Hard to believe, but Chile has just enacted a law permitting civil divorce. Here’s the article – Chile Steps Slowly in New World of Divorce – from the International Herald Tribune.
Here’s one startling statistic from the article. The change may have been prompted by an awareness that Chileans were responding to their inability to divorce by never marrying. At least before the enactment of the change (permitting divorce), more than half the children in Chile were born to unmarried parents. Proponents for the change argue that it will strengthen marriage rather than weaken it, by giving spouses the assurance there will be a legal escape route if it becomes necessary.