By Corazon Damo-Santiago
The Bible is the story of how God reached out to man by making covenants. These seven covenants started in the Garden of Eden. The Webster dictionary defines covenant as a formal, solemn, binding agreement or premise. The New World Dictionary: Concordance to the New American Bible explains it religiously in the context of the Old and New Testaments. It says that covenants were made, “not to win God’s benefits which are totally gratuitous” but accept the rules as God’s people. An important aspect of the covenant is the consequences if the rules are violated.
Story of creation
After creating a perfect world in seven days, “He put the man, he had formed” (Genesis 1:8) Then He said, “It is not good for the man to live alone. I will make a suitable companion to help him” (Genesis 1:18). While Adam was sleeping, He took one of his ribs, closed up the flesh, formed a woman out of the rib and brought it to Adam, who said, “At last, here is one of my own kind.” (Genesis 1:21-23).
To Adam and Eve, the first parents of mankind, “preternatural gifts” were given, “wisdom of immensely high order…strength of will…perfect control of passions and senses…resulting in perfect interior tranquility.” Too, they were gifted with freedom from suffering and death.
In the Garden of Eden, God made a covenant with Adam and Eve, “not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge” (Genesis 1:16).
Fall of man
Adam and Eve disregarded their covenant with God. Tempted by the serpent, they believed that the fruit will make them like God who knows what is good and what is bad.
The serpent cunningly said: “You certainly will not die. No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God (Genesis 3:4-5).
Chris McCarthy in the Story of the Bible stated that Adam and Eve committed the sins “lust of flesh, lust of the eyes and the pride of life.”
Covenant of marriage
United, Adam and Eve became one. God, who created man out of love, also called husbands and wives to love.
The church attaches great importance to Jesus’ presence at the wedding of Cana where He performed His first miracle. In His preachings, Jesus emphasized that marriage is indissoluble (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1614).
God Himself has determined it and when some Pharisees asked if divorce is allowed, Jesus answered: “Have you not read, that from the beginning the Creator made them male and female? For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall be one flesh. So, they are no longer two, but one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, no human being must separate” (Matthew 19:4-6).
Divorce in the Philippines
The Philippines is a predominantly Catholic in faith. Vatican City and the Philippines are the only two countries in the world where divorce is not legal.
However, House Bill 7303 which seeks to legalize divorce in the Philippines has been approved in the House of Representatives on March 19, 2018.
The survey conducted nationwide by the Social Weather Station from March 25 to 28, 2017, and from December 8 to 16, 2017, and showed that “53 percent of adult Filipinos support divorce for irreconcilably separated couples.”
Damo-Santiago is a former regional director of the Department of Education National Capital Region. She is currently a faculty member of Mater Redemptoris Collegium in Calauan, Laguna, and of Mater Redemptoris College in San Jose City, Nueva Ecija.