|
Source: (consider it)
|
Thread: All them marriages
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
Soooo... the Vicar of Christ on earth has declared that most Roman Catholic marriages are invalid because of lack of proper intent. The rad trads are in fury over this. Me, I'm an Anglican and I tend to think that marriage is not a sacrament. His Holiness is right though, is he not? given that over 95 percent of marriage annulments are granted by the Vatican, we are left with one of two choices. Either a large percentage of marriages are invalid or the Church is in the very regular habit of declaring null actually valid marriages.
Make of this what you want, moderators. It's a real question though.
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
Soooo... the Vicar of Christ on earth has declared that most Roman Catholic marriages are invalid because of lack of proper intent.
Link, please.
--------------------
Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
|
Posted
This is what the search engine came up with
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/most-marriages-today-are-invalid-pope-francis-suggests-51752/
Haven't read it yet... But I was once a guest at a wedding in an RC cathedral where the happy pair had FIVE previous marriages between them, all anulled. Struck me then and still does that the anulment route is basically RC divorce and, in a world where the vast majority of states have divorce, simply another way for the vatican to make money.
--------------------
Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Galilit
Shipmate
# 16470
|
Posted
I was involved as a "witness" in a friend's annulment proceedings.
As it was explained to me by the "court" before which I gave my testimony, there has to be a proven, material impediment to the success of the marriage which, had the applicant known of it at the time he/she would not have married that person.
In her case her husband was bi-polar but this was only diagnosed more than ten years after the wedding. (Before that we all thought he was just a genius!)
She wanted to marry again (to another Catholic in a Catholic church), so she had to get this annulment.
It was a gruelling 3 hour inquisition from a form several pages long and I had to transcribe my oral answers in my own hand, signing every single page.The priest would listen to my answer and then tell me what parts of what I had said he thought relevant. He would say "Yes. Write that down", for example.
My friend told me that the process is regarded more and less seriously in different places. So that some countries it's just a formality (as it was for her other "witness" in California) and others it is a long process and not always granted.
"Long process" for me (in Israel under the Latin Patriarchate) meant they got her application and my name and contact details and then did nothing at all for 6 months before they even got in touch with me. After another 3 phone-calls and 2 appointments to which the priest never even turned up (without telling me he was not coming), I actually sat at a desk answering the questions on the form. The Priest (and HIS witness) asked me many supplementary questions to clarify...I dunno what. Some incredibly private questions and intrusive enquiries, I might add.
In retrospect it was an experience I'll never forget. It showed me how the RC priests involved could do exactly what they felt like - either to expedite or to delay the matter; to help her or to make her difficult situation even moreso.
Not at all what Our Brother from Nazareth had in mind!
Though she got it in the end and is happily married to this day.
--------------------
She who does Her Son's will in all things can rely on me to do Hers.
Posts: 624 | From: a Galilee far, far away | Registered: Jun 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
|
Posted
[tangent]
How would you know he had an illness ten years before it was diagnosed ? Bipolar disorder is not present from birth.
[/tangent]
--------------------
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Humble Servant
Shipmate
# 18391
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
given that over 95 percent of marriage annulments are granted by the Vatican, we are left with one of two choices. Either a large percentage of marriages are invalid or the Church is in the very regular habit of declaring null actually valid marriages.
Or possibly very few Catholics with valid marriages apply for annulments. The Vatican only sees the null ones. Do we know how many marriages end in nullity?
Posts: 241 | Registered: Apr 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
however gruelling the process, the end result is that the overwhelming majority of annulments are granted, so are the overwhelming majority of RC marriages contracted on invalid grounds?
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Arethosemyfeet
Shipmate
# 17047
|
Posted
I suppose one could take the view that any marriage that does not succeed in being lifelong, stable and productive of the fruits of the spirit for the participants is invalid, and hence that anyone pursuing an annulment almost by definition be in an invalid marriage. Not sure I'm convinced by that argument, however.
Posts: 2933 | From: Hebrides | Registered: Apr 2012
| IP: Logged
|
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
Soooo... the Vicar of Christ on earth has declared that most Roman Catholic marriages are invalid because of lack of proper intent.
Link, please.
the catholic herald online, La Stampa, a lot of papers had the news yesterday. Damian Thompson is beside himself in the Observer, it's almost funny (not in any kind of Christian way, of course).
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
|
Posted
He's issued a revised transcript giving the statement as "a proportion of" - not sure if that means they are saying he was misquoted, or that he has corrected his original statement.
--------------------
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Anselmina
Ship's barmaid
# 3032
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Galilit:
I was involved as a "witness" in a friend's annulment proceedings.
As it was explained to me by the "court" before which I gave my testimony, there has to be a proven, material impediment to the success of the marriage which, had the applicant known of it at the time he/she would not have married that person.
In her case her husband was bi-polar but this was only diagnosed more than ten years after the wedding. (Before that we all thought he was just a genius!)
Does this mean, then, that there is no 'in sickness and in health/for better for worse' clause to a Roman Catholic marriage - or something similar?
I would've thought that a 'material impediment to the success' of a marriage was more about malicious behaviour or deliberate deceit
eg, an existing spouse, a secret family, a serious criminal history, rather than a developing illness.
--------------------
Irish dogs needing homes! http://www.dogactionwelfaregroup.ie/ Greyhounds and Lurchers are shipped over to England for rehoming too!
Posts: 10002 | From: Scotland the Brave | Registered: Jul 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Galilit
Shipmate
# 16470
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
[tangent]
How would you know he had an illness ten years before it was diagnosed ? Bipolar disorder is not present from birth.
[/tangent]
Because you look back over your relationship and say "A-ha! That would explain..." this or that incident. Which you did not understand at the time but you do now in the light of the diagnosis.
--------------------
She who does Her Son's will in all things can rely on me to do Hers.
Posts: 624 | From: a Galilee far, far away | Registered: Jun 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
chris stiles
Shipmate
# 12641
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Galilit:
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
[tangent]
How would you know he had an illness ten years before it was diagnosed ? Bipolar disorder is not present from birth.
[/tangent]
Because you look back over your relationship and say "A-ha! That would explain..." this or that incident. Which you did not understand at the time but you do now in the light of the diagnosis.
There lies the danger of confirmation bias though
Posts: 4035 | From: Berkshire | Registered: May 2007
| IP: Logged
|
|
Bibaculus
Shipmate
# 18528
|
Posted
My guess is that this is a situation (there are others I could mention but won't) where the RC Church has backed itself into a corner. Marriage is for life, right? Except it isn't. So the Church has to find a way of pretending to uphold the ideal, while dealing with the reality. The result - decrees of nullity, legalism, papal statements which, err, lack clarity - means a lot of people end up getting hurt. But hey! The Church holds the line on what marriage is.
--------------------
A jumped up pantry boy who never knew his place
Posts: 257 | From: In bed. Mostly. When I can get away with it. | Registered: Dec 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Galilit
Shipmate
# 16470
|
Posted
I think Anselmina's point is the one.
The question is where do you draw the line between "in sickness and in health" and "if I had only known he was [fill in "impediment"] I would not have married him in a month of Sundays"
--------------------
She who does Her Son's will in all things can rely on me to do Hers.
Posts: 624 | From: a Galilee far, far away | Registered: Jun 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Anselmina:
quote:
Originally posted by Galilit:
I was involved as a "witness" in a friend's annulment proceedings.
As it was explained to me by the "court" before which I gave my testimony, there has to be a proven, material impediment to the success of the marriage which, had the applicant known of it at the time he/she would not have married that person.
In her case her husband was bi-polar but this was only diagnosed more than ten years after the wedding. (Before that we all thought he was just a genius!)
Does this mean, then, that there is no 'in sickness and in health/for better for worse' clause to a Roman Catholic marriage - or something similar?
I would've thought that a 'material impediment to the success' of a marriage was more about malicious behaviour or deliberate deceit
eg, an existing spouse, a secret family, a serious criminal history, rather than a developing illness.
Quite, I mean what if you find out your partner has the Huntingdon's gene five years after your marriage ?
--------------------
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Doublethink.:
[tangent]
How would you know he had an illness ten years before it was diagnosed ? Bipolar disorder is not present from birth.
[/tangent]
I lived with it (not in myself, although I'm not a stranger to 'disordered passions'...) for 26 years before it was finally diagnosed because it went from bad to worse. It was ALWAYS there. Strongly correlated with, amplified by oestrus it seemed. And I thought it WAS me! The diagnosis explained everything. And helped nothing.
--------------------
Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Chesterbelloc
Tremendous trifler
# 3128
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Galilit:
I think Anselmina's point is the one.
The question is where do you draw the line between "in sickness and in health" and "if I had only known he was [fill in "impediment"] I would not have married him in a month of Sundays"
Actually, I entirely agree. It seems like a bit of sharp practice to me; but who am I to judge?
The current Holy Father (God bless and keep him and defend him from all his enemies) has a tendency to talk freely off the cuff - a lot, really - without always deeply considering what he is actually saying, or whether he is right, or what effect it will actually have. In fact he did say precisely what was initially quoted - that the great majority of "our" sacramental marriages are invalid - and not what he was later recorded in the "transcript" as saying, which is merely that " a portion" of them are. It is difficult not to belive that the Holy Father was (and presumably alllowed himself to be) corrected by the official account.
All rather regrettable, and avoidable.
--------------------
"[A] moral, intellectual, and social step below Mudfrog."
Posts: 4199 | From: Athens Borealis | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
CL
Shipmate
# 16145
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
quote:
Originally posted by Galilit:
I think Anselmina's point is the one.
The question is where do you draw the line between "in sickness and in health" and "if I had only known he was [fill in "impediment"] I would not have married him in a month of Sundays"
Actually, I entirely agree. It seems like a bit of sharp practice to me; but who am I to judge?
The current Holy Father (God bless and keep him and defend him from all his enemies) has a tendency to talk freely off the cuff - a lot, really - without always deeply considering what he is actually saying, or whether he is right, or what effect it will actually have. In fact he did say precisely what was initially quoted - that the great majority of "our" sacramental marriages are invalid - and not what he was later recorded in the "transcript" as saying, which is merely that " a portion" of them are. It is difficult not to belive that the Holy Father was (and presumably alllowed himself to be) corrected by the official account.
All rather regrettable, and avoidable.
The halfwit only opens his mouth to change feet.
Posts: 647 | From: Ireland | Registered: Jan 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gramps49
Shipmate
# 16378
|
Posted
Just today I was listening to a comedian who had gotten married to lover after living with him for five years. She said they divorced after just a few months because they did not have romantic love.
She described their relationship as just old friends.
Excuse me, but I thought the purpose of marriage was to have a life long friendship with your companion?
Am I missing something?
Posts: 2193 | From: Pullman WA | Registered: Apr 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gramps49:
Just today I was listening to a comedian who had gotten married to lover after living with him for five years. She said they divorced after just a few months because they did not have romantic love.
She described their relationship as just old friends.
Excuse me, but I thought the purpose of marriage was to have a life long friendship with your companion?
Am I missing something?
I have many lifelong friendships but only one wife. I'm not sure the church has ever taught that the point of marriage was lifelong friendship.
In the Orthodox Church marriage is seen as a path to salvation (the other path being monasticism -- single laypeople kind of get the short shrift). Friendship, romance, even offspring are a bonus.
--------------------
This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
simontoad
Ship's Amphibian
# 18096
|
Posted
What a pity. I read the updated article linked. It seemed to me that the Pope was trying to talk about the commitment needed to marry, and the understanding of that commitment. I don't think the Pope was trying to give millions of Catholics a reason to throw over an unsatisfactory spouse.
Towards the end of the article, it seemed that the Pope was talking about the benefits of cohabiting prior to marriage. He also seemed to be saying that when the Bride is pregnant, it might be better in the long term for the couple not to marry, but to work out whether they had the necessary commitment to a life-long marriage.
All this seems to 49 year old me to be very good, although I'm pretty sure this boy in his 20's was just trying to get his leg over regularly, and not thinking at all about marriage or God.
The controversy over the Pope's exaggeration and its correction will blow over, but I hope the examination of marriage will continue.
--------------------
Human
Posts: 1571 | From: Romsey, Vic, AU | Registered: May 2014
| IP: Logged
|
|
Galilit
Shipmate
# 16470
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chesterbelloc:
It is difficult not to belive that the Holy Father was (and presumably alllowed himself to be) corrected by the official account.
There is an entire episode (titled "Official Secrets") of Yes, Minister devoted to the difference between what was actually said and what the minutes show (or will show). Sir Humphrey Appleby explains it very well to young Bernard on YouTube.
Standard practice.
--------------------
She who does Her Son's will in all things can rely on me to do Hers.
Posts: 624 | From: a Galilee far, far away | Registered: Jun 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Chesterbelloc
Tremendous trifler
# 3128
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by simontoad:
Towards the end of the article, it seemed that the Pope was talking about the benefits of cohabiting prior to marriage.
The passage of the speech which contains these comments is summarised in the article as: quote:
He said that in Argentina’s northeast countryside, couples have a child and live together. They have a civil wedding when the child goes to school, and when they become grandparents they “get married religiously.”
“It’s a superstition, because marriage frightens the husband. It’s a superstition we have to overcome,” the Pope said. “I’ve seen a lot of fidelity in these cohabitations, and I am sure that this is a real marriage, they have the grace of a real marriage because of their fidelity, but there are local superstitions, etc.”
Here it is entirely unclear to me what the Pope means. At first, it looks like he is saying that not wanting to get married by the Church is a superstition which we must overcome. But then he goes on to imply(?) that since such civilly married couples already have a "real" marriage the superstition to be overcome is that one needs a religious marriage (i.e., a marriage regularised by a Catholic decree). The fact is that Catholics who marry outside the Church and without the Church's prior consent certainly contract canonically invalid marriages. Ed Peters the canonist puts this very lucidly. See also Peters's comments on the Pope's words about cohabitation .
That's all from me, as I meant to be on holiday!
--------------------
"[A] moral, intellectual, and social step below Mudfrog."
Posts: 4199 | From: Athens Borealis | Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by CL:
The halfwit only opens his mouth to change feet.
Wow, CL! I thought you were a Catholic.
--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
|
Posted
Enjoy your holiday, Chesterbelloc. The links were helpful in illuminating Catholic understanding.
Not for the first time, the Pope's off-the-cuff remarks have caused a furore. But they have unearthed the vexed issue of canonical form which to this outsider does look to have exceeded its sell-by date.
Registrars legalise, churches solemnise, but essentially couples marry one another. In my nonco neck of the woods, that is, since we see marriage as a covenant, not a sacrament.
God knows the heart. If folks make the promises of lifetime exclusive commitment and either or both have their fingers crossed while doing so, then, regardless of form, I do not know what they have actually done. God's grace is at work in the midst of all our human imperfection, so I hope that in the learning experiences of marriage, the initially insincere or unaware become more sincere and/or more aware of their verbal commitments. I hope, but do not know.
It seems highly preferable to me to recognise that insincerity invalidates promises. Let your yes be yes and your no be no. That's a Christian standard.
It also seems highly preferable to me to acknowledge that many cohabitations (Catholic, Protestant and legal understandings) do indeed involve lifelong, faithful, commitments and in so doing may indeed reflect more of the love between Christ and his church than a number of those formally and correctly begun. I've seen the truth of that, both ways, often enough, with couples we know.
[ 20. June 2016, 08:49: Message edited by: Barnabas62 ]
--------------------
Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
|
Posted
This is one of the points where I actually think the RCC is wrong. In a way, that wouldn't matter too much, except for the impression the RCC creates, or at least some of those who speak on its behalf, that once the magisterium has spoken, it's either 100% or nothing.
First of all, I think it, and quite a lot of non-Catholics, have got too hung up on whether marriage is a sacrament and if so, what the consequences are. Doctrine has been allowed to constrain the messiness of reality.
Why should it follow from the argument that marriage is a sacrament, or that some are and some aren't, that those that are become objectively indissoluble?
In saying that there are some initial failures of commitment that should be treated as comparable, or almost comparable, to inability or refusal to consummate and so grounds for an annulment, curiously I think the RCC is on to something.
However, it's that conclusion that if a marriage once trespasses from being just a marriage into a - wait for the roll of drums - sacramental marriage, it moves from being soluble to insoluble, which is the cause of the problem. It's confusing the primary with the secondary.
We all, I hope - except perhaps for a very few hyper-liberal Protestants who perhaps see it as just part of the exploratory journey to finding the true self - regard divorce as wrong, a bad thing, a serious sin against ḥesed and a tragedy for those affected by it. The difference is between those who think a marriage cannot be dissolved and those who think it should not be dissolved.
But where does this distinction between one sort of marriage and another come from? And what difference does it make to the obligations of marriage does it, or should it, make whether your particular tradition calls marriage a sacrament or a covenant? Is there really any difference, or is this a theological illusion? If it is, it won't be the first.
As far as I understand it, though others who say they know better than I do, the CofE position is:-
1. There is no distinction between a church wedding and a registrar's wedding. You are just as married, however you got got married, AND are bound by the same obligations. These are set out in the Preface to the wedding service and the vows, but as a Christian they bind you just the same, however you contracted your marriage. That is what marriage commits you both to.
It looks as though that was also the RC position before the Council of Trent.
2. Marriage is created by the free consent of the parties + the legally required form of publicity. Neither creates a marriage on its own.
3. The CofE doesn't like divorce. It discourages it. A clergy person cannot be compelled to marry someone who has a previous spouse who is still alive unless the marriage was annulled under English law. However, unless you are both old-fashioned and very high church, it does accept that if the marriage has been dissolved, the couple are no longer married to each other. That appears to have been the case even before 1857. What was missing before then was the freedom to remarry. They were condemned to permanent singleness.
4. English law only allows annulments on limited grounds, e.g. to the second spouse in a bigamous marriage, non-consummation, under-age at time of wedding etc. All are to do with the marriage never having 'taken' or being incomplete.
5. A sacrament is 'an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace'. There are two 'dominical sacraments' commanded by Jesus, baptism and Holy Communion. There is no command to get married. Jesus blessed the wedding feat at Cana. Indeed, the wedding service refers to that. But it is up to you whether you call a marriage a sacrament or not. Whatever you call it, you are both expected to regard it as entered into before God as a sacred trust and creating obligations by which you must both abide.
6. I suspect that virtually all people who get married whether in church or before a registrar accept that, regard it as representing what they want to do. That is what they hope for. They intend to live by those commitments. It's the actual working out of this commitment over perhaps 40, 50 or even 60 years that is the problem.
Even those who say 'if it doesn't work, we can always get divorced', hope it will work. Virtually the only exceptions are those who get married for criminal or vaguely criminal reasons, e.g. immigration fraud or to deceive someone into giving them their life savings.
--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gee D
Shipmate
# 13815
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
.:-
1. The CofE doesn't like divorce. It discourages it. A clergy person cannot be compelled to marry someone who has a previous spouse who is still alive unless the marriage was annulled under English law. However, unless you are both old-fashioned and very high church, it does accept that if the marriage has been dissolved, the couple are no longer married to each other. That appears to have been the case even before 1857. What was missing before then was the freedom to remarry. They were condemned to permanent singleness.
2. English law only allows annulments on limited grounds, e.g. to the second spouse in a bigamous marriage, non-consummation, under-age at time of wedding etc. All are to do with the marriage never having 'taken' or being incomplete.
I have changed the numbering.
As to point 1, the Diocese of Sydney will not license a man who is divorced, or married to a divorcee, as a priest in any capacity (women are not licensed as priests in Sydney full stop, alas). There is no such rule as you describe though.
Point 2 - In my prentice days as a solicitor, I acted for a woman seeking a court annulment under the Matrimonial Causes Act, rather than a divorce. There was not enough money to brief counsel, and my supervising partner thought it would be good experience for me. I gather that that was the only such petition that year, and that there had been precious few in the previous decade. Together, the judge and I made our way through the evidence and the matters of which he needed to be satisfied to make the order - the case was undefended, so that was quite ok. Her reason for wanting the annulment from the court was to enable her to go to the church tribunal, decree in hand, and make the grant of a church annulment a lot easier. The grounds were very limited and she relied upon non-consummation.
[ 21. June 2016, 00:01: Message edited by: Gee D ]
--------------------
Not every Anglican in Sydney is Sydney Anglican
Posts: 7028 | From: Warrawee NSW Australia | Registered: Jun 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
"Why should it follow from the argument that marriage is a sacrament, or that some are and some aren't, that those that are become objectively indissoluble?"
Because, in Catholic theology at least, the promise of grace attached to sacraments cannot be revoked or annulled. God is faithful even if you are not. You cannot be un-baptised, un-confirmed, un-absolved, un-ordained.... etc. or un-married, aka divorced. You have to establish that there was no sacrament in the first place.
I'm with the reformers on this one, there is no institution or promise of grace attached to marriage in Scripture. The idea (that also plagues our debate on same-sex marriage0 that it was instituted in Eden between Adam and Eve (because Christ alluded to Genesis in his opinion on Jewish repudiation) is bonkers. It may be Trent's view, but it's bonkers.
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
|
Posted
Not only that, Joesaphat. There's another way their argument does not work. There's the promise of grace in the dominical sacraments, but that does not mean a person cannot refuse it, reject it or repudiate it. It makes apostasy worse, but being baptised does not make a person incapable of apostasy. It is also entirely possible, as St Augustine says, for the wicked carnally and visibly to press the consecrated bread with their teeth without partaking of Christ.
It is likewise visibly obvious that there are plenty of people who apostatise on their marriages. One of the many other reasons why I think the RCC is wrong on marriage, is that they go on insisting that the person at the receiving end of the repudiation has to go on being held to the marriage that the other person has rejected. The doctrine leaves the victim with a raw, open wound, without allowing any way in which it can heal over.
It's the sort of doctrine that only a consortium of lonely old bachelors could think up.
--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
|
Posted
Someone help me out here; is the RCC saying that those who are not married by the RCC are not really married?
--------------------
arse
Posts: 10697 | Registered: Sep 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
mr cheesy
Shipmate
# 3330
|
Posted
Further thought: say someone is in the Ordinariate and has been previously married in an Anglican church (or, God forbid, in a Register office). Are they considered to have real marriage? Do they somehow have to be remarried by the RCC?
--------------------
arse
Posts: 10697 | Registered: Sep 2002
| IP: Logged
|
|
Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
|
Posted
It will require a knowledgeable Catholic to answer your questions, mr cheesy, but I think the position is that if two wicked schismatics marry in the CofE or in a Registry Office, the RCC church regards them as indissolubly married. However, if two Catholics, or a Catholic and a non-Catholic marry other than by an RC marriage, the RCC regards them as merely fornicating.
I've no idea what happens if you are married and join the Ordinariate. I would have hoped it is accepted that you are married, but I don't know.
I believe that in some circumstances a person who becomes a Catholic whose wife or husband doesn't, gets a 'get out of gaol free card' that enables them to shed their previous spouse with the freedom to take a new one. I think, though, they have to do this at the time and quickly. Otherwise they are taken to have acquiesced in their situation.
Again, you need to ask a Catholic who actually knows what they are talking about. If what I say is correct, I suspect they will express it less unflatteringly.
--------------------
Brexit wrexit - Sir Graham Watson
Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
| IP: Logged
|
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mr cheesy:
Someone help me out here; is the RCC saying that those who are not married by the RCC are not really married?
No, the spouses are the ministers of the sacrament. If both are baptised, their marriage is valid. If however they separate and one desires to marry a Roman Catholic, their marriage can be dissolved (it's called the Pauline or Petrine privilege, I can't remember, there are two ways of doing it in canon law, but I sat the exam such a long time ago I can't remember)
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
moonlitdoor
Shipmate
# 11707
|
Posted
I think your memory is at fault there. Surely Catholics teach that a sacramental marriage cannot be dissolved. Those privileges are about dissolving what Catholics call natural marriages, those which are not sacramental because they are not between Christians.
--------------------
We've evolved to being strange monkeys, but in the next life he'll help us be something more worthwhile - Gwai
Posts: 2210 | From: london | Registered: Aug 2006
| IP: Logged
|
|
Gramps49
Shipmate
# 16378
|
Posted
Mousethief, it seems that Genesis 2:8ff teaches it
8 Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for[e] him.” 19 Now out of the ground the Lord God had formed every beast of the field and every bird of the heavens and brought them to the man to see what he would call them. And whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. 20 The man gave names to all livestock and to the birds of the heavens and to every beast of the field. But for Adam there was not found a helper fit for him. 21 So the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon the man, and while he slept took one of his ribs and closed up its place with flesh. 22 And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. 23 Then the man said,
“This at last is bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called Woman,
because she was taken out of Man."
24 Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and they shall become one flesh. 25 And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed.
In other words the primary purpose of marriage is companionship, sexuality is secondary, procreation is third, at least in my book.
Posts: 2193 | From: Pullman WA | Registered: Apr 2011
| IP: Logged
|
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by moonlitdoor:
I think your memory is at fault there. Surely Catholics teach that a sacramental marriage cannot be dissolved. Those privileges are about dissolving what Catholics call natural marriages, those which are not sacramental because they are not between Christians.
I think that's the Pauline privilege, the Petrine one applies to marriages between non-catholic Christians.
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
Doublethink.
Ship's Foolwise Unperson
# 1984
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Enoch:
It will require a knowledgeable Catholic to answer your questions, mr cheesy, but I think the position is that if two wicked schismatics marry in the CofE or in a Registry Office, the RCC church regards them as indissolubly married. However, if two Catholics, or a Catholic and a non-Catholic marry other than by an RC marriage, the RCC regards them as merely fornicating.
I've no idea what happens if you are married and join the Ordinariate. I would have hoped it is accepted that you are married, but I don't know.
I believe that in some circumstances a person who becomes a Catholic whose wife or husband doesn't, gets a 'get out of gaol free card' that enables them to shed their previous spouse with the freedom to take a new one. I think, though, they have to do this at the time and quickly. Otherwise they are taken to have acquiesced in their situation.
Again, you need to ask a Catholic who actually knows what they are talking about. If what I say is correct, I suspect they will express it less unflatteringly.
Well, my grandad and step-gran had a ceremony not long before he died. They'd had a civil marriage many years before, she was RC, he was not. But she'd always wished to marry in the church. She was given away by her eldest son.
The priest made a point of saying that the church was not discounting that they had been married many years, it was just that they were renewing their committment before God. (Well, that is how I remember it - it was more than 16 years ago.). In the register they were recorded as having a "disparity of cult".
[ 22. June 2016, 19:41: Message edited by: Doublethink. ]
--------------------
All political thinking for years past has been vitiated in the same way. People can foresee the future only when it coincides with their own wishes, and the most grossly obvious facts can be ignored when they are unwelcome. George Orwell
Posts: 19219 | From: Erehwon | Registered: Aug 2005
| IP: Logged
|
|
Ricardus
Shipmate
# 8757
|
Posted
Yes, a year or so ago I attended a 'convalidation of marriage' where the priest took a similar line. The couple were at pains to stress that it wasn't a wedding.
--------------------
Then the dog ran before, and coming as if he had brought the news, shewed his joy by his fawning and wagging his tail. -- Tobit 11:9 (Douai-Rheims)
Posts: 7247 | From: Liverpool, UK | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged
|
|
Russ
Old salt
# 120
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
His Holiness is right though, is he not? given that over 95 percent of marriage annulments are granted by the Vatican, we are left with one of two choices. Either a large percentage of marriages are invalid or the Church is in the very regular habit of declaring null actually valid marriages.
So who grants the other 5% ? ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
Assuming you mean that 95% of applications received by the Vatican are granted, why is that a problem ?
If this is a low-discretion process with fixed criteria that are known to every parish priest, why are you surprised that almost all the applications that make it as far as the Vatican meet those criteria ?
--------------------
Wish everyone well; the enemy is not people, the enemy is wrong ideas
Posts: 3169 | From: rural Ireland | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
HughWillRidmee
Shipmate
# 15614
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Bibaculus:
My guess is that this is a situation (there are others I could mention but won't) where the RC Church has backed itself into a corner. Marriage is for life, right? Except it isn't. So the Church has to find a way of pretending to uphold the ideal, while dealing with the reality. The result - decrees of nullity, legalism, papal statements which, err, lack clarity - means a lot of people end up getting hurt. But hey! The Church holds the line on what marriage is.
Like discounts rather than price reductions on cars the manufacturers can't shift - gets rid of the backlogged stock for what the market will bear without having to admit the marketing guys screwed up!
Also - it keeps the baseline price high for the next version in case the public can be persuaded that the replacement model is worth the higher price. Series models will always be compared list price to list price rather than actual to actual in order to hide any failures.
--------------------
The danger to society is not merely that it should believe wrong things.. but that it should become credulous, and lose the habit of testing things and inquiring into them...
W. K. Clifford, "The Ethics of Belief" (1877)
Posts: 894 | From: Middle England | Registered: Apr 2010
| IP: Logged
|
|
HughWillRidmee
Shipmate
# 15614
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
His Holiness is right though, is he not? given that over 95 percent of marriage annulments are granted by the Vatican, we are left with one of two choices. Either a large percentage of marriages are invalid or the Church is in the very regular habit of declaring null actually valid marriages.
So who grants the other 5% ?
Assuming you mean that 95% of applications received by the Vatican are granted, why is that a problem ?
If this is a low-discretion process with fixed criteria that are known to every parish priest, why are you surprised that almost all the applications that make it as far as the Vatican meet those criteria ?
I read this to mean that almost no-one applies for an annulment unless they do so to the Vatican - presumably it's an RCC thing?
--------------------
The danger to society is not merely that it should believe wrong things.. but that it should become credulous, and lose the habit of testing things and inquiring into them...
W. K. Clifford, "The Ethics of Belief" (1877)
Posts: 894 | From: Middle England | Registered: Apr 2010
| IP: Logged
|
|
PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
|
Posted
At the beginning of his papacy, the Holy Father on one of his now famous aeroplane interviews, said that his predecessor as Bishop of Buenos Aires, whose name I forget, had said that half of all marriages are invalid due to lack of proper intent. He is more or less repeating that sentiment here. He has also released two documents in September last year which aimed to streamline the annulment process. This is part of his ongoing struggle to find an answer to the question of the divorced and remarried. He attempted, in a questionnaire, to get support for an improved pastoral approach to the remarried, and called two synods in 2014 and 2015 to revisit questions on which the Magisterium had already pronounced. His attempts were a failure, as he discovered that the Church is an immovable object on this.
I had a long running discussion with IngoB on this subject, and on one point, we agreed. Annulment isn't the answer to failed marriage. There are specific cases where it's right, such as consanguinity, forced marriage, being mentally challenged to the point of not understanding the proceedings. But defect of intent based on modern society's lack of value placed on marriage doesn't render a marriage null. Cases of annulment should run into a few hundred a year. The system was always corrupt. Playboy princes and Hollywood stars could get annulments because they could bribe the Church to grant them. But ordinary folk, if they became desperate enough to seek civil divorce, were totally shunned by the Church.
Now it's almost an industry. How many annulments in a country like the USA are refused? Hardly any, because the US is a high divorce culture, and the Church has come to realise that if it shuns divorcees, it loses them and their offspring forever. I feel sorry for Pope Francis over this, because he has tried to steer the Church in the direction of accepting that readmitting divorcees to the Eucharist can be a matter of pastoral, forgiving love. In fact it should be acknowledged that not all cases are sinful, but I wouldn't expect the Church to find it possible to admit this. So the only tool he has in his box is to keep on giving out annulments like supermarket receipts. It's a dishonest, corrupt and totally unsatisfactory way of dealing with the divorce epidemic, and until the Church recognises this it deserves all it gets in opprobrium for this state of affairs.
--------------------
Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged
|
|
Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
|
Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Russ:
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
His Holiness is right though, is he not? given that over 95 percent of marriage annulments are granted by the Vatican, we are left with one of two choices. Either a large percentage of marriages are invalid or the Church is in the very regular habit of declaring null actually valid marriages.
So who grants the other 5% ?
Assuming you mean that 95% of applications received by the Vatican are granted, why is that a problem ?
This cannot be decided by parish priests, not even diocese tribunals
If this is a low-discretion process with fixed criteria that are known to every parish priest, why are you surprised that almost all the applications that make it as far as the Vatican meet those criteria ?
--------------------
Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
Posts: 418 | From: London | Registered: Oct 2015
| IP: Logged
|
|
|
Printer-friendly view
