In December’s Catholic World Report, we had an article, now online at IgnatiusInsight.com, by Canonist Ed Peters in which he discusses how and why the Church should make the results of annulment proceedings public. Not the details, mind you, but just whether someone is actually married or not.
This is something I’ve mentioned before, when it was relevant because of questions regarding John Kerry’s previous marriages. Although we avoided a national crisis (in more ways than one) with his electoral defeat, it’s still an important question. The point is that it is in the public interest to be able to determine whether someone has received an annulment. Say I’m the father of single Catholic woman. Her boyfriend has been married before, is divorced (a public record, by the way), and claims to have received an annulment. For various reasons, I have my doubts (she is my hypothetical daughter after all), so I decide to find out if he’s telling the truth. Sorry, I’m told, but we can’t tell you. Does this seem right? Oh, but if the Church allows the second wedding it means there’s no problem, some would say. Yet wouldn’t it be better for the woman to find this out well before she falls in love?
This is why annulment records, like marriage and divorce records, should be made public, not the gory details, but just the fact of it having occurred.
Similarly, in proposing to give the public the opportunity to verify the records of annulments, there would be no question of disclosing the grounds for the annulments, the evidence used in reaching the decisions, or even which parties filed the cases. All that one could determine–but determine with accuracy and reliability–would be that a certain couple’s attempt at marriage was declared, on a certain date in a certain tribunal, to have been ecclesiastically null.
So why isn’t this simple rule in place? Consider, if you call the Archdiocese of Boston or the Archdiocese of Washington, Senator Kerry’s two dioceses of residence, you will be told, politely but firmly, that the status of his annulment is none of your business. The same goes for several other high profile Catholics, mainly politicians, mainly ones who have had a president in their family. Could it be that the disclosure of those records would reveal some uncomfortable facts for both the individuals involved and the archdioceses themselves?
This was settled a long time ago, Dom, in regards to public figures and by now I guess everyone.
The records are not public (even to a simple yes/no question like “Is he married”) - in the sense of the public having a right to access them - but only made available to an party with standing which obviously would only be a person seek to marry one who had been married in the Catholic Church to verify that both the marriage and anullment had taken place.
As for Dad, I’m not sure his curiosity overcomes the privacy of such records.
But that is Peters’ point: It hasn’t been settled because it has not been addressed universally, i.e. no canonical precedent has been set. He is arguing that if canon law is to be followed then the existence or non-existence of a declaration of nullity should be a public record, just like marriage. He is arguing that it is in the public interest to know such things, not just the interest of the person looking to marry. This is why we still publish banns.
I think Patrick is missing the point. Curiousity, where it concerns Dom’s hypothetical daughter’s hypothetical sweetie, isn’t just the thing that killed the cat. His daughter won’t be able to know either until she tries to tie the knot. And at that point the chance that she will back off is not high. I’d also like to know whether a pastor counts as a party with standing if he want to know whether his school teachers have the annullments they might have claimed. I think he ought to have the right, but I think any one should. It really isn’t prudential for the church to set up a situation that will certainly cause trouble.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/1/05 at 01:54 PM
I think that this is a case of demanding from the church what ought to be demanded of society. As a hypothetical father you ought to be able to foster enough of a relationship of trust with a young man who gets your blessing. Otherwise don’t give you blessing. Also you ought to raise a hypothetical daughter who generally steers clear of divorced folk, and if the extrordinary happens it will be the best of men. And we ought to all work to develop strong community ties and social custom regarding courtship, not to mention stigma for the divorce.
The Church doesn’t do everything for us. We need to do more ourselves, hypothetically of course.
Like I said, when it comes to giving your blessing or not (presuming they ask for it or heed it), it’s too late. The time to know these things is before she falls in love.
As for steering clear of divorced folk, there are very fine Catholic people who have received annulments, whose spouse left them through no fault of their own. You imply that divorced people are immoral and somehow damaged goods.
Please keep these private. You might as well have the Priests start posting the “Sin of the Week” they hear in the confessional.
As someone who has been through this, confidentiality is CRITICAL to getting the whole thing done.
all this because of Kerry, someone should put him in his place.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/2/05 at 07:39 AM
DB: I am implying that. There are cases as you have mentioned. but they are not the vast majority. Divorced folk are usually not where you want your daughter dating. Obviously there is human freedom, exceptions etc. But divorce would go down if people returned to a stigmatized view of the divorced.
Tkozal, receiving an annulment or being in a position to receive one is not a sin. No one is suggesting that the details of the annulment process be made available, just the fact of one. Really, people should read all of Ed Peters’ argument before responding.
I resent your implication that divorced people are immoral and damaged goods. My father left my mother. Are you saying that my mother is an immoral person because she went through with the divorce and later sought an annulment? Careful. That’s my mother you’re talking about.
As for your daughter dating divorced people, how indeed are we to know if he is divorced if we can’t get access to the records?
Because you don’t let your daughter date until she is responsible enough to make these choices. I don’t pretend to offer the perfect solution. There isn’t one. But families need to be more discerning about the courtship and demanding the Church publish annulments is a half measure. Get the culture’s act together, raise your children well. Teach them to gaurd there heart. Explain to them the difficulties in marrying a divorced person or interfaith marriage and that they ought to be avoided (check the Catechism for that one).
As for your family, how could I ever speak to a particular case? Leave off the personal story and look at the vast ocean of divorces. And also, just because one spouse leaves the other does not mean that there is only one guilty party in the failed marriage (your case not implicated, of course—b/c I don’t know anything about your fam.)
Divorce is generally an indicator that says stay away. Obviously people have to use there judgement and rely blindly on stigma and cultural norms, but only in the disasterous last 60 years of Christendom has divorce not had a serious social stigma. It was for good reason because most people today did not have a good reason to get divorced.
“But families need to be more discerning about the courtship and demanding the Church publish annulments is a half measure.” Forgive me, but that’s silly. All that Dom and Ed (and I) are saying is that everybody has a right to know who is married and who isn’t. It matters to society, and especially in the Church, not just to your daughter who’s starting to date somebody. (Historically, the whole system of requiring marriage before a priest with jurisdiction and in the presence of two other witnesses, and the publication of banns of marriage, arose because of so many clandestine weddings being celebrated that nobody could be sure who in fact was married and who wasn’t.) And if the fact of an annulment is confidential, then we cannot really know who is married in the Church and who isn’t.
I think that your line of reasoning is on par with discussing which type of postage stamp is best for closing gaping chest wounds. The problem is divorce, not publishing annulments. the Church has enough to do, it oughtn’t be asked to do basic homework for people.
Essentially you are asking the church to do basic tasks for lovers and families. Unless of course you are worried about the rare occurence of a psychopath that lives a huge lie for his entire life. Concerns of this nature are not a good reason to burden the church with a duty that should be one’s own. Publishing the banns is service enough.
What is all this work we’re asking the Church to do? If someone inquires, you tell them if an annulment has been granted rather than tell them nothing.
How is publishing the banns a service? By your own reasoning, the Church doesn’t need to bother with that either.
“I think that your line of reasoning is on par with discussing which type of postage stamp is best for closing gaping chest wounds.” I think you have neither any real idea what we’re talking about nor why we’re even talking about it. Have a nice day.
“I resent your implication that divorced people are immoral and damaged goods. My father left my mother. Are you saying that my mother is an immoral person because she went through with the divorce and later sought an annulment? Careful. That’s my mother you’re talking about. “
How in the h—- did you get that from My post? geez, switch to decaf, Dom.
The Priest comment had to do with publicity, not your momma.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/2/05 at 11:55 AM
ELC: I know precisely why you are talking about it. In relation to Kerry the problem is not that the annulment was not public, the problem was that divorce no longer has a stigma attached to it.
To unpack the analogy, the gaping chest wound is the cultural view of marriage and divorce, the band-aid is pronounced annulments.
tkozal: Dom was responding to me, I believe and that because I refuse to switch.
The service Mr. Bettinelli is asking the Church to perform is not, pace Downto, just “for lovers and families,” but for all the faithful.
I would agree that it’s a bad thing that divorce no longer has the stigma that it once had. If it did, then very few Catholics would enter invalid “second marriages”; they would all wait until a definitive ruling had been made on the validity of their first unions, and if those unions were determined to be invalid, they would contract their second unions according to the proper canonical form, and the faithful would know that the second unions were presumptively valid, and there would be no problem. (If the first marriage was determined to be valid, then those persons would refrain from entering invalid second “marriages.”)
Similarly, if we had some eggs, we could make some ham and eggs, if we had some ham.
In the world we live in, though, people like Ted Kennedy not only divorce, but contract subsequent unions. The faithful know that one of two things is true: either the first marriage was valid, and Sen. Kennedy (or whoever) is now living in an adulterous relationship, or the first marriage was invalid, and Sen. Kennedy is merely guilty of habitual fornication (since his second “marriage” is invalid for lack of canonical form). In either case, Sen. Kennedy cannot lawfully approach the Blessed Sacrament. Now in many of these cases, the divorced/remarried person is later observed receiving Holy Communion on a regular basis. Maybe he has received a decree of nullity, determining that his first, putative marriage was in fact not valid, and he has had his “second” marriage convalidated; in that case he may legitimately approach the communion rail, as he is no longer living in a gravely sinful relationship. (I assume for purposes of the illustration that he is not guilty of some other mortal sin.) But the faithful who observe him do not know whether this is the case or not. They have no way of knowing whether he is actually married to Wife No. 1, married to Wife No. 2, or married to neither but living in sin with “Wife” No. 2. The situation is scandalous, in the original meaning of that word: under such circumstances, it is likely that at least some of the faithful will conclude that the Church no longer regards concubinage as a mortal sin that disqualifies one from communion, and will therefore be more inclined to fall into that sin themselves.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/2/05 at 05:22 PM
(1) From USENET—11 years ago (!)
Marty> No, Ted Kennedy was not married in the Catholic Church for
Marty> his “second” marriage. His wife, Joan, from whom he is
Marty> legally divorced, is still alive, and the woman to whom he
Marty> is now legally married is also a divorced Catholic. As I
Marty> recall the ceremony was in a private house in Virginia or
Marty> thereabouts.
During the campaign I looked it up. Teddy sought an annulment. Joan, of course, was notified and she threatened to bring a civil action that would challenge or reopen to negotiation an agreement made between the two of them at the time of their civil divorce. The outcome was that Teddy withdrew the application for a declaration of nullity and married outside the Catholic Church. —
I’ll add in 2005, I don’t know if since then an anullment was obtained.
(2) When I said Dad had no right to examine the records, I did not mean to imply that Daughter (i.e. the potential spouse) has no right to examine the records. She does.
(3) Ed Peters doesn’t make the case for making anullment records public by giving any examples of what good does it do to Ed Peters (or anyone) to know if Kerry (or anyone) has their marriage anulled—or more precisely how is Ed Peters damaged by not knowing. He just repeats several times that the Tribunals don’t but should.
(4) I also think that Ed overstates the accessibility of records of marriages and divorce. Laws vary from state to state. I know in New York, a civil divorce cannot be verified by a simple inquiry at the office of public records.
Making public announcements out of annulments? Why not just make all divorced Catholics wear a scarlet “D” on their clothing until the paperwork is sorted out?
People like Kerry aren’t affected by all this talk. It’s the little people who are just trying to get on with their lives, even under circumstances beyond their control? It’s hard to pretend your married when your wife runs off with the postman, and the courts let her take the kids with her. Even to another state.
But that changes nothing, so (geez!!!) you can all relax. As long as a marriage certificate is attached to one’s baptismal certificate—somewhere, ANYwhere, in the Catholic world—ain’t NObody gonna beat the rap! We’ve screwed up a lot of things in recent years, but this sort of record keeping is one thing we still do well enough.
A young woman who meets a gentleman who is divorced, when the conversation gets serious enough, should have no difficulty inquiring about his status. If that gentleman is not honest enough to respond honestly, better to know now than later.
And if Daddy has to get involved, either she’s too young to decide much of anything for herself, or he’s too… (wait, I can only say stuff like that on MY blog).
The above does not challenge in any way, the constant teaching of the Church on the indissolubility of marriage. It does challenge all the busybodies who treat the divorced Catholic as the “whipping boy” for what is, in fact, a crisis of poor marriage preparation. (Go ahead, ask me about mine.)
Once again, no one is saying that lists of annulments should be published. All we’re saying is that the FACT of an annulment is not private, as it involves the public sacrament of marriage.
As long as a marriage certificate is attached to one’s baptismal certificate—somewhere, ANYwhere, in the Catholic world—ain’t NObody gonna beat the rap!
That’s the point. The marriage certificate is public, but anybody can claim to have received an annulment and you have no way of knowing if that’s true.
Apart from daughters and fathers, Seamus makes the wider point regarding why we need to know such things, especially with public figures. It is precisely people like Kerry that we need to deal with this. If he had been elected president, we would have been faced with the prospect of a Catholic president who we don’t know whether he is validly married or not.
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Shall we know who is married?
In December’s Catholic World Report, we had an article, now online at IgnatiusInsight.com, by Canonist Ed Peters in which he discusses how and why the Church should make the results of annulment proceedings public. Not the details, mind you, but just whether someone is actually married or not.
This is something I’ve mentioned before, when it was relevant because of questions regarding John Kerry’s previous marriages. Although we avoided a national crisis (in more ways than one) with his electoral defeat, it’s still an important question. The point is that it is in the public interest to be able to determine whether someone has received an annulment. Say I’m the father of single Catholic woman. Her boyfriend has been married before, is divorced (a public record, by the way), and claims to have received an annulment. For various reasons, I have my doubts (she is my hypothetical daughter after all), so I decide to find out if he’s telling the truth. Sorry, I’m told, but we can’t tell you. Does this seem right? Oh, but if the Church allows the second wedding it means there’s no problem, some would say. Yet wouldn’t it be better for the woman to find this out well before she falls in love?
This is why annulment records, like marriage and divorce records, should be made public, not the gory details, but just the fact of it having occurred.
So why isn’t this simple rule in place? Consider, if you call the Archdiocese of Boston or the Archdiocese of Washington, Senator Kerry’s two dioceses of residence, you will be told, politely but firmly, that the status of his annulment is none of your business. The same goes for several other high profile Catholics, mainly politicians, mainly ones who have had a president in their family. Could it be that the disclosure of those records would reveal some uncomfortable facts for both the individuals involved and the archdioceses themselves?
COMMENTS
This was settled a long time ago, Dom, in regards to public figures and by now I guess everyone.
The records are not public (even to a simple yes/no question like “Is he married”) - in the sense of the public having a right to access them - but only made available to an party with standing which obviously would only be a person seek to marry one who had been married in the Catholic Church to verify that both the marriage and anullment had taken place.
As for Dad, I’m not sure his curiosity overcomes the privacy of such records.
Posted by Patrick Sweeney on 02/1/05 at 11:46 AM
But that is Peters’ point: It hasn’t been settled because it has not been addressed universally, i.e. no canonical precedent has been set. He is arguing that if canon law is to be followed then the existence or non-existence of a declaration of nullity should be a public record, just like marriage. He is arguing that it is in the public interest to know such things, not just the interest of the person looking to marry. This is why we still publish banns.
Posted by Domenico Bettinelli on 02/1/05 at 11:50 AM
I think Patrick is missing the point. Curiousity, where it concerns Dom’s hypothetical daughter’s hypothetical sweetie, isn’t just the thing that killed the cat. His daughter won’t be able to know either until she tries to tie the knot. And at that point the chance that she will back off is not high. I’d also like to know whether a pastor counts as a party with standing if he want to know whether his school teachers have the annullments they might have claimed. I think he ought to have the right, but I think any one should. It really isn’t prudential for the church to set up a situation that will certainly cause trouble.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/1/05 at 01:54 PM
I think that this is a case of demanding from the church what ought to be demanded of society. As a hypothetical father you ought to be able to foster enough of a relationship of trust with a young man who gets your blessing. Otherwise don’t give you blessing. Also you ought to raise a hypothetical daughter who generally steers clear of divorced folk, and if the extrordinary happens it will be the best of men. And we ought to all work to develop strong community ties and social custom regarding courtship, not to mention stigma for the divorce.
The Church doesn’t do everything for us. We need to do more ourselves, hypothetically of course.
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 07:19 AM
Otherwise don’t give you blessing.
Like I said, when it comes to giving your blessing or not (presuming they ask for it or heed it), it’s too late. The time to know these things is before she falls in love.
As for steering clear of divorced folk, there are very fine Catholic people who have received annulments, whose spouse left them through no fault of their own. You imply that divorced people are immoral and somehow damaged goods.
Posted by Domenico Bettinelli on 02/2/05 at 07:37 AM
Please keep these private. You might as well have the Priests start posting the “Sin of the Week” they hear in the confessional.
As someone who has been through this, confidentiality is CRITICAL to getting the whole thing done.
all this because of Kerry, someone should put him in his place.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/2/05 at 07:39 AM
DB: I am implying that. There are cases as you have mentioned. but they are not the vast majority. Divorced folk are usually not where you want your daughter dating. Obviously there is human freedom, exceptions etc. But divorce would go down if people returned to a stigmatized view of the divorced.
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 07:43 AM
Tkozal, receiving an annulment or being in a position to receive one is not a sin. No one is suggesting that the details of the annulment process be made available, just the fact of one. Really, people should read all of Ed Peters’ argument before responding.
I resent your implication that divorced people are immoral and damaged goods. My father left my mother. Are you saying that my mother is an immoral person because she went through with the divorce and later sought an annulment? Careful. That’s my mother you’re talking about.
As for your daughter dating divorced people, how indeed are we to know if he is divorced if we can’t get access to the records?
Posted by Domenico Bettinelli on 02/2/05 at 07:47 AM
Because you don’t let your daughter date until she is responsible enough to make these choices. I don’t pretend to offer the perfect solution. There isn’t one. But families need to be more discerning about the courtship and demanding the Church publish annulments is a half measure. Get the culture’s act together, raise your children well. Teach them to gaurd there heart. Explain to them the difficulties in marrying a divorced person or interfaith marriage and that they ought to be avoided (check the Catechism for that one).
As for your family, how could I ever speak to a particular case? Leave off the personal story and look at the vast ocean of divorces. And also, just because one spouse leaves the other does not mean that there is only one guilty party in the failed marriage (your case not implicated, of course—b/c I don’t know anything about your fam.)
Divorce is generally an indicator that says stay away. Obviously people have to use there judgement and rely blindly on stigma and cultural norms, but only in the disasterous last 60 years of Christendom has divorce not had a serious social stigma. It was for good reason because most people today did not have a good reason to get divorced.
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 07:54 AM
Correction from previous post:
I meant “...NOT rely blindly on stigma…”
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 07:57 AM
“But families need to be more discerning about the courtship and demanding the Church publish annulments is a half measure.” Forgive me, but that’s silly. All that Dom and Ed (and I) are saying is that everybody has a right to know who is married and who isn’t. It matters to society, and especially in the Church, not just to your daughter who’s starting to date somebody. (Historically, the whole system of requiring marriage before a priest with jurisdiction and in the presence of two other witnesses, and the publication of banns of marriage, arose because of so many clandestine weddings being celebrated that nobody could be sure who in fact was married and who wasn’t.) And if the fact of an annulment is confidential, then we cannot really know who is married in the Church and who isn’t.
Posted by ELC on 02/2/05 at 09:22 AM
I think that your line of reasoning is on par with discussing which type of postage stamp is best for closing gaping chest wounds. The problem is divorce, not publishing annulments. the Church has enough to do, it oughtn’t be asked to do basic homework for people.
Essentially you are asking the church to do basic tasks for lovers and families. Unless of course you are worried about the rare occurence of a psychopath that lives a huge lie for his entire life. Concerns of this nature are not a good reason to burden the church with a duty that should be one’s own. Publishing the banns is service enough.
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 10:37 AM
What is all this work we’re asking the Church to do? If someone inquires, you tell them if an annulment has been granted rather than tell them nothing.
How is publishing the banns a service? By your own reasoning, the Church doesn’t need to bother with that either.
Posted by Domenico Bettinelli on 02/2/05 at 11:08 AM
Correct. I am sorry. That is correct. The banns publication is not a church service; it is a civic service.
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 11:39 AM
“I think that your line of reasoning is on par with discussing which type of postage stamp is best for closing gaping chest wounds.” I think you have neither any real idea what we’re talking about nor why we’re even talking about it. Have a nice day.
Posted by ELC on 02/2/05 at 11:51 AM
“I resent your implication that divorced people are immoral and damaged goods. My father left my mother. Are you saying that my mother is an immoral person because she went through with the divorce and later sought an annulment? Careful. That’s my mother you’re talking about. “
How in the h—- did you get that from My post? geez, switch to decaf, Dom.
The Priest comment had to do with publicity, not your momma.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/2/05 at 11:55 AM
ELC: I know precisely why you are talking about it. In relation to Kerry the problem is not that the annulment was not public, the problem was that divorce no longer has a stigma attached to it.
To unpack the analogy, the gaping chest wound is the cultural view of marriage and divorce, the band-aid is pronounced annulments.
tkozal: Dom was responding to me, I believe and that because I refuse to switch.
Posted by Downto on 02/2/05 at 12:03 PM
Sorry, Tkozal, but that sentence was directed at Downto, not you. I forgot to put his name in front of that sentence.
Posted by Domenico Bettinelli on 02/2/05 at 12:07 PM
The service Mr. Bettinelli is asking the Church to perform is not, pace Downto, just “for lovers and families,” but for all the faithful.
I would agree that it’s a bad thing that divorce no longer has the stigma that it once had. If it did, then very few Catholics would enter invalid “second marriages”; they would all wait until a definitive ruling had been made on the validity of their first unions, and if those unions were determined to be invalid, they would contract their second unions according to the proper canonical form, and the faithful would know that the second unions were presumptively valid, and there would be no problem. (If the first marriage was determined to be valid, then those persons would refrain from entering invalid second “marriages.”)
Similarly, if we had some eggs, we could make some ham and eggs, if we had some ham.
In the world we live in, though, people like Ted Kennedy not only divorce, but contract subsequent unions. The faithful know that one of two things is true: either the first marriage was valid, and Sen. Kennedy (or whoever) is now living in an adulterous relationship, or the first marriage was invalid, and Sen. Kennedy is merely guilty of habitual fornication (since his second “marriage” is invalid for lack of canonical form). In either case, Sen. Kennedy cannot lawfully approach the Blessed Sacrament. Now in many of these cases, the divorced/remarried person is later observed receiving Holy Communion on a regular basis. Maybe he has received a decree of nullity, determining that his first, putative marriage was in fact not valid, and he has had his “second” marriage convalidated; in that case he may legitimately approach the communion rail, as he is no longer living in a gravely sinful relationship. (I assume for purposes of the illustration that he is not guilty of some other mortal sin.) But the faithful who observe him do not know whether this is the case or not. They have no way of knowing whether he is actually married to Wife No. 1, married to Wife No. 2, or married to neither but living in sin with “Wife” No. 2. The situation is scandalous, in the original meaning of that word: under such circumstances, it is likely that at least some of the faithful will conclude that the Church no longer regards concubinage as a mortal sin that disqualifies one from communion, and will therefore be more inclined to fall into that sin themselves.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on 02/2/05 at 05:22 PM
(1) From USENET—11 years ago (!)
Marty> No, Ted Kennedy was not married in the Catholic Church for
Marty> his “second” marriage. His wife, Joan, from whom he is
Marty> legally divorced, is still alive, and the woman to whom he
Marty> is now legally married is also a divorced Catholic. As I
Marty> recall the ceremony was in a private house in Virginia or
Marty> thereabouts.
During the campaign I looked it up. Teddy sought an annulment. Joan, of course, was notified and she threatened to bring a civil action that would challenge or reopen to negotiation an agreement made between the two of them at the time of their civil divorce. The outcome was that Teddy withdrew the application for a declaration of nullity and married outside the Catholic Church.
—
I’ll add in 2005, I don’t know if since then an anullment was obtained.
(2) When I said Dad had no right to examine the records, I did not mean to imply that Daughter (i.e. the potential spouse) has no right to examine the records. She does.
(3) Ed Peters doesn’t make the case for making anullment records public by giving any examples of what good does it do to Ed Peters (or anyone) to know if Kerry (or anyone) has their marriage anulled—or more precisely how is Ed Peters damaged by not knowing. He just repeats several times that the Tribunals don’t but should.
(4) I also think that Ed overstates the accessibility of records of marriages and divorce. Laws vary from state to state. I know in New York, a civil divorce cannot be verified by a simple inquiry at the office of public records.
Posted by Patrick Sweeney on 02/2/05 at 10:38 PM
Making public announcements out of annulments? Why not just make all divorced Catholics wear a scarlet “D” on their clothing until the paperwork is sorted out?
People like Kerry aren’t affected by all this talk. It’s the little people who are just trying to get on with their lives, even under circumstances beyond their control? It’s hard to pretend your married when your wife runs off with the postman, and the courts let her take the kids with her. Even to another state.
But that changes nothing, so (geez!!!) you can all relax. As long as a marriage certificate is attached to one’s baptismal certificate—somewhere, ANYwhere, in the Catholic world—ain’t NObody gonna beat the rap! We’ve screwed up a lot of things in recent years, but this sort of record keeping is one thing we still do well enough.
A young woman who meets a gentleman who is divorced, when the conversation gets serious enough, should have no difficulty inquiring about his status. If that gentleman is not honest enough to respond honestly, better to know now than later.
And if Daddy has to get involved, either she’s too young to decide much of anything for herself, or he’s too… (wait, I can only say stuff like that on MY blog).
Posted by David L Alexander on 02/3/05 at 01:24 PM
The above does not challenge in any way, the constant teaching of the Church on the indissolubility of marriage. It does challenge all the busybodies who treat the divorced Catholic as the “whipping boy” for what is, in fact, a crisis of poor marriage preparation. (Go ahead, ask me about mine.)
Posted by David L Alexander on 02/3/05 at 01:27 PM
Once again, no one is saying that lists of annulments should be published. All we’re saying is that the FACT of an annulment is not private, as it involves the public sacrament of marriage.
As long as a marriage certificate is attached to one’s baptismal certificate—somewhere, ANYwhere, in the Catholic world—ain’t NObody gonna beat the rap!
That’s the point. The marriage certificate is public, but anybody can claim to have received an annulment and you have no way of knowing if that’s true.
Apart from daughters and fathers, Seamus makes the wider point regarding why we need to know such things, especially with public figures. It is precisely people like Kerry that we need to deal with this. If he had been elected president, we would have been faced with the prospect of a Catholic president who we don’t know whether he is validly married or not.
Posted by Domenico Bettinelli on 02/3/05 at 01:36 PM
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