St. Helena, Pray For Us! Or, How To Love Our Friends Who Have Been Abandoned By Their Spouses

I cannot fathom a reason why I would ever abandon Beth. But most of the abandoned spouses I’ve ever met also couldn’t foresee their home being broken up. I live a pretty darn blessed life and I am ever-thankful for it.

But in the past 6 days, two very close friends who try as much as any of us to adhere to Christ have shared with me varying degrees of disaster growing in their lives. One discovered infidelity on his wife’s part and it seemed to have grown out of a friendly relationship she had with another man. The other has been told to leave the house and is now homeless.

Being a great Catholic father does not simply mean I need to do amazing things with my children and raise them into sainthood. We all fall short of the standard set forth by Bandit Heeler. It also means indirectly showing them how a Catholic man (or simply a Catholic human) is called to act in the world. And that means loving our brethren. Even the difficult ones.

The Church’s teaching on abandoned spouses

Pope St. John Paul II spoke clearly when he released Familiaris Consortio in 1981 when he said that “…marriage and the family constitute one of the most precious of human values…”, and “…that only by the acceptance of the Gospel are the hopes that man legitimately places in marriage and in the family capable of being fulfilled.”

Notice that marriage and family are presented as being two parts of one whole, namely a “precious family value”. That is near-radical concept in today’s world. Yet we can only fully realize that blessing by residing in Christ’s wounded body, by clinging to the Gospel. For we, the church, are two parts of one whole, married to Christ. We are the body, He is the head. This goes for those of us in the individual marriages, and those members of our parishes that are outside of these relationships – to include (cue ominous music) unmarried parents, people cohabitating, and same sex attracted people.

Men and women in the Church can feel rejected by the Church. Broken men and women in the Church have rejected them. Some of the stories are heartbreaking and we need to do better. As the heads of our households, men can make that happen. And our brothers in Christ who have been abandoned by their spouses are treading water out there all alone and getting tired.

Surprise! The Church allows for divorce…kinda.

In some, well-defined circumstances, the Catholic Church approves of divorce. Civil divorce, that is. When a spouse is not intending to end the bonds of matrimony – which is an impossibility and a mortal sin to attempt, anyway – but has no other recourse except a civil divorce to protect the children, protect an inheritance, and secure/protect other rights, then the Church permits a civil divorce.

You need not tolerate an unrepenting abuser. But an unrepenting abuser is still married. And the Sacrament of Matrimony is intended to save the abused and the abuser. So pray for the spouse from afar. But get safe first.

Details don’t matter – St. Helena will intercede for you.

St. Helena was the wife of an emperor and the mother of an emperor. Without her, we wouldn’t have the True Cross. Occidental Christianity would like be very different. And legendarily, Cyprus would have fewer cats. She was also an abandoned spouse. St. Helena was raised in the lower classes of society and somehow met and married the future Roman Emperor, Constantius sometime before 270 AD. They had one son together, Constantine I. 

When their emperorlet was a teenager, Constantius realized that he was a rising commodity in Rome. He dropped Helena and Constantine in the court of the Great Persecutor, Emperor Diocletian.

Lacking the education in court intrigues that other mothers of young nobles, St. Helena nevertheless managed to help her son move through shark-infested waters of the Tiber River and emerge as the Roman army’s choice of successor when Constantine’s lame-o dad abdicated the throne via the grave.

Because of this display of single-motherhood, and her subsequent sainthood, St. Helena is perfectly fitted for helping us when we are forced to break up the marital abode – but not the marital bonds, no man or woman has the power to do that.

St. Helena shows us how to persevere.

Abandoned spouses can feel like living martyrs. There is a lack of center. It is as if the boat you planned on sailing into eternity is suddenly cut in half.

It might seem that leaning away from the missing half and hoping to balance on your one hull is the best choice. But leaning toward the missing half and trying to repair the rift is going to get you further and get you there more safely, too (usually…see above).