TILL DIVORCH DO US PART

In a world where marital vows are meant to last a lifetime, what happens when the fairytale ends? We delve into the issue of divorce, where the promise of forever meets the final policy of goodbye

- AA Patawaran

In the Philippines, we have a deep and complicated relationship with endings. We sing of forever. We accept hardship as duty. We trust in vows, sometimes without question. Even before colonial churches shaped doctrine, family was already sacred. In precolonial barangays, kinship structured society. In this system, bloodlines, not territorial borders, were what truly defined connections and interactions among people. Homes were centres of belonging, governance, moral order. Long afterward, family remains the anchor of identity.

This explains our reluctance toward divorce. It is not only bishops or constitutional law. It is the belief that marriage upholds the household, and the household upholds the nation. That belief now faces a reckoning. In May 2024, the Philippines’ House of Congress approved the proposed Absolute Divorce Act on second reading. The bill now awaits Senate review, where cautious optimism and principled hesitation walk a narrow path. Senator Loren Legarda, who signed the committee report, remains measured. “I want to see final safeguards in place”, she said, “particularly mechanisms that protect the poor, uphold the sanctity of marriage where it can still be preserved, and ensure the law will not be wielded carelessly or in haste.”

Her caution is well placed. Legal divorce, even under strict guidelines, is more than policy. It shapes cultural expectations. It redefines permanence. It gives a concluding form not only to relationships but to commitments.