On this week’s Marriage Unhindered on Relevant Radio, Doug Hinderer sat down with Dr. Christine Bacon to confront a hard reality many Catholics face: marriages that look shattered beyond repair. Their conversation didn’t float in abstractions. It was gritty, concrete, and rooted in the painful stories of spouses abandoned, betrayed, and tempted to give up.

Dr. Bacon explained how her ministry began with just four people in her living room in 2016—four spouses whose partners were divorcing them, annulling them, or leaving for someone else. Instead of walking away, these men and women chose to stand on their vows. “God does His best work in the 12th hour,” she said, and she has seen it. After shifting to Zoom during COVID, that small gathering has grown to more than 500 participants across every state and ten countries. More than 40 marriages have already reconciled.

Doug pressed into why this happens. The world tells wounded spouses, “Move on. Find your soulmate. You have a right to be happy.” Dr. Bacon pushes back with the Gospel’s straight line: deny yourself, pick up your cross, and follow Christ. That includes denying the desire to abandon a difficult marriage or chase a fantasy of perfection.

Doug added that while bodies can separate, souls cannot. “What God has joined together, you can’t pull apart.” He reminded listeners that even when a spouse announces, “I’m done,” time often softens hardened hearts. He’s seen people return after one year—or twenty.

Their discussion touched on Lila Miller’s Impossible Marriages Redeemed, where Dr. Bacon herself is named. The stories echo the same pattern: fidelity, suffering, and surprising grace.

The clearest takeaway came from Doug: “There’s no problem in a marriage for which there is not a solution.” For spouses living in the wreckage, this isn’t sentimental—it’s a call to hope, one cross at a time.

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