There's been another one related to the pledge/community covenant.
This time it has nothing to do with Catholicism or evolution. I hate divorce.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Welcome friend! Consider this your online Steve-and-Adam's room! Traber 611 Online! So kick back, grab your favorite SAGA-esque snack, turn down the lights, and get ready to relive the good old days!
7 comments:
"I would like to see a broader understanding of faithfulness and mercy, and a broader understanding of human weakness and how that plays out in life," he said.
Yeah, me too. To err is human. Perhaps that's why the administration at Wheaton always felt so inhuman to me, because they were perfect?
Forget divorce. I hate the self-righteous sons-of-bitches that run the college. [don't censor this, Dave]
I don't know why they ever changed the mascot. They obviously love running crusades.
And, for anyone keeping count, this is the third eminently qualified professor I had (and adored) at Wheaton who has been fired for essentially illegal and distinctively unchristian reasons.
Q&A with my favorite guy in the world:
http://www.wheaton.edu/news/DivorcePolicy.html
Nice.
Self-righteousness...definitely a lot of that going on. Part of why I left.
At this time, I don't think we as former students without more knowledge of the Gramms' relationship or the college's conversations with Dr. Gramm are in a place to condemn anyone or any institution, which is why I left my statement as simply I hate divorce. It's messy, destructive, and in my opinion, usually not in line with God's will. I feel sympathy for Dr. Gramm and his wife that one or both of them felt divorce was a necessary step. I respect Gramm's decision to not talk to the college with a story of how his divorce was his wife's fault. I respect the college's efforts to hold its community to a certain level of accountability as long as there is genuine concern for the well-being of those who seem askew. Gramm himself apparently called members of the administration cordial and compassionate.
Coye, I don't appreciate your sons of bitches statement. It bothers me because I associate it with not just frustration but flat out hatred, which I tend to only appreciate when directed at sin, not sinners.
Dave, I'm not a fan of the language, but I want to see it stay unless Coye takes it down himself. This is a lot different than Coye flicking us all off while wearing a dress.
The problem with divorce is that it shatters communities.
As a life-long reader of the scriptures, it is my judgment that they care much less about who's sleeping with whom (although that tends to be the evangelical focus) than they are concerned with the justice and charity of human relations. Much of the rationale for opposing divorce rests on the historical relationship between men and women, whose social positions have always been markedly unequal. To give a man power of divorce over his wife (and note that Paul and Christ almost invariably address men with regards to divorce) is to increase the power imbalance: he can dismiss her, retain his status, retain his posessions, retain control of his home and children, and leave her homeless, penniless and powerless (unless, perhaps, her father or brother take her in). In this context, a prohibition against divorce makes perfect sense: it protects the vulnerable party. When women have more social and legal power and are, thereby, less vulnerable, this prohibition seems less emphatic.
Even in a context (which we don't have) in which men and women are socially and politically equal, there are plenty of good reasons against divorce. It still has the potential to shatter lives and wreck communities and families; this can be particularly insidious when young children (who have very little agency) are involved. We should remain concerned about the emotional and psychological violence done to those whose relationships and social ties are broken.
It is not inconceivable that marriage could hold two people-- neither "at fault"-- in a situation which is worse for both of them than a mutually sought divorce. I don't want to claim that such a divorce would be easy or unproblematic, but we must keep in mind that "staying together" is not a priori any less problematic, any less an affront to justice and charity in human relations.
Demanding that the only acceptable divorce narrative casts the spouse as "villian" at fault in the separation requires that either 1) two people are forced to stay in a relationship which harms both of them, 2) one person unjustly narrate the other as being at fault, or 3) one or both people be judged a pariah and suffer the legal, economic and social ills that come with that judgment. None of these options protect justice and charity in human relations; all three of them transgress against one or both of the people involved.
And that is exactly what the divorce policy of Wheaton College does-- it adds another layer of separation and division to an already unfortunate situation. There may be situations in which a faculty member's divorce may interfere with his or her ability to be a mentor/example for his/her students. There are also situations where staying in a marriage would have the same effect. for Wheaton to recognize one danger without addressing the other is a case of the law blinding justice.
I, too, hate divorce. I hate it for the violence it does to human beings, and I cannot applaud a similar violence undertaken nominally against divorce. "Divorce" means "to part or break association with." How does forcing someone-- already wounded, already suffering-- out of their community not constitute another, even more problematic divorce?
Thanks for the thoughtful response.
Post a Comment