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	Using Children As a Weapon in the Divorce Debate By Martin Scicluna Malta Independent May 10, 2011 http://www.independent.com.mt/news.asp?newsitemid=125017 What is it about the Maltese Church and the anti-divorce movement, Zwieg bla Divorzju, that causes them to use children as weapons in the battle to win votes in the forthcoming referendum to introduce remarriage after legal separation? Just before Easter, the Archbishop issued a Pastoral Note to children in which he urged them “to pray so that adults” (that is, their own parents) “take their decision” (in the forthcoming referendum) “on what Jesus wishes them to do” (sic). Coming on top of the attempts made by the Church-run schools to distribute anti-divorce leaflets among schoolchildren inviting their parents to attend seminars organised by Zwieg bla Divorzju, as well as putting pressure on teachers to join the anti-divorce movement, the Archbishop’s letter is a most deplorable attempt – using all the Maltese Church’s insidious power – to influence the votes of the parents of these children by instilling in them a sense of guilt. As Pope Benedict XVI could attest personally, inciting children against their parents in this way is frankly reminiscent of the youth sections of the National Socialist Party in Germany in the 1930s, but should be given short shrift in a relatively advanced secular parliamentary democracy like Malta. Given that the Archbishop’s note to children came almost to the day of the latest cri de coeur from the victims of Maltese clerical sex abuse, this showed the most exquisite sense of mistiming. Despite the findings of the Promoter of Justice in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican that the allegations of child abuse were well-founded, victims have still not heard officially of the outcome from the Archbishop. These victims are unable to find closure in their private lives until the Archbishop comes clean and formally, publicly, apologises for his Church’s poor handling of these cases. Presumably, he is waiting until after the divorce referendum to do this for fear that doing so before would undermine the Church’s crusade against it and could lose it the struggle for power which lies at the heart of its campaign. What does it say about the values of our Church that makes it ignore the sufferings of these victims – in cases which now go back eight years – while having no hesitation in dragging children into the current debate on divorce? Its record on clerical sex abuse leads to a justifiable charge of hypocrisy, and worse. As these cases have shown, the Church, as a human institution, does not hold a monopoly on establishing moral foundations in society, as it claims, far less the right to use innocent children as weapons with which to induce their parents to vote against remarriage after legal separation. The latest attempt to draw children into the debate came from the leader of Zwieg bla Divorzju who, bereft of any solid arguments against remarriage after legal separation, resorted after Easter to his default position of trying to instil in his listeners a culture of fear about divorce – the latest being the unsupported statement that “children are worst hit by divorce”. Never one to let the facts stand in the way of a specious argument designed to scaremonger in the referendum debate, his latest statement repeats the pattern set by his allies, the Maltese Church, by using children as the preferred weapon of choice to smite those whose informed consciences are telling them clearly to vote Yes to the introduction of divorce legislation. In the course of preparing the think-tank report ‘For Worse, For Better: Remarriage After Legal Separation’, we drew on as wide a range of views as possible, examining 25 major studies which recognised the complex variations in marriages that end in divorce and the fact that each case is determined by the particular context and background of the breakdown. What most reports showed clearly was that children are better off in a conflict-free divorced family than in conflict-ridden two-parent families. The studies suggested that it is simply wrong to state that the experience of divorce per se harms children. What variables influence the longer term outcome for children of separated or divorced parents? First, intense and frequent marital conflict has been associated with poorer psychological adjustment among children in both intact families and divorced families. Johnson, Kline and Tschann in their study, ‘On-Going Divorce Conflict: Effects on Children of Joint Custody and Frequent Access’, found that children in low conflict relationships are better adjusted than children in high conflict married or divorced families. The crucial point is that the strategies used to resolve conflict – as opposed to the degree of conflict – impact significantly on child adjustment. Children view parental separation or divorce as a crisis and generally speaking experience acute stress. But acute responses appear to diminish greatly within the first year after separation or divorce as Waldron, Ching and Fair showed in their report ‘A Children’s Divorce Clinic: Analysis of 200 Cases.’ Emery’s ‘Marriage, Divorce and Children’s Adjustment’ also showed that considerable numbers of children are well-adjusted in the years after divorce. The general conclusion, on which most reports agree, is that there are conflicting opinions about the effects of divorce on children. The research picture suggests that the subject is extremely complex. Some of those who oppose civil dissolution, and the right of parents to re-marry, claim that it harms children. Others claim that children are better off with parents who have re-married after legal separation than constant marital conflict and discord in a failed marriage. In general, however, no research study denies that the process of marital breakdown – whether resulting, as is the case in Malta today, in legal separation – may damage children. The evidence is widespread to the effect that children are emotionally and psychologically affected by the conflict and bitterness which can accompany the marital discord and breakdown, which precedes legal separation or divorce. There is very little research which focuses specifically on the different and comparative effects at each discrete stage of legal separation, annulment, divorce or, indeed, the root problem, which is marital breakdown itself. Research of this nature would labour under the obvious difficulty that the conflict arising out of marital breakdown is inextricably bound up with the legal separation or divorce that follows. It is difficult to establish whether the psychological effects on the children are due to the experiences associated with chronic discord in a marriage which is breaking up, or to those specific to breakdown, since breakdown, legal separation or divorce rarely occur without a substantial period of prior parental antagonism and conflict. Bald statements, of the kind being peddled by Zwieg bla Divorzju that divorce per se harms children are irresponsible and not supported by the evidence. Divorce is a legal remedy to dissolve a finished marriage and an opportunity to re-build the post-divorce parental relationship in a way that is deliberately designed to serve the best interests of the children. The fundamental and overriding point is that it is marital friction, hostility and breakdown which cause the primary emotional damage to children. It is utterly wrong to state categorically that it is the experience of divorce itself which harms children. Martin Scicluna is a member of the IVA Campaign and the lead author of the Report ‘For Worse, For Better: Remarriage After Legal Separation’
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