The most ignored words attributed to Jesus in the Gospels are the second half of Matthew 18:18, "... whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." The Church has done a banner job with the binding part. But the loosing? Not so much.

Does anybody really think Jesus ever intended for people to be stuck for a lifetime in loveless, life-draining and abusive marriages? Even in the famous Matthew 19 that hardliners love to reference, Jesus acknowledged that Moses had authority in his day to modify the regulations for practical reasons. Why should the Church have any less authority to modify them for pastoral reasons?

A Church that holds a rigid ideal that runs counter to human experience will, ultimately, become irrelevant. And human experience tells us that sometimes people need do-overs.