By Francis Ewherido
Parents bring children into the world, nurture them, see them through school and then there comes a time when they must let go of their children to chart their own future. What that time should be is still a matter of opinion.

The second strand of the matter is how do you let go? Do you leave your grown-up and married children to take all their decisions and make mistakes or get involved when you see them make mistakes that can be detrimental to their future? Or should parents mind their business until the children specifically ask for help? Do some parents even know when and how to let go in the first place?

There are no straightforward answers or universally-accepted solutions.  Last year, news broke of a 40-year-old widow in Zimbabwe on the verge of marrying her 23-year-old son she singlehandedly brought up from age 11 because she did not want to labour and another woman will enjoy the fruits of her labour. At the time the news broke, she was six months pregnant for her son! For this woman, letting go is non-existent in her vocabulary.

One point when letting go has become imperative is when our children get married. Parental and family intrusions are tearing marriages apart and creating problems. Marriage is no place for many cooks; they simply spoil the broth. On December 1, 2013, in this column, I made a distinction between interference and intervention:“Couples must note the little but significant difference between interference and intervention. Interference means ‘to meddle,’ ‘to obstruct a process,’ ‘be a hindrance.’ Intervention, on the other hand, means ‘mediation,’ ‘to come in as an extraneous factor.’” Intervention here should be seen as positive while interference is negative. In English it is not strictly so, but call it poetic license.

Interference in children’s marriages is wrong and parents who do it are those who do not know when to let go and those who failed in their parental duties during the children’s pre-teen and adolescent years and want to make amends for their failings at the wrong time. Others are downright self-centred parents. Sometimes it is just parental love and concern taken too far. Whatever, it is late; you do not look for a black goat at night.

Since 1988 — long before I got married —when I left home till date, my mother (my only surviving parent) has never interfered in my affairs. I know I am always in her thoughts and prayers and that is enough. I am the one who calls her for advice once in a while because of her enormous experience and wisdom.

Your adult and married children are no longer in the kindergarten. You are living your lives; allow them to live theirs. Unfortunately, sometimes it is the children who invite this interference. But parents must resist such invitations. They must advise their children to grow up and take charge of their marital lives. I am totally against parental interference in children’s marriages.

While intervention is positive and I do not have issues with it, I will not get involved except my children and their spouses; especially, specifically request me to intervene. I will intervene in my children’s marriage, even without invitation, on only one condition: if my son’s/daughter’s life were to be at risk from their spouses. I would rather save the life of my child than lose him/her. Parents who are predeceased by their children suffer a great deal and agonise over the loss throughout their life time. Marriage should not be the cause of such agonies.

I grew up seeing some violence-infested marriages where the victims stayed back; a couple of them died in the process, many more died psychologically and emotionally. There was always this helplessness from the victims and their families because “they are wedded (more like welded) in the church.”

Any day, I am an apostle of the indissolubility of marriage, especially Christian marriages; but as my children are growing and getting to the age of marriage, I am beginning to empathise with the parents of victims of abusive marriages. The case of Titilayo Arowolo, the banker, who was brutally stabbed about 76 times on June 24, 2011, and whose husband was recently sentenced to death for the murder, readily comes to mind. I sympathise with the deceased’s father, but I am of the opinion that parents who find themselves in a similar situation should help end the marriage before tragedy strikes.

For Catholics, the religious obligation of the sacrament of matrimony is usually the biggest obstacle in attempts to end such marriages. But the Catholic Church, other churches and religious groups do not teach that people should be abused or killed in marriages. Also such life-threatening experiences rob a marriage of its true nature, flavour, goals, value and identity as a covenant.

The Catholic Church needs to isolate and review such life-threatening marriages critically with a view to interveningin order to save the life of one or both parties. I am not a Church expert on these matters, but I believe that a good pastoral approach to such irredeemable situations will be to treat them just like marriages where there is prior deceit or misrepresentation. The marriages should be annulled and the victims allowed to remarry, if they so wish, without any encumbrance. Even with the Church’s strict, scripturally-based rules on matrimony, marriage is still a sacrament, not a death sentence.