Bishop Says Divorce Children Are Born 'Losers'
Bishop Christopher Jones of Elphin has claimed that many children of damaged homes are so starved of love that they grow up to be dysfunctional adults – having ultimately been born “losers.”
The bishop said his 17 years of working social services in Sligo had shown him how a broken marriage greatly damaged these children.
"Many of them were born losers. They had no start in life in terms of a loving relationship," he told the Irish Independent. Jones added he had observed that kids who were not given love at an early age were "denied a sense of self-esteem and self-worth."
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Bishop Christopher Jones emphasized that he was not condemning single parents, many of which he believed were making “heroic efforts.” However, he believed that “the greatest good” would “come ultimately from the family in marriage,” the Irish Independent reported.
According to Jones, there are marriages that end for uncontrollable reasons and in those circumstances “compassion ought to be our overriding response.”
Nevertheless, he told the Irish Independent, “When a culture of marriage weakens, an ever-growing number of children will never experience the inestimable value of being raised by a loving, married mother and father.”
The president of the Catholic marriage care service Accord added, "This is not to say that children cannot thrive outside of the marital family but if we really value childhood, then we must do what we can to try and ensure that children are raised by the fathers and mothers who bring them into the world."
Bishop Jones said that since 2008 Accord has seen an increase in numbers of people coming for marriage/relationship counseling, the highest figure to date – with over 43,000 hours provided last year.
According to the CDC in 2009, out of 44 states and Washington, D.C., the divorce rate for the United States was 3.4 per 1,000 people.
