Folia Canonica 11. (2008)
STUDIES - George D. Gallaro: Oikonomia and Marriage Dissolution in the Christian East
114 GEORGE D. GALLARO were admitted by the Church and a second marriage was tolerated. There is no contradiction in this. The Christian ideal is the absolute indissolubility because such is the image of the supernatural mystery proposed to the believer. But everyday life shows that this reality is not always achievable. So at this point we must ask ourselves: are we to consider all the couples who fail to achieve the full ideal to be outside of the Christian faith? After all, the Eastern practice does not differ much from the practice of the West nowadays. The difference consists in the fact that the West, by identifying the sacrament with a contract, is able to declare null and void marriages that took place and continued only because a clause of a purely social and non-theological nature has not been observed either fully or in part. A mere juridical view of marriage can allow all this to happen. For the Christian East all those marriages declared null are almost always valid because it is not the contractual aspect that is the constitutive element of the sacrament but the symbolic/mystical element of the mystery of the Word Incarnate. A marriage contracted “for a limited time”, a polygamous marriage, a marriage between homosexuals or between persons strictly related by blood or affinity are all null, because they do not distinguish the two natures in the Word made man. Faced with the demands of faith and the exigencies of human nature after original sin, the Church cannot but appeal to divine mercy and apply economy in imitation of God’s action who always applied it in similar cases. When Church accepts divorce in individual culpable cases, she maintains the principle of indissolubility of marriage without eliminating it altogether. She is aware that a culpable act has taken place due to one or both of her members, her children. The Church, as custodian of the sacred state/character of marriage, punishes such children for their detestable act. And to show that they have done an unspeakable act against the faith, she keeps them away from the Eucharist, but only for a time, because the Church is for salvation not for condemnation. However, when a crime has taken place, for instance, adultery, homicide, abandonment of spouse, it is evident that the sacramental and supernatural aspect of the iconic union of the Word Incarnate has been eliminated. There still remains obviously a bond of a social nature, and in this case it is the task of the civil society to intervene, not the Church’s. Let us not forget that for the Church Fathers theology is contemplation of the divine order, not just the study of it. The aspect of indissolubility changes substantially when the bond is no longer of a theological nature but of a social one because from a supernatural order it is reduced to a natural one, although still remains a certain sacred character in it. The Church has authority to intervene within her competency and make use of economy. It is in this sense that the passage from Saint Matthew -It was said, ‘whoever divorces his wife let him give her a certificate of divorce.’ But I say to you that every one who divorces his wife, except on the ground of unchastity, makes her an adulteress; and whoever marries a divorced woman commits adultery [5:31-32] should be understood without abnormally stretching its meaning.
