The Irish standard., 1902-01-11

On a recent Sunday, Rev. VIM.
T. Russell, secretary to Cardinal Glib
bons, preached the following sermon
on Divorce at the Baltimore Cathe-
dral:
What, therefore, God hath Joined
together let no man put assunder.-St.
Matt. xix, 6.
'"Ehis prohibition is coeval with the
institution of marriage" said Father
Russell. "In evidence of this we have
the words of our Lord. Speaking Of
marriage, He said: Have ye not read
that He who made man from the be-
ginning made them male and female?
For this cause shall man leave
father and mother and cleave to his
wife, and they two shall be in one
flesh. What, therefore, God hath
Joined together let no man put asun
der. The Pharisees say to Him, Why,
then, did Moses command to give a
bill of divorce and to put away? And
He said to them, Because Moses, by
reason of the hardness of your heart,
permitted you to put away your wives,
but from the beginning it was not So
Three conclusions are to be drawn
from this passage. First, according
to the original design Of God, the bond
of marriage could not be dissolved;
secondly, on account of the hardness
Of their hearts, Moses as law-giver
permitted divorce; thirdly, the Chris
tian law reafirms the original decree
in it's full vigor.
After centuries during which the
original law of marriage was at first
neglected and afterward entirely
ignored, the law was revived in all its
force by Jesus Christ.
Those who maintain that the Chris
tian religion still permits divorce base
the Scriptural proof of their doctrine
on the words Of our Lord contained
in st. Matthew, fifth chapter, thirty
second verse. From this text they
argue: Christ says, "He who shall
put away his wife, except for this one
cause, and marrieth another commit
teth adultery" Therefore, they con-
clude, he who dismisses his wife on
account Of this crime and marries
another does not sin.
Let us first observe that this clause
Except for the crime named) does not
occur in the corresponding text of St.
Mark or st. Luke. We read in st.
Mark x, 9-12: ''What, therefore, God
hath Joined together let no man put
assunder." And in the house again
His disciples asked Him concerning
; the same thing, and He said to them,
''Whosoever shall put away his wife
and marry another committeth adul-
terry against her, and If the wife shall
put away her husband and be married
to another she committeth adultery"
In st. Luke xiv, 1s: "Every one
that putteth away his wife and mar
rieth another committeth adultery"
In both these texts we see that Christ
simply calls it crime for a man to
put away his wife and marry another.
st. Matthew xix, 3, throws some
light on the solution of this seeming
difficulty. The Pharisees ask our
Lord: 'Is it lawful for man to put
away his wife for every cause?" In
the Jewish law there were numerous
causes justifying man in repudia-
ting his wife, and some causes en-
powering the woman to compel the
man to give her bill of divorce. The
Pharisees ask our Lord a leading
question.
To this question our Lord makes an
swer. From His words one thing is
evident, that man who dismisses his
wife for any cause but one, and mar
ries another, commits adultery. But
this answer is not entirely satisfac-
tory. For man may have the right to
repudiate his wife and still not have
right to marry another. st. Paul
puts this very forcibly in Romans vii,
= 23. In First Corinthians vii, 10.
II: ''But to them that are married.
not 1 but the Lord commandeth that