Alternative history

I voted for divorce. I voted against gay marriage and will vote no in upcoming referendum.am practising catholic. I am legallyyour separated but I do not agree as a catholic with divorce-and-remarriage without a church annulment. however what about those who get a church annulment? What good is that if you cannot re marry? What about people of other faiths and none?. You might say state annulment is the answer. However state annulment takes away all rights eg marriage property rights. This very important if you are a woman who stayed at home rearing children. You would not have automatic rights to half the house and would not be entitled to maintenance for yourself. The children would be entitled to maintenance. When I separated I had children and was a stay at home mother. All my efforts in the marriages and in good faith having children and staying at home to rear them would have been disregarded as the marriage would be seemed not to exist. In a divorce these would have been regarded from a financial point of view. Had I opted for a church annulment it would have been to be free to marry again if I wished. I would have preferred Divorce to state annulment, had i qualified. I would have more recognition of my life spent on my family, financially, this would be important had I not married again and needed to survive on my own with my children. As it happened I went for neither as I decided I had no interest in remarrying.

tb I'm very sympathetic to your situation and I accept that a Catholic can vote for civil divorce in good conscience. Actually, my father did so in the first divorce referendum, though not in the second.

On the whole, though, I think you have to look at the overall influence on society of any such measure. There are always hard cases. I hope that doesn't sound lacking in compassion. You can have separate legislation to deal with the hard cases.

I don't think civil divorce is good for society and I think its opponents simply realised that it was a losing game. But I don't claim to have any particular insight into this.

Should the state recognise marriage at all or should it offer something comparible like civil partnerships instead

I agree that state annulments are irrelevant now that divorce is law. I’m posing my argument as an Alternative History to you as a person who would not have supported the divorce referendum had you a vote. The anti divorce people posted posters about dire happenings instead of exploring the argument and coming up with an alternative. However despite the dire warnings, my family and I flourished as did many families I knew where they were divorced or legally separated.

Some families are better off with only one parent it is not the ideal but sometimes the better alternative when marriages go wrong

Any annulment civil or church by declaring a marriage void does give you the freedom to marry again unless the grounds for that annulment being granted would render a future marriage impossible like serious mental illness, impotence or homosexuality. These grounds are also accepted by the state I believe.

I think you may be mistaken on your point regarding one party being married and the other not. There can't be a half marriage. The concept of illegitimacy no longer applies in civil law.

I campaigned against divorce. A local presbyterian minister was most impressed when I argued with him on biblical grounds. He said he would love to preach that way but his flock were divided and he couldn't risk a breach in his local church.

The vote was very close. It rained in Donegal which traditionally voted No to liberalisation measures. The turnout there fell due to the bad weather. I hold that a sunny day (yes there are sunny days in Donegal!) could have led to a very narrow No victory. Alternative History indeed!