Around the family, other shifts occurred. ‘Companionate’ marriage created high expectations which were all too frequently disappointed. In the 1970s, divorce rates began rising across Europe, and against furious protests from the Roman Catholic Church, the possibility of divorce was introduced into the law codes of Catholic countries where it had previously been outlawed – in Italy, for instance, in 1970. That was a remarkable shift from the moment in 1947 when the constitution of the new Italian Republic had only missed affirming the indissolubility of marriage by three votes in the
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