The Advantages of Using a Minister-Mediator

Divorce arouses some of the strongest emotions you will ever experience. You know this is so if your are contemplating divorce, are in the midst of divorce, or are close to someone who is going through it. Emotions are the weather systems of the body/mind/spirit and need to find release – will find release, even if that means a physical or verbal eruption, or an even more dangerous repression, like a ticking bomb in the organs and tissues of the body.

The law is a cerebral kingdom where too much emotion can disrupt the rational equilibrium. The only emotion that has managed to carve a niche for itself is righteous indignation, which is like a little boat of words tossing on a sea of wrath. If you are trying to paddle on the vast ocean of emotions – fear, grief, shock, rage, yearning, bewilderment, exhilaration, despair – and the only emotion that is allowed expression is righteous indignation, all your emotions are going to start looking like righteous indignation. This is a natural consequence of the system, but it is a terrible injustice to you.

Lawyers are not trained to be masters of interpreting and supporting the elusive parade of human emotions. They are masters of an enormous body of law and their one job is to use those laws to fight for what’s in your best interests. Ministers, on the other hand, receive training in how to support, console and guide the individual though the labyrinth of emotions, particularly as it pertains to moral and spiritual dilemmas – divorce certainly being one of the major ones.

In my role as a mediator, the minister plays the supporting role, but a critically important one. I do not believe that a truly fair and long lasting resolution can be reached if the emotions are barred from participation in the process. They will come back to subvert or undermine the work unless they are taken into consideration from the beginning. This does not mean that we get bogged down in long detours of emotional wrangling – mediation is not therapy – but rather that I am alert to the spoken and unspoken emotional currents that steer the negotiations and can recognize when they threaten to capsize the vessel and when the tide is full and ready to carry the ship to shore. I am a firm and fair referee when it comes to maintaining civility. The emotions will not overwhelm if they are given a chance to be heard. Your feelings are welcome at this table. This is the first advantage.

The second advantage is that I care deeply about how this process influences and is influenced by the deep moral compass of your heart and soul. The spiritual toxicity that can result from a bad divorce is a poison to you and your children and the world. As the learned Rabbi said, “Divorce is a Mitzvah!” – that is, a spiritual challenge, a moral test, and my job is to coach you so that you can pass this test and not have to repeat the same patterns in a future relationship!

My sense of morality – as you might have already guessed – is not the old-fashioned, guilt-ridden, finger-pointing kind. Far from it. My conviction is that each soul is the captain of its own ship and master of its own destiny and seeks its own fulfillment with all the integrity and care it can muster. My role is to discern the still, small voice of that thirsty soul and help clear the way for its advancement.

It is the deep law of the Soul and the interdependent realm of the Spirit that a pure intent can not harm another being. It is my intent that we should work together in such a way as to make this so.

Divorce can be a blessing. Don’t allow it to be a curse.

Rev. Rebecca Armstrong