well as a denomination to establish what we really mean theologically when we say “family.” The first question for us as the church is not about “same sex” but about what is “marriage.”