Albay 1st District Rep. Edcel Lagman denied Thursday that a divorce law would destroy families, saying a marriage is already wrecked even before a couple files for divorce.

“Hindi ho totoo ‘yun sapagkat bago magpetisyon for divorce e sira na ‘yung pamilya, sira na ‘yang kasal,“ the principal author of HB 9349 said in a TeleRadyo Serbisyo interview.

He quoted a Supreme Court ruling that said divorce would be a “merciful interment of a long dead marriage.”

Lagman said divorce is not the monster that destroys the relationship between husband and wife but marital abuse, infidelity and abandonment. “Ito ang sumisira sa kasal,” he said.

He noted divorce is not against the teachings of the Catholic Church since the latter also allows dissolution of marriage.

HB 9349 or the Absolute Divorce Bill was approved by the House of Representatives on third and final reading, with 126 yes votes, 109 no votes, and 20 abstentions.

Absolute divorce bill gets final House nod

Under the measure, the grounds for absolute divorce include the same grounds for legal separation and annulment. But divorced spouses are given the right to remarry, unlike in legal separation.

Grounds for divorce include physical violence or grossly abusive conduct directed against the petitioner or a child of the petitioner, drug addiction, habitual alcoholism, or chronic gambling, homosexuality, marital infidelity, and abandonment without justifiable cause for more than one year.

The bill also allows spouses, who have been separated for at least 5 years to file for divorce. Other grounds include irreconcilable differences, other forms of domestic abuse, and when one of the spouses undergoes sex reassignment surgery or transition from one sex to another.