Some tragedies are so sudden and horrific that everyone recognizes them as such immediately. 9-11 is a tragedy that struck to our nation’s core. It was sudden. It was unexpected. It was unprovoked. There was no denying the tragedy of 9-
11.
Divorce, on the other hand, is a tragedy our society fails to recognize as such. Despite evidence of increased child abuse and poverty, despite great percentages of homelessness, drug abuse, and perpetrators of violent crime being linked to single parent households, despite increased suicide, runaway and dropout rates, despite so much pain, divorce is not seen as a tragedy.
Conversely, attempts are instead made to normalize divorce, normalize what we know to be devastating to many families that remain silent, those lacking the ability to make their stories known, attempts are made to normalize this tragedy.
However, the greatest tragedy of divorce is not that which can be measured by statistics, but what happens inside a victim of divorce, in the heart, in the mind, in the soul.
How can you measure broken heartedness
How can you gage the cost of distraction caused by a lack of sleep and a preoccupied mind?
How can you determine the damage done to a soul rejected by one who had promised lifelong love and partnership?
It is the damage that occurs inside a person that is the greatest tragedy of divorce. Many will recover. Many will go on to get good jobs, buy new homes, remarry, appear well adjusted, but when you dig a little deeper, all of them carry the scars of divorce just below the surface.
When challenges are present, when a spouse’s education is not what one would hope for in the modern job market, when abuse is involved, especially when it is hard to prove or when the courts have become calloused by having seen worse, when a child has special physical, medical, mental, or academic needs, then becoming “well-adjusted” is a herculean task.
The tragedies of divorce, those that occur to adults and those that occur to children, do not often occur in intact families.
The statistics are undeniable and yet those statistics also have an underlying factor perpetuating them – the inability to concentrate, to the inability to hope, the inability to see past ourselves to a future and a world that awaits.
The greatest tragedy of divorce is the inability to dig oneself out of the hole divorce leaves in hearts, minds, and souls so that we can truly see the world around us.
Imagine, without the pain and distraction of divorce, how much time, effort, finances, and prayer one could devote to his or her job, education, health, family.
How would that change your life?
How much would that change your child’s life?
Imagine without the pain and distraction of divorce, how poverty, incarceration, suicide, drug use, child abuse and so many more negative things would decline.
How would that change your life?
How much would that change your child’s life?
How would that change our society?
Imagine, without the pain and distraction of divorce turning us in to ourselves, unable to identify with the greater pain and tragedy of others, how much Good we could bring to the world!
Imagine how much suffering could be prevented if our focus was not turned to ourselves but to God and His children. Could even a 9-11 have been prevented if we had spent decades looking to others instead of to ourselves?
Imagine how we could change the world. Imagine how much time, money, effort, and prayer we could offer those suffering beheadings and crucifixion in the Middle East and in other parts of the world. Imagine how we could reach out to a woman on the street so she doesn’t have to go home to her pimp every day. Imagine how much we hope we could give those women and their unborn babies on their way to abortion mills, if we weren’t so focused on our divorces, if we had hope in our own futures!
The greatest tragedy of divorce is that it robs, not just the immediate family, but the world of the Hope and Joy inside each of us. It robs the inherent desire to do Good given to us by a Loving Father. It steals the power we have been given to change the world for the better. It denies the world of our best. It denies the world of our gifts and talents and abilities.
Imagine if you put no effort into your divorce, into stressing over your finances, childcare, your next date, more.
How would that change your life?
How would that change your child’s life?
How would that change our society?
How would that change our world?
How could Loving others prevent another 9-11 near home or abroad?
14 years ago, a terrible event occurred in America, to America. Men possessed by evil used simple tools, the element of surprise, and a captive, unsuspecting population to wreak havoc on the world as we knew it, the world that would never be the same. On 9-11, 19 men callously killed almost 3000 Americans who were just trying to do their best to survive in this world.
But, at the same time as evil was taking over on those planes, amazing men and women were being formed.
Heroes rushed in to save as many as they could. It is suspected that at least some guessed they would never see daylight again, and yet this didn’t stop them. They showed themselves to truly be New York’s Finest, New York’s Bravest, New York’s Best.
On 9-11, while evil struck, Military personnel, who had been through battle zones and a hell most of us cannot imagine, faced hell in their own backyards where they should have been a safest in the place of command at the Pentagon. Having an idea of the danger present, heroes from around the nation waited no time at all as they prepared to fly overseas to meet the enemy in their own lands, families stood tall and kissed these heroes good-by.
On 9-11, ordinary men and women, who refused to sit idly by and become victims once more, who refused to allow destruction such as they had heard about occur again, became heroes, thinking less of themselves and more of where they were headed, acted to save countless lives.
One beautiful, blue Tuesday morning that changed America forever: almost 3,000 innocent lives immediately lost.
Do not let those lives have been lost in vain. Let those men and women inspire us to give of ourselves, to believe in the Goodness that is each of us, to reach for more, to dig ourselves out of ourselves, to look around at the world around us, to sacrifice, to make a difference.
The suffering divorce causes in individuals, in the theft of our time and energy which could be used to help others, shows that, although using totally different methods, divorce is inspired by the same evil that inspired the attacks on 9-11.
Evil attacks in the way it wants. It doesn’t play by rules. It knows our weaknesses. It knows our spouses will fall for temptation just as it knows a terrorist will fall for lies of a power-hungry liar. Evil also knows it can win victories when we fall for the distraction required to survive a trauma of divorce. Evil weakens us by turning us in to ourselves, blinding us to the building .
Today, on 9-11, decide to not fall for evil. You cannot control the actions of an ex spouse, a judge, or a lawyer any more than you can control the actions of a terrorist, but you control how you react to them.
You can choose to follow the lead of those heroes who saved so many on that fateful day. You can put aside your own concerns and focus on doing Good for others.
You can discover your power by doing Good, by helping others, by being a hero to your children, to another family, to someone in your own backyard or halfway around the world.
And when you do, you realize that while divorce will always be a tragedy, you, like those who have moved on from tragedies far greater than our own, tragedy does not define you.
911 affected my family and me in a personal way I write about in this month’s newsletter. I hope you subscribe today to get this first issue, and please dedicate today to making a difference and to praying for those affected by 9-11, especially those who give their lives to help others.
Statistics – The Fatherless Generation
God Bless…
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Excellent commentary and an attitude I’ve been writing of for a couple years now. Into the start of my 6th year of this travesty of divorce, it remains that attitudes and error-filled convictions abound still with some of my children (let alone the former spouse). Parent-child estrangement is, perhaps, the most devastating by-product of the divorce culture, outside of divorce itself. It leaves an indelible mark upon the life and Soul of the children involved well into adulthood, if left uncorrected. Often caused by one (or possibly both) parents mishandling of established procedures concerning divorce and children, parental estrangement is, as it was in mine, left to fester unimpeded by any outside efforts to heal it. The reason being it takes both parents to do so and if one is unwilling, there is not much the other can do but watch – and pray to Heaven for the help needed.
Divorce has been painted over the years as a healing and salvific savior of failing spouses and marriages. In effect, it is the worst purveyor of death and destruction of the family known to man for this one simple fact: It. Harms. The. Innocent.
Innocent spouses are helpless to contest No Fault Divorce. We are but consigned to live the affect for the remainder of our adult lives, all the while knowing our children will be living the affect far longer than we.
Thank you Dave. I too experienced this travesty 6 years ago. It is amazing how, when you’re going through something like this, you feel like you’re the only one in the world doing so, but then you begin to climb out of the hole and find out that the world continued spinning and others were suffering similar fates, that you were not, ARE not alone.
You are so right about the damage done to children of divorce and parent-child estrangement. I have worked SO hard to do all I could for my boys while also disciplining them and teaching them about faith, but there is a part of them I will never know thanks to divorce. My ex sees it too but blames me for his estrangement. I think you are more accurate. Estrangement is a necessary by-product of divorce, something those seeking divorce for selfish reasons have blinders to and refuse to accept responsibility for.
Marriage is the one “contract” that our courts award perpetrators for breaking. Your closing statements are so powerful; I am going to simply repeat them and thank you again for commenting.
God Bless…
Thanks for your kind comments…it sounds like we have parallel thought processes concerning our respective situations. I hope your kids have as few scars as possible, but the main thing is to TALK IT OUT, immediately and as frequently as necessary for the kids. It’s something mine were never urged to do and it shows. God’s Blessings to all…
Thank you Dave. Yes, talking it out is helpful. If you have tips on making that easier, I’d love to hear them. Sometimes I think I fail miserably at that. Also, let me know if you’re ever interested in doing a guest post. A man’s perspective would be Good to hear, and God may use you to reach an population I cannot.
God Bless…
Thank you for the invitation & privilege…there certainly are a couple topics for a post just within these brief exchanges. Perhaps you should skim a few of my other posts and see how they fit within yours…if you’ve still a mind afterwards, just send me an email and we can go from there. (I have been published a few times before on other websites, though nothing recently.)
RT @1MomAnd5Boys: Imagine a World Without The Tragedy of #Divorce: Inspiration of 911: #singleMom #Catholic #Christian MakeADifference http…
RT @1MomAnd5Boys: Imagine a World Without The Tragedy of #Divorce: Inspiration of 911: #singleMom #Catholic #Christian MakeADifference http…