yes, Susan, but back in the real world... some of us have given everything, and more, to make a marriage work 'til-death , when that marriage had no chance of doing so in the circumstances.

Yes, Noreen the real world... you seem to have made some pretty definitive, gratuitous assumptions about the world I live in. In the real world where I live, I have often been the one to come in the middle of the night to take the Mrs. out of a beating. In my real world, I have been the one to escort a lady to the lawyer.... in my real world, I have cleaned up the wreckage left by someone who bailed out, and I've raised her two children... In my little corner of the real world, I've reached out to and spoken up for people who have been in the situation you describe so painfully, when other churches and clergy have denied them the Sacrament and treated them like lepers. In fact I grew up in that sort of real world, and I was my mother's strongest supporter from the age of 13 on, when she created peace in our home by ending the abuse that had taken it over.

Noreen, I support with action my belief in people's right to decide how to live, for themselves. Not quite what you assumed, I think?

It takes two to make this marriage thing work- and sometimes it doesn't.

Yes, I referred to this in my own post, which you seem to have missed in your eagerness to set me straight from YOUR moral high ground.

Implied criticism of those who are already suffering and dealing with the consequences, from your moral high ground/marital contentment, could be taken to be offensive.

This thread was about someone asking for advice. Several other people posted about completely different situations as though what they had experienced were parallel, and it isn't. I commented based on how far off the mark I thought their "help" was, in relation to the topic of this thread. I questioned the logic's applicability to the situation first presented.

Noreen, you just were off base, and I think it would be mature of you to acknowledge it.

~Susan