Impossible Marriages Redeemed: They Didn't End the Story in the Middle

The message of the culture is clear: When things get REALLY bad in a marriage, the best, and even only, thing to do is to divorce and "move on." The message of the contemporary Church is not much different, although Catholics (both ordained and lay) might advise annulment after the civil divorce and before the "moving on." The 65 stories in this book tell of a different way: A way of Christlike faithfulness and solemn commitment to one's sacred promises--something that was common (or at least considered honorable and right) in eras past, but which seems forgotten today. If the world is telling you (or if you are telling friends and family) to walk away from a marriage, read this book first. As a requested follow-up to the remarkable Primal Loss: The Now-Adult Children of Divorce Speak, this book will supply the hope, motivation, and tools needed to keep a marriage and family intact and on the road to true redemption. The vast majority of the stories in this book are anonymous. Most are recounted by the spouses themselves or by the grateful children of once-disastrous unions, while two or three are told by other close family members. The first section of this book contains 50 stories of redemption--the details of marriages that went through the wringer and survived. Some of those marriages turned blissful, some merely content, but all were redeemed. Also, the vast majority of contributors are female. This same phenomenon occurred in Primal Loss, and you mustn't read anything more into that fact than this: Women, due to their more verbal and relational nature, are much more likely than men to respond to and execute a request to tell a personal, emotional relationship story. In no way should we take this imbalance to mean that men are more often the "bad guys" in marital break-up. In fact, today, women are much more likely to file for divorce than men, a statistic that is largely explained by the pervasive and corrosive influence of feminist ideology, which grossly misunderstands and/or deliberately rejects sexual complementarity and the meaning and order of marriage—all of which is a story (or a book) for another day. Readers should go in knowing that for every woman writing her story, there is a man who has his own difficult tale that never made it from his heart to the page.The second, smaller section of the book contains 15 stories of "standers"--those wives or husbands who have chosen to stand for their marriage vows despite complete abandonment by their spouses. Even the Church seems to have forgotten these few courageous souls, who are often patted on the head, scolded, or even deemed emotionally unhealthy for not "moving on" to find that shiny new romance themselves. The profound sacrifice of these lonely but faithful souls makes the rest of us uncomfortable, yet we need to honor them as heroic witnesses for matrimony. As St. John Paul II said in Familiaris Consortio (83): "[T]heir example of fidelity and Christian consistency takes on particular value as a witness before the world and the Church." These faithful spouses know well what Christ is asking, and it's no less than a share of His saving cross, that, while rough-hewn and heavy, is made light with His grace, and with the knowledge that the cross alone leads to glory and salvation—and to union with our True Spouse.

Leila Miller is a wife, mother of eight, and grandmother to many. Her books include Primal Loss: The Now-Adult Children of Divorce Speak; Made This Way: How to Prepare Kids to Face Today's Tough Moral Issues; and Raising Chaste Catholic Men. She resides in Phoenix. Website: LeilaMiller.net