Last year, Pope Francis suggested that half of all marriages are invalid. His reasoning was that Catholics often fail truly to grasp what marriage is, and it is in this context that the Synod Fathers are contemplating easier access to annulments Along with language and ideas unheard in Rome since the Second Vatican Council, the Extraordinary Synod on the Family is urging what has long been anathema in the Vatican: ­broadening access to annulments. Even fierce opponents of Cardinal Walter Kasper’s call for a path back to the sacraments, such as Cardinal Angelo Scola of Milan and the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Gerhard Müller, have fielded concrete proposals to make the process easier and faster. The reason for this new consensus, Archbishop Di