AMERICA/PERU - The Bishops lament declaration of Rapid Divorce Law that “weakens the family, places children and youth at risk for growing up with a model of marriage that is far from the transcendent values of love, unity, and stability.”

Lima (Agenzia Fides) - The Peruvian Bishops’ Conference has issued a statement expressing their lament for a decision made by the Peruvian Government to approve policies that facilitate and support the disintegration of families, through the passing of Law no. 29227 that regulates a non-contentious proceeding in conventional separation and divorce in town halls and notaries.
“While the country is experiencing an economic and material growth,” the statement reads, “it is sad to see that the government ratifies a law that permits the dissolution of families by rapid means, which does not benefit them in any way and on the contrary, it weakens them and leads to their breakdown, placing children and youth at risk for growing up with a marital model and constitution that is temporal, passing and conditional, far from the transcendent values of love, unity, and stability that should be the foundations for a marriage between a man and a woman.”
In response to this unfortunate decision, the Bishops manifest their hope that the Peruvian Government may also “concern themselves in drafting and approving laws in favor of the family, which protect and guide it on paths of integration, education, and the success of mutual love, so that it can guarantee the formation of homes, true life-cells for Peruvian society,” and asks that authorities may not loose sight of the “well-being and progress of all members of the family and guarantee its stability.”
It is not the first time that the Bishops speak out against this project. Already at the beginning of April, they issued a statement describing the Law as “in no way in consonance with or strengthening to the family and on the contrary, it weakens it and leads to its rupture and separation.” Cardinal Juan Luis Cipriani, Archbishop of Lima, said in his radio program, “Dialogues of faith,” that the law is “a bureaucratic solution that will cause worse problems, because it is an incentive for more divorces, more broken marriages, more suffering, and more attacks on society.”
The Law that accelerates the divorce process was passed by Congress on May 15, with the support of 59 legislators versus 8 who voted against it. There were also 11 representatives who did not vote. However the new law that authorizes divorce upon mutual consent in town halls and notaries was also criticized somewhat by the College of Notaries and family judges, who warned that without some corrections, the results could be disastrous. This Law allows Peruvians to obtain a divorce in three months in the town halls and notaries, without having to wait over two years for the Judicial Branch to approve the legal separation. (RG) (Agenzia Fides 20/5/2008; righe 33, parole 439)