'TILL DEATH DO US PART'. A police officer and his bride join the mass wedding rites at the St. Joseph Parish inside the National Capital Region Police Office in Camp Bagong Diwa, Taguig City in this March 19, 2024 photo. Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas, in a pastoral exhortation on the divorce bill on Tuesday (May 28, 2024), reminded couples planning to get married to fully prepare to fulfill the duties and responsibilities that come with marriage. (PNA photo by Avito Dalan)
MANILA – The Archdiocese of Lingayen-Dagupan on Tuesday urged couples planning to tie the knot to make sure that they are fully ready to fulfill the duties and responsibilities of married life.
“The Church urges that those intending to contract marriage discern with maturity their preparedness for the duties marriage imposes on them and not treat it as some provisional arrangement that can be conveniently set aside when it so suits them,” Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Socrates Villegas said in a pastoral exhortation on the divorce bill.
The prelate also said dioceses across the country have a "family life apostolate" that offers counseling services for those who have marital problems.
Villegas said divorce is not a moral option for the faithful and will always be against Church teachings.
“While we may not have the power to thwart the passage of a law that would legalize divorce by legislators minded to pass it, it nonetheless remains the duty of every Catholic to catechize and instruct fellow Catholics and brothers and sisters in other faith communities the reasons why we cannot support a bill that makes legal what to us is a transgression of Christ's sovereign will," he said.
The Lingayen-Dagupan archbishop added those promoting divorce are contrary to couples who have maintained their relationships with one partner.
“To criticize this as an unreasonable demand is to cast a slur on the hundreds, thousands even, of couples in the Philippines who have remained true to the promises of their wedding day. They are the tangible proof that such fidelity is possible. They are the empirical evidence that personality differences notwithstanding, difficulties are not impossible to overcome as long as couples do not give up on love,” said Villegas, a former president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP).
The prelate said the sacrament of matrimony is more than just a symbol of the union of Christ and the Church.
"Through the wedded love of husband and wife, Christ the Lord seals his love for his Church, and because the bond that the Lord forges between himself and his Church is a bond that can never be broken, divorce would be perfidious to the reality of the sacrament,” he added.
Last week, the House of Representatives passed on third and final reading House Bill 9349 or the proposed Absolute Divorce Act on May 22.
The Vatican City and the Philippines are the only two nations in the world that outlaw divorce. (PNA)
