THE CHURCH AND DIVORCE

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1020, 9 January 1911, Page 8

THE CHURCH AND DIVORCE

X'ROFESSOfi DEXNEY'S EVIDENCE. Professor Eenn?y, Professor of New Testament Theology at the United Free College, Glasgow, giviug evidence before the Koyal Commission on Divorco and matrimonial causes, said that the New Testament, whilst it deelarecl-»that marriage ought to be permanent, and consequently implied that nothing in legislation ,should teml to impair its sanctity, ijave' no express guidance to the Legislature "tor dealing with cases in which rhe divine ideal had evidently been frustrated. It did not give a divine sanction to divorce either for adultery or for desertion or for .any other cauw\ but. neither did it preclude divorco as a legislative remedy in any given qasc. He regarded tho passage in Bt. Matthew allowing divorce for infidelity as the first reflection of a Christian teacher as he brought the absolute word of Jesus into relation to the facts of. the world. On the subject generally he would be disposed to say (1) that nothing in the law should tend to disparage th« Christian idea!.of marriage as a permanent union of husband and wife with a view to family life, a union which was recognised by law, and which was tho centre both of Church and State; (2) that the law has to take account of facts by which, in certain cases, marriage was unquestionably, destroyed, and that for dealing .with these facts Scripture gave us no statutory authoritative guidance; (3) that in the interests of morality,-and therefore of the Christian ideal of marriage, it was a mistake to put the marriageable people in o situation in which marriage was prohibited. Offcncss against tho law of marriage should, perhaps, bo punished— there was statutory authority enougli lor that in the Old Testament,, and in many of tho ecclesiastical ordinances of national Protestant Churches—but they should not b? punished by sentences of celibacy. With regard to the question of divorce for cTuelty or criminality involving a long term of penal servitude, he thought that it was probably bettor that a few people should be made unhappy than that society should be corrup.tcd on a vital point of morality. . Lord Guthrie—ln Scotland, are you aware whether., owing to our having bad divorce for adultery and desertion for threo hftndred years, there has been any prejudicial, results in the way, of. affecting people's ideals in regard to marrying. Professor Denney—l do not think so. T think the people have the utmost possible reverence for the sanctity of the marriage relation. Judgo Tindal Atkinson—Do you say that guilty parties should be allowed to remarry after divorce?—lt is bad that it should be, and bad that it should not be. It is a question of which is worse.