Cana Movement worried about marriage break-ups situation

The Cana Movement is looking at ways to make the pre-marriage courses more relevant to couples, movement director Louis Camilleri said.

Speaking to The Times in the light of the current situation of marriage breakdowns and debts which couples were incurring, Fr Camilleri said that apart from restructuring, which has been done to the courses in the last years, the movement is continuing to see how they can be improved through research.

Earlier this month Fr Camilleri said debts were among the preoccupations and difficulties faced by couples. He said loans taken out by couples sometimes led to marriage break-ups.

"The pre-marriage courses are intended to help engaged couples to reflect on their relationship and their commitment to their marriage, but there are no guarantees that the marriage will be successful," he told The Times.

Fr Camilleri said a stable relationship and a successful marriage depended on a number of factors, including family background, the upbringing of the couple, personality, sense of sacrifice, psychological factors, the degree of commitment the couple had towards their relationship and marriage and the time and effort they were willing to invest to make their marriage work.

"The increasing number of marriage break-ups is very worrying to the movement," he said.

Asked how the movement viewed marriage break-ups, which were becoming increasingly common, Fr Camilleri said the Cana Movement saw in this phenomenon one of the indicators of the rapid changes in society which, he said, had belatedly reached Malta.

"We are now affected by the same malaise that western society has been living through for some time," he said.

Are the courses necessary considering that a number of couples have sex before they are married and some even live together? the question was put. Fr Camilleri expressed his belief that marriage preparation was very important, especially since relationships had become more complex. He said that couples needed to have a clear idea of what marriage commitment was.

"I think that engaged couples need to have the opportunity to discuss and think about their relationship, their expectations, and their future marriage, and these courses give them this opportunity," he said.

The Cana Movement has been organising pre-marriage courses since 1956. He said that at first the courses consisted of seven sessions for large groups. However, around 10 years ago the movement overhauled the courses. Today, he said, pre-marriage courses are held for small groups of couples. He said the movement trained married couples to act as facilitators of these small groups. The movement has 260 facilitator couples.

Although the marriage preparation courses were an important part of the movement's work, Fr Camilleri said the movement offered other services, such as marriage counselling, support groups and teaching of natural family planning, which, he said, were equally important.

Earlier this month the movement's annual general meeting heard of its difficult financial situation due to rising costs and a drop in revenue.

"The Cana Movement is a voluntary organisation, and most of its workers are volunteers. However, to be able to run efficiently, it also has a small number of paid staff, mainly for administrative work, and a few professional workers," the director said.

The government makes an annual grant to the movement to help it carry out its services. This grant, Fr Camilleri said, covered one-third of the movement's costs.

The movement, he added, organised fund-raising activities to help it carry out its work.

"Unfortunately the income from the activities has not been very good, and we are trying to find new ways to raise money," he said, adding that the movement welcomed anyone who could help in the fund-raising activities.

Last year the income from fund-raising covered just 16 per cent of the movement's total expenses.

The movement's costs arise from three main areas: salaries, training and administration.