Healing From Divorce Is Hard But Possible—Here's How

For most people who go through a divorce, there is a grave sense of injustice. Not just for those who have been betrayed by infidelity, but for everyone who stood at the altar on their wedding day and pledged their lives and love to their spouses for life, yet ended up divorced. The anger that comes with feelings of injustice can be overwhelming, often turning into rage. It's easy to shake your fist and say, Wait, what about me?

A few years after my own unwanted divorce, anger had become my constant companion and there was a great distance between me and God. I could barely stand going to Mass because it was so painful. All those happy families and couples were just reminders of what I had lost. Have you ever had this experience?

The first step is this: realizing God isn't at the center of your life.

In times like these, it's easy to think that you'll never be happy again and that you'll always be broken inside. You might be asking yourself, "How in the world will I ever heal from this?" In my own experience, it took me a while to figure out why I wasn't healing, why I was so lost, and more importantly why I never found my need for justice fulfilled. It was because God was no longer the center of my life, all those other things were.

I had let my anger and disillusionment, and my relentless search for justice become my focus. But just like being hit by a bolt of lightening, one day I realized with great certainty that the only way to really heal from all that hurt was to come back to Jesus. But not just come back to him, to encounter him. I needed my relationship with God to not just be revived, I needed to encounter him the way Mary Magdalene encountered him on Easter Sunday.

And the second step is letting go of attachments to make room for Him again.

I believe the same is true for anyone in crisis. So, how does one go about doing this? Let me share with you some of the steps I took, coupled with some excellent practical wisdom from Bishop Robert Barron:

1.    You have to let go of your own feelings.

If we want Jesus to heal us, he must be at the center of our hearts, and that means we have to set aside our righteous indignation. The hardship of being displaced by divorce is part of following Christ that we must accept. This may sound insensitive to the great tragedy that takes place because of divorce, but it's not. It is truly a step toward healing.

In his video titled, The Centrality of Christ, Bishop Barren tells us the following important point, "What has to fall away if Jesus is the absolute center of my life are my private feelings of being wounded and having unjust things happen to me, and my righteous indignation, and my desire to set things right. 'I'm setting the agenda, here, Lord, do what I want.' That's got to fall away. If that's how we feel then Jesus is not Lord of our lives."

2.    You have to let go of your home.

Having a home is a very big deal for people who go through a divorce. Many people lose their homes and this is a great suffering. I was very indignant that I lost the right to be in my own home after my divorce. We all want a place to call our own, to be stable, and comfortable and relaxed. Foxes have dens, etc. but the Son of Man has nowhere...if you're going to follow Christ, you have to be ready to accept this.

In the same video, Bishop Barren quotes Jesus saying: "Foxes have dens. Birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to rest his head." He wasn't trying to scare them away, he was making a point..." meaning, our need for comfort and stability has to fall away if we are to follow Christ.

3.    The people you love the most have to take second place to Jesus.

For anyone who is divorced, this is simply a call to let go and place the ones you lost because of divorce; your ex-spouse, your in-laws, neighbors and friends, children, etc. in God's hands. Give them all to him and let him handle them.

So this is what I did and what I hope you will consider doing if you really want to heal. This is the hard work of healing. Let go of your own feelings, let go of your home, let go of the ones you love and make Christ the center of your life. If you do this, he will bless you in ways you could never imagine.