Canon Law & Order | "There is no Such Thing as Catholic Divorce" (S1 E3)

S1 E3: In this mini-series hosted by Father Will Banowsky, judicial vicar for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City, Father Will explores the intricacies of Canon Law in the Catholic Church, as well as it's practical application and effects. 

In this episode, Father Will and Heather Eichholz, canon lawyer for the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City, begin to explore how canon law serves real people and why a declaration of nullity is designed for truth and spiritual healing, not shortcuts. They unpack what the Church actually investigates in a marriage case and how compassion for both petitioner and respondent matters at every step.
• Heather’s “canonical origin story” and the role of lay canonists in keeping tribunals running
• What an annulment is and why the Church does not treat it as a loophole
• Why the process focuses on courtship, consent, freedom and the early marriage
• Common misconceptions including fear that children become “illegitimate”
• Grounds that can affect validity including coercion, simulation, abuse, addiction and withholding children
• How throwaway culture and poor discernment can weaken marriage decisions
• How to support respondents with listening, clarity and reminders of dignity
• Practical marriage advice on communication, dating your spouse and seeking help early

For those of you who are in marriages that are struggling, talk to your priest, talk to a counselor, talk to each other.

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Learn more about the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City online at archokc.org, and follow us on social media by searching "Archdiocese of Oklahoma City."

Transcript

Canon Law And Tribunal Basics

SPEAKER_00 0:00

In the Catholic Church, the faithful are bound by canon law, a set of individual paragraphs of set law that the church interprets and applies to given situations, established by the church to maintain order, govern, and protect her people. Here's how it works.

Heather’s Path Into Canon Law

SPEAKER_01 0:24

Welcome back to another episode, episode three of Canon Law and Order. Today I have with me one of our uh judges on the tribunal, um, Heather Eichholtz. Um, and if you'll notice, right, Heather is one of many throughout the world lay canonists. Um there's not enough priests to keep all the tribunals around the world running. Um, and so it's thanks to a lot of our lay canonists that really any tribunal is able to function because you're able to be here full-time, where many of us priest canonists have parishes or other sponsorities. Um, so Heather, just out of curiosity, I'm sure there are people wondering um, what is your canonical origin story? How did you end up uh in canon law? I'm assuming it's not something that someone just wakes up one day and says, I want to be a canon lawyer. I mean, usually with precepts, you're gonna be a canon lawyer. So what's your canonical origin story?

SPEAKER_02 1:25

Um, I didn't even know. I'm a cradle Catholic, had no idea canon law even existed. Um, I was actually going to school for my theology degree. And during the course of my theology degree, um, Father Alvy, one of my professors, approached me and he goes, I would really like to introduce you to canon law. I think it's a really good place for you and your ethics. Um, and so what he did was he reached out to um Catholic University and I audited um over the internet a class just to see if I liked it or not. Um, I was fascinated by all the things uh canon law touched on. Um, there's not any one particular area of the church canon law doesn't affect. And so I got very interested in canon law and how it governs or organizes the day-to-day life of the church and the clergy and the bishops and the cardinals and how it all came to be. Um, so I was lucky enough for Father Alvy to help me get into canon law school, and here I am today.

SPEAKER_01 2:44

And you've had a bit of a journey, right? Because we're not the first diocese um that you've worked for, you know. Correct. So maybe just for the people at uh at home, you know, what is sort of your um, I don't want to say uh uh CV, but but rather, you know, just sort of your journey.

SPEAKER_02 3:01

Um so uh I was uh getting my bachelor's degree from uh Brushy University in Owensboro, Kentucky. And Father Alvy, an incardinated priest, and the president, Father Larry, was an incarnated priest of the diocese. And so it was um fortunate because they could set up a conversation between me and the bishop at that time. And the diocese of Owensboro sent me to Canon Law School in Ottawa, Ontario, St. Paul's, uh, paid for it. And when I came back, then I gave them three years of work to pay back the education. Um, after the three years there, uh, my friend Andrew was the director of the tribunal in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. And he reached out to me and he said, Hey, I'm transitioning to a different position. Um I thought you might like to come back to the Midwest since I'm originally from Minnesota. So I transitioned to Sioux Falls, and I was the director of their tribunal um almost six and a half years. Uh, then I was um contacted by a friend, Kathy, who was the chancellor in Grand Island, Nebraska. And Kathy said that um she was going to be retiring, excuse me, and she thought I would make a good chancellor for the diocese, was I interested. So I met with the bishop there. Um, he offered me the job, and I was the chancellor for two years. It's a very demanding position, and you basically work round the clock. And I thought, well, I miss the tribunal. I miss that work with the people. I miss helping the people realize that this is an olive branch that God extends to you to keep you moving towards him. And so the Archdiocese of Oklahoma was looking for an associate judge, and I thought, perfect, I can slide right back into tribunal work.

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Yeah, being the chancellor, right? Like if the archbishop is sort of the principal, then the vicar general and the chancellor are the vice principals. And depending on the diocese, one of them is the disciplinarian and one's not. Yeah. Then it can be a bit uh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:38

Yeah, it can put you in situations that you're like, okay, I know what I have to do, but do I like doing it?

SPEAKER_01 5:46

Well, and you mentioned, right, talking about the tribunal, about that olive branch. And a lot of what the tribunals are set up for. It's not the only thing that they do, but a lot of what is done, I mean the majority of it is the annulment process. And the reality is, I think there is a lot of misconception about what an annulment is or isn't. Um, you know, what would you say to someone who is on the fence on annulments because they don't understand it and see it as a loophole rather than a healing process?

SPEAKER_02 6:26

In the church, there's no loopholes. Um the annulment process is designed as a spiritually healing process. The very process that you go through, the very paperwork that you go through, the whole reason you're supposed to sit down with a priest or a deacon and fill it out is because as you're removing that scab from that wound, you talk about it with the priest or the deacon. You discuss how you're feeling, why you're feeling this way, what's led you to feel this way. And you get spiritual guidance and feedback from them. That's the design of the process to bring you closer to God to understand why you made the human decisions that you made and why they led to where they led. The annulment process isn't placing blame on either party. What it's doing is exposing our human nature and saying, it's okay, God loves you. And here's how we're gonna work with you to bring you closer to God.

unknown 7:39

Right.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

And it's one of those things, right? That one of the the pitfalls or the traps of the temptations that people have during this process is you using it right as a way to relitigate the the issues of the divorce when really it's it's it's a self it's a project of self-reflection. It's looking at myself, looking at my journey, looking at everything that I've done in the lead up to the marriage, uh, in whether or not there's a sacrament. There's why it's more important, right, to focus on the courtship and the meeting and family of origin issues and the wedding and then the first year of the marriage than it is to focus on what happened 10, 15, 20 years.

SPEAKER_02 8:25

Yes. But that's a lot of the problem for people because the end of the marriage is the worst day of the marriage. So they have a tendency to focus on that hurt instead of looking backwards and saying, here's good memories, here's bad memories, and here's where we just weren't compatible. And here's how everything played out. Um it's really easy in the annulment process to bring all of that pain and that frustration and that anger back into the process instead of saying, This is a process that's supposed to let me let go of it. And so I really enjoy tribunal work because when people call or when people come to see me, I feel like I can help them realize God wants you to let go. You can love somebody, but maybe you can't live with them, and that's okay.

SPEAKER_01 9:29

Right. And then looking at too, you know, were the elements really there for a sacramental reality. And I think that's one of the things that people really struggle with when they look at the annulment, whether it's um someone who has gone through it or someone who the marriage has fallen apart, it's irreconcilable, and the other spouse, the other party is the one petitioning and they feel like they're along for the ride. You know, like, well, what does this mean? We were together this many years. Are you saying that none of this counts? Or even those people who look at it, you know, because you know, we live, right? And this is something that Pope Francis has said a lot during his pontific. We live in a throwaway culture. And and so some people look at it as like, oh, annulments are just weakening marriages, and basically it's it's letting people off scot-free um when really that's not what the process is designed for, and it's it's looking at a deeper question. Like I remember having a conversation um on a walk to school when I was in Seminarian Rome um with a gentleman, um, and he said to me, He said, Don't you think it's holier, right? Don't you think it's holier for someone who is divorced to rather than looking for an annulment that just stay single and unmarried for the rest of their life, you know, what's holier? And and I looked at him and I said, Well, but if there's no sacrament there, then why do they need to sort of be trapped rather than seeking the healing? And I think that's one of the things that a lot of people don't understand, that that there are things that can make key sacraments invalid, you know. Um, of course, canon 1060, all marriages have the favor of law are presumed valid until proven otherwise. And of course, uh the hardest sacrament to prove invalid is holy orders. I mean, uh, I had a professor in Rome basically say literally the only way without any other sort of factor, such as an invalid baptism or an invalidly ordained bishop, you know, um, that they would invalidate holy orders if literally there was a gun to your head on camera at the time of ordination. But with marriage, there's a lot of factors that go into play. I mean, first off, right? We talk about free will. Um, that's why if you go and confess and you're drunk, you're not absolved because you're not freely confessing. Um, so what would you say to someone, you know, let's say you're um sitting at Charleston's, you know, at the bar, um, or, you know, and and just having a margarita after work, and someone came up to you and just said, I don't get an ultimate. Like, like, why can't they just deal? What would you say, you know, how would you explain to someone the reality that marriages can be invalidated, invalid, and what factors are there to someone who's sort of maybe um not out of the hardness of their heart, but more out of the concern for the sanctity of marriage?

How Marriages Can Be Invalid

SPEAKER_02 12:44

I think annulments are part of the sanctity of marriage. So the church says they never hold anybody to the impossible. Okay. So what do they consider impossible? You know, if you have a spouse who is waking up every single day with broken ribs, bruises, you want them to deal? That's cruel. Um, you know, nobody should have to stay in a relationship that's abusive emotionally, physically, you know, mentally. Somebody shouldn't have to be called names on a daily basis. They shouldn't have to have things thrown at them. Um, what about the children? How safe are the children within that marriage? But more than that, there's small nuances to marriages that can make them invalid. Um, somebody married just for status to stay in a country. That's not fair to do to somebody. Or what about those marriages where you entered it and you only entered it because the other person made a lot of money? And now what you're doing is you're living a carefree life, you don't want anything to do with that spouse, you don't even sleep in the same bedroom, and you're just spending all their money. So there's small things that you look for to say, do you really respect the dignity of this person? Or are you using this person for another thing? And that's what annulments look at. And they're there to help people so that they don't feel trapped, they don't feel mistreated, they don't feel worthless because everybody has self-worth.

SPEAKER_01 14:42

Well, it's kind of one of those things, right? Like one of uh the kind of the key grounds, you know, when you look at um both total and partial simulation, or as I call uh the contrast, you know, because right, what are the essential elements of marriage? Um, it's indissoluble. Um and sadly, unfortunately, we are one of the few, if the only Christian denomination anymore that holds to the indissolubility. Even a lot of the Orthodox churches have uh I like to call it a freebie divorce. They was refer to your second marriage as penitential. Of course, there's you know, there's probably the old man with with a beer right now saying every marriage is penitential, you know. Um, but indissoluble um uh order to the good of of having children, in order to the good of of both spouses. And and oftentimes if you hold one of those back, you're partially simulating the consent. So, like if you go into the marriage and you have no intention of being faithful, you know, it's like you know, as a you know, go into like as a man, I have the right to have a mistress. Or I mean, as as the a woman, I have the right to do whatever I want, you know, my body, my choice, um, which is again part of that throwaway culture, you're reserving something from the marriage, which causes that invalidity. I mean, you know, it's kind of one of those things where unfortunately still happens, right? Where um people go in and think, all right, if it gets hard, I can leave. It's why looking at family of origin is so important, because if you're coming from a history of divorce in your family, unfortunately, right, you can overcome that. That's why it's presumed valid, has the favor of law to prove it otherwise. But if you go into it, right, it's like, well, in these situations, everyone in my family has l left, then then that opens the door and you're reserving that. Or even we see that even more so now. Um, people withholding the right to have children.

SPEAKER_02 16:51

Oh, that's a big one lately. Yeah. Um, there's a lot of people out there who decide, I like my toys, I like my money. Kids are gonna detract from that, so we're just not gonna have them. And they don't realize that the fruits of marriage come about through your children. That's where you see the two become one. That's where you see all of the wonderful things that you do together manifest is in those children.

Discernment Culture And Modern Pressures

SPEAKER_01 17:20

Well, and and the having children is not just part of uh the consent, part of the vows that you make, but also when you look at the nuptial blessing blessing in every marriage, it's all scattered throughout. Even specifically, may they see their children's children, you know? Um, and unfortunately, that's that's a big one, right? That that comes. And there's other things, right? You know, there's um a lot of external factors, especially when it comes to um teen pregnancy or even adult, you know, a pregnancy, pregnancy out of wedlock, and and how that um, especially cultural realities, right? Like um, you and I have both seen cases um where, you know, two 18-year-olds in a moment of passion get pregnant, and then before they know it, both sets of parents are forcing them to get married. Um, and depending on if it's a small village or not somewhere, uh they might get the pastor to fast track all the paperwork. And then, well, are they now stuck when it wasn't their choice, right? Um that's where freedom kind of comes into play. Um, but then also to and the unfortunate reality, and there was a study that just came out, and I'm not trying to detract anybody from Gen Z or anything, but talking about how you know they're the first generation um whose IQ or standardized testings have gone down from generations before. This is not me attacking Gen Z, I promise. It's more talking about how as we become more technologically advanced as a society, our ability to think critically and to understand what discernment is um diminishes and over the generations. Um this is not a um an official endorsement from this show. Uh, but uh Mike Judge's uh 2006 movie Idiocracy um kind of is a little bit prophetic and shows some of the dangers when we uh don't sort of focus on um uh keeping critical thinking. Oh, yeah. Of course, it also talks right with people not wanting children where where it also doesn't allow for um some of the good values to be passed down. Um but our ability to discern and the impact that a deficiency in discernment have um also can affect the validity of a marriage. And oh yeah, and I mean we could probably devote a whole 30 minutes talking about that, and this is more just an overall, you know, but it's kind of one of those things where, and also just say it's like, well, I didn't think it through, so the marriage is is automatically no, no, that's not how it works. Um, but because you have to look at all the factors together. But if you are in a very desperate emotional situation, especially if you're trying to escape a bad family of origin, or you know, you're in your 30s and you're desperate and you just think, well biological clock, like this is my last shot. Um, and you start to kind of ignore the red flags, or even um, you know, some sort of emotional trauma uh in the midst of the engagement can just kind of cut, you know. And so it's one of those things where and and I understand, right, where people think that maybe annulments are are too freely given, but I think we give too much credit when we take that stance to uh humanity, um, when we're all broken people. And right.

SPEAKER_02 21:00

They they forget about that human condition. You know, every single case that I've read over the last 12 years, there's something of me in those cases because we share a human condition. So sure, I made the exact same decision, but my decision went a different way than their decision. Does that make mine better? Does that make theirs worse? No, it just means we're all human and that condition plays into our discernment.

SPEAKER_01 21:32

And unfortunately, too, right? Our over society's overall view on marriage is as as a contract or as, you know, something disposable or something niche, you know. Um, because right, the number of cohabitating couples rather than people getting married or just looking at, oh, it's just a piece of paper. Mm-hmm. It also right diminishes our understanding and And makes it harder for people to truly understand what marriage is. It's why um it's why I really like some marriage prep programs other than others. Like I really like focus. Uh it's F-O-C-C-Us, not F O C U S, which is the campus ministry program, but but focus because it really forces the couples to start asking questions, um, you know, and looking at like, okay, like is there a compatibility here? And, you know, my parents are a focus mentor couple, and they've had couples that have thanked them afterwards because they ended up deciding not to get married because of it. And and it's one of those things too where where I wish that we could invest more in a marriage prep, but there's a there's always that ticking clock where people are in a hurry because, like, right, so I was a seminarian for six years. So six, you know, two years of philosophy, four years of theology. For confirmation, most places it's a year, sometimes it's two full years. Same for first communion, year, two full years, and uh reconciliation is kind of scattered in there. Um, but when it comes to marriage, right, it's maybe six months, and maybe you have a mentor couple, or maybe you just do a retreat and and maybe you start asking the hard questions. And I think that's part of of the problem, right, where when we look at it, is is are we doing the best that we can to ensure um there's the adequate discernment and understanding and full handing over? Um because right, if you can see through the asking the questions, um you want kids, maybe he or she doesn't, you you hear that, so okay, well then I'm gonna back off because now I know um that you are reserving part, you know.

SPEAKER_02 24:07

And two substance use plays a lot into marriage. So there's a lot of mental health issues that play into marriage, you know, enabling alcoholism, bipolar, um, depressive disorders, uh, and how they're being treated can really impact how that marital relationship develops. Because if you have a foundation built on sand, then the whole thing is going to collapse five, 10, maybe even 15 years in, but it will collapse. And that's part of the things that I think people don't take a really good look at. I love this person. I know they have this substance abuse problem. I can help them with that. No. Read a book on addiction first, then decide if this is something you want to do. And I think sometimes we fail to inform our children of those things. Like you really need to figure out what's depressive disorder. Can you really live with somebody who has those symptoms? Are you willing to put in the time and effort? Or is this something that you can't live with? And that's okay. We forget to tell them it's okay to say, I can't live with this, I can live with this, and to figure out what it is they're looking for in a spouse.

Caring For Respondents Through The Process

SPEAKER_01 25:41

And and I just want to be clear, right? If you are in a marriage where some of these things are present, that doesn't mean that your marriage is null. In fact, again, the the favor of the law presumed valid. Um, and there are a lot of holy marriages that could come from that. But then there also is a lot of brokenness that can and that cause a sacrament to not be there, you know, especially when we're talking about addiction and and the biggest epidemic right now that is hindering relationships, not just marriage, um, but dating pornography, right? Yep. Um, and these things that lessen your your will and your capacity to understand. You know, it's kind of goes back to that thing about critical thinking. When we rely on artificial intelligence to do our answer our questions or write our papers, we're not training our brain to understand conflict, we're not understanding our brain to look at issues, you know, and it's kind of my fear, right, as a canonist, um, that that's going to affect a lot of things. And this is me being pessimistic. Usually I'm more optimistic. My blood type is be positive. Um, but I can, you know, I can be a pessimist, and you know, how many um future religious or future priests are going to struggle in their vocation um or choosing the wrong one because they've lost that ability to discern like how many marriages um will suffer. And I think that's kind of one of the dangers that we're facing now, especially with using Chat GPT and similar AI for everything, um especially when it comes to solving problems or writing paper, we're we're losing, and and I think that's something that when we diminish our capacity when we are not fully mature and that reality um it's gonna cause problems. This is and I don't mean to be pessimistic, it's just uh there's still time to fix everything. Um you know, the other kind of uh hard thing really when walking with with couples, um, you know, is you know, sometimes we'll have um anolman petitions that'll come through, and they've been maybe married five years, a year, you know, less than 10. Um, but sometimes it's marriages that have been 20, 30, 40 years and in a whole lifetime. Oh, yeah. And it's hard to look back on going into, you know, what do you say? How do you comfort someone, um, especially someone who'd be the respondent in an annulment, or really in any sort of canonical proceeding, you have a petitioner, you have the respondent, the petitioner's the ones asking the respondent is the other party. In an annulment, there are three parties the petitioner, the respondent, and the church. That's why the defender of the bond always gets a say. Yes. Um, you know, how do you comfort that respondent who's struggling because it was not necessarily their decision for the marriage to end and not their decision to seek an annulment, and now they're being told, you know, your 30-year, 40-year marriage was never a sacrament.

SPEAKER_02 29:08

You know, that's interesting. I've had those conversations with respondents, and I remind them, but your marriage happened. It's your human history, it's good and natural. It just didn't rise to a sacrament, you know, and and that takes some time because what I found is when a respondent calls and they're upset, I say to them, you have a right to be upset. And then I let them tell me everything that they're upset about. And then once they have that all out, then I try to have a conversation with them about you can always love the person, you can always hope the best for the person, but you don't want to be with somebody that you have to force to be with you. You're worth more. And a lot of times the divorce has just diminished or completely annihilated how this person looks at them, their self-worth, their value. And so I think it's really important when you get that respondent to remind them you are worth more. You deserve somebody who wants to be with you, who wakes up every single morning and says, This is where I want to be. And I think if you have those conversations with them, it makes a difference for them in the process. Because I always invite them whenever they have a question or whenever they're need something to call me. And I think that helps them work through the process where they may not have a pastor that they can go to or a priest. So just by opening those conversations up, listening and being compassionate, I think you can really help somebody work through it.

SPEAKER_01 30:57

I think it's important, right, that to understand that while the sacramental effect was never there, the civil effect was. You know, the the life happened, the history happened. You know, one of the questions that I've seen come up, um, especially from respondents who are non-Catholic, um, well, this doesn't mean my kids are illegitimate. And an annulment does not make your son John Snow. Um you know, it there's still because of that, that's civil reality. Um, and it's hard, you know, because part of the annulment process, right, is really meeting people in and then, like you mentioned earlier, opening those scabs and tearing open some like if you are really doing this process in good faith, and and sometimes, right, you'll you'll see a petition and and like every question has two sentences, yes, and they're just you know uh trying to stick it to their ex, you know, or whatever, um, or they're just trying to do it to um please their current relationship. Um it requires some self-reflection. But when you have the people who are really doing this in good faith, that are really saying, like, okay, like I'm gonna try and see, and if it says it's valid, it's valid. If it says it's it's null, it's null. But I want to really allow the healing to begin, it's transformative. And you can see that clearly in in their testimony in your encounters with them. And and for many, right, it's it's a new beginning. Um, for many, it's their avenue for reconciling back with the church after being away for years. Um, and that's why I really, you know, I call it a process of sanation, a process of healing. Yeah. Um, because it begins to heal um the wounds between that the person has, the person has with the spouse, but the person has with the church.

SPEAKER_02 33:00

It's I I always say to people, you go to confession to heal from the sin. You come to the annulment process for the same reason to heal from the hurts of the marriage, from what two people can do to each other. So you have to let the process do what it's supposed to and see where you are in the different stages of the process, self-reflect, have those conversations, but just watch yourself change because you will.

unknown 33:35

Right.

SPEAKER_01 33:35

That's why I also think that it's important that you should never start the process when you're still angry.

SPEAKER_02 33:40

That, yes, because it comes through in the testimony loud and clear. And then I'm like, oh, I wish this person would have waited because I can see the threads of what they're trying to tell me, but I have to get through all of the anger and all of the hurt and the pain in order to see all of that. Where had they just waited six months to a year after the divorce, the testimony looks completely different.

Building Strong Marriages On Purpose

SPEAKER_01 34:10

And I know we've talked about a lot of kind of painful realities. I want to reiterate marriage is a beautiful and wonderful thing was given by God. You know, we see this in um the creation of Adam and Eve, right? It's why the Hebrew word for woman means the one that completes the man. It's why Jesus' first miracle is at the wedding of Cana. Um so I don't want anyone to think that like marriage is ugly and gross, and you should never, you know, it's a very beautiful, especially when you are called to that vocation and you have found the person you are supposed to be with. It's a beautiful thing, but it's not easy, right? Oh no, but nothing worth having is ever easy, and it's why it's really important um for couples to really take the time to get to know each other. Yeah. Um, it's really important for um couples to not rush into things, um, you know, and to really understand the humanity. You know, one of the things that I often say in all my wedding homilies is the things that you can't stand about each other today are the same things you you know we won't be able to stand about each other tomorrow or 10 years from now. Then I usually joke and say in 20 years, it'll be your kids, you know. Um, because there are some attitudes, and this also right plays into some of the factors that nullifies the marriage when you think that God'll fix everything I hate about him if I can just or her, yeah, if I can just get him to that altar. Like the sacrament will just make everything better. Yeah, and that's not how it works. It gives you the graces you need to overcome it, yes, but it doesn't change who the person is.

SPEAKER_02 36:00

Well, I'm the same person I was 30 years ago when I married my husband. He's the same person he was 30 years ago. Um, as a matter of fact, some of our idiosyncrasies have become more pronounced, some have become less pronounced, but through the years, your personality is your personality. And that's really, in essence, what attracted you to the person to begin with. So, you know, I focus on what did I love about Michael when I first started dating him? It's still there. I still love it, and I can live with the little things that bother me. It doesn't matter as much as the fact that I care about him and I want to do good by him and I want to us to have a good relationship. Right.

SPEAKER_01 36:52

Yeah, it's like my my parents, they've been married for almost 41 years, and I'm pretty sure in 1985, um July 6, 1985, uh my mom would have said to my dad, I find you neither cute nor funny. And I'm pretty sure at home tonight, if he says something dumb, which tends to be a genetic reality on the Y chromosome of my family line, she'll probably say the same thing. You are neither cute nor funny. But it's the understanding that, but but I still love you. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 37:25

Yeah. You you go to bed every night and you still love this person. You wake up in the morning every day and you still love this person. And you can live with the quirks because we all have them, you know? And then you add a kid in there, and yes, a child brings more stress to the relationship. But I also think that people forget to work on the husband-wife relationship because you, I mean, your entire being is focused on that child and making sure that they're they're healthy and they're happy and they have everything they need, but you still have to focus on one another.

SPEAKER_01 38:04

And that's one of the dangers, right? If you favor one of the essential elements of marriage over the other. And you have children and you forget about marriage being ordered to the other, go to the abusage, which is why um, if you're watching this and you can't remember the last time you went on a date with your spouse, go on a date. Like continue to feed that.

SPEAKER_02 38:26

Oh, definitely. Develop your personalities individually, but come back together and develop them as a couple. That's what partnership is about. It's about, you know, making those decisions together. It's about each spouse having veto power over those decisions and communicating why. Communication is the biggest thing you can do to help your marriage. Honest communication.

SPEAKER_01 38:52

And that's kind of the thing, right? You know, um, a few years back, Pope Francis got a lot of flack when he said that, you know, he believed that about 50% of all marriages were null. And I don't necessarily agree, I don't necessarily disagree, but the reality is, right, is that a lot of the cases we get are null because the ones that are valid are the ones that are not breaking, they're not ending. Right. There are there are the elements there, you know, you haven't kept that escape hatch. You've done your homework, you've done your due diligence. Um, and we'll get into in future episodes, whether it be with you or Father Brashears, whenever he gets back from his uh pilgrimage, um, to kind of talk about more about just the sacramental realities of marriage um and the process in and of itself. But it's also it's important before we dive into that to just kind of understand some of the realities of what an annulment is and isn't.

SPEAKER_02 39:44

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 39:45

And the fact that what it's really looking for is did a sacrament happen? And it's hard to say, like, well, why would God not let a sacrament happen? But it's our humanity. And he almost he knows before we do, he knows before we take pen to paper in the digital age, uh, fingertip the keyboard, um, whether it's there or not. We have new microphones now, and I feel kind of handcuffed because I'm not as free to talk with my hands. Um, well, thank you, Heather, um, for you know, sitting down with us, telling a little bit about your story and and just spending this time talking about it. And thank you.

SPEAKER_02 40:25

Sure.

Final Encouragement And Farewell

SPEAKER_01 40:25

For those of you who are in marriages that are struggling, like um talk to your priest, talk to a counselor, talk to each other. I think that's the most important thing, right? Like, marriages are worth fighting for. Um, and our woundedness can be overcome together. It's why marriage has the favor of law. Because as long as you keep fighting for it, that marriage is gonna be valid, even if there are those things in the way. So find someone, talk to someone. It's a beautiful vocation. It's not easy, but it's worth having having. Thank you, and uh enjoy your beautiful spring.