Why not make marriages contractual? (First of two parts)

BEHIND THE SCENES
Alfred P. Dizon

Changing the Roman Catholic’s tough stance on divorce will take more than simple luck and good intentions.

Since divorce is still not feasible in this blighted republic where raising children is some sort of a cottage industry, maybe making marriages contractual could be a compromise middle ground between the Church and the State.

If a couple can’t stand each other say within a period of five years, then they could just make the marriage die an easy death after the contract. If they find sleeping with each other is still bearable, then they could opt to renew the contract. This could spare couples a lot of money spent in litigation for annulment cases.

Besides, this will make the abusive party think twice in perpetrating his abusive ways knowing that once the contract is over, the aggrieved spouse can always find a better partner. In this essence, marriages could actually become stronger as couples know that for their marriage to tick, they have to work hard for it.

For the women of the Gabriela party-list who are pushing for a twice-failed legislation to legalize divorce, the stakes are high.

Gabriela’s Luzviminda Ilagan says countless women across the country are mired in abusive relationships with almost no hope of breaking free and the entire family suffers.

Now they are waging a lopsided battle with the Catholic Church which, Ilagan says, disregards husbands’ philandering while simultaneously condemning divorce.

A report by Amanda Fisher says according to retired archbishop Oscar Cruz, divorce is an easy way out for those who cannot cope with the stress of married life. Fisher’s account:
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Mandy (not her real name), 29, disagrees “100 million percent.” And it’s easy to see why, after suffering multiple injuries, including a back cyst and sinusitis, as a result of repeated and protracted beatings from her husband of six years, Denver.

Denver’s violent tendencies – directed at himself at least in one case – were evident early on. Before they got married, Denver repeatedly smashed his head against a wall one night when Mandy insisted on returning home. The first time he harmed her by cuffing her ears during an argument, they had already been together for a year. “After that first abuse, it followed and followed and followed,” she says.

The pair met at a gathering of Singles For Christ. Although Mandy rejected Denver’s early advances because of his reputation as a playboy, his persistence – coupled with Mandy’s bad family life – paid off.

At 19, Mandy decided the way to an independent life, free from the burden of financially supporting her mother and sister, was to have a baby. Denver proved useful. “It was a relationship of convenience,” she says.

She even had to turn a blind eye to her husband’s drug addiction and thievery. At one point she had to lie to protect him even after he stole from her family.

“I wanted him to be a better person and I can see that I am the one who can correct what he’s doing and I can straighten him,” she says.

Living alternately with Denver’s family and her own, Mandy was completely devoid of support. Both families stood by while she endured abuses almost daily from her husband.
“Nobody approached me. For me it was my fault because I was in the relationship and I got pregnant.”

It was even on her mother’s advice that Mandy married Denver in 2004, believing the abuse would stop if she did.

“It’s always the woman who is wrong in the people’s minds...they will tell her ‘Go back because he’s your husband and you have your kid to take care of’ and at the end of the day, it’s not your welfare that’s important but the welfare of your children.” But it was the beginning of the end of her agony at the hands of her drug-addled husband.

She found supportive barangay staff who directed her to Gabriela. She is now doing all she can to reclaim her life, and reclaiming her maiden name is paramount. “My aim is to get my last name back.”
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The beautiful, university-educated woman believes abuse can happen to anyone under certain circumstances, and support of others provides the strength a woman needs to leave an abusive relationship. That support is necessary from friends, family and co-workers, but also from a government that recognizes women’s right to leave a hopeless marriage.

But Mandy has found it hard to accept the terms of annulment, in which she is the guilty party on account of an inexistent psychological condition.

“I cannot write the real reason why I’m filing for an annulment. (It’s not fair to have) to say there’s something wrong with you.” Moreover, the costly process, which cost two months of the single-mother’s P8,000 monthly wage, is likely to take at least two years. The daily abuse may be over, but the scars live on, even in her son. “Every time he sees a knife he says ‘mommy, put the knife away, papa might grab it’.”