Annulments

[Maggyie]

I think I read that the United States' annullment process is considered a model for the rest of the world by certain Roman authorities, as they move much quicker here and the bureaucracy is less intimidating - although it is still quite a bureaucratic (to say nothing of emotional) ordeal to go through the process in America. The fact that we have the most annullments can be put down to numerous factors, including:

1. We have a very large number of Catholics
2. Remarriage is something that is done quite frequently in our culture, so more are likely to pursue
3. Our annulments system is more responsive, so more are likely to pursue
4. Lousy catechesis (the annulment system needs less reform than our marriage prep programs perhaps)
5. Prevalence in our culture of situations that tend to nullify marriages - take pornography for example. Can you imagine how many men have an addiction to pornography during the time they get married? Rich material for annullment right there. Even if both bride and groom knew about and recognized the problem, I have heard it argued (convincingly) that someone who has an *ongoing* porn issue has damaged their sexuality so badly that they can't contract a valid marriage until they get clean for good.

Could it be that in the United States we've got it down better than they do in other places? It's not neccesarily that everybody else does it right and we do it wrong. For instance I know that in America addiction absolutely plays a role in invalidating a marriage, but maybe in other places they don't consider whether there were pre-existing addictions etc. Which I think they should be considered.

ETA: And I don't think that what one needs to know to get married is generally understood by puberty. In fact one of the easiest cases of anullment I know of is to show the tribunal that you were both teenagers when you "married."

Edited October 20, 2010 by Maggie

[MissScripture]

[quote name='MichaelFilo' timestamp='1287578928' post='2180987']
If we truly had 59,000 couples getting invalidly married then there are serious implications on our intelligence and ability to grasp basic concepts, or the state of the Church that she cannot teach that marriage is for life, between a man and a woman, and is procreative.
[/quote]
To know something and to understand it are two very different things. I can know facts, but to understand their implications is not always going to go along with that. And just because the church is teaching, it doesn't mean that people are learning. I've had plenty of things taught to me, in my life, that I have never actually learned. And with the mindset of many going into marriage prep, it's not surprising that they don't learn what the Church actually teaches on marriage.

[Archaeology cat]

[quote name='CatherineM' timestamp='1287438168' post='2180507']
An annulment simply recognizes that a true sacramental marriage did not take place. Most of the ones I saw were granted because the parties weren't mature enough to know what they were really getting into. It had nothing to do with their ages. [b]There are probably loads of people who could qualify for annulments, but they never divorce.[/b] At some point in their relationship, they figured it out, grew up, got better catechized, etc., and made their marriages into strong ones. The tribunal only looks at the moment of the marriage, not what comes later. If it is a good marriage at the start, but falls apart later, no annulment.
[/quote]
I'm confused by the bolded - does that mean they don't have a valid marriage? I mean, say they were immature about what marriage meant and was, but stay together and follow Church teaching as they go along and learn more - what does that mean for them?.

[quote name='CatherineM' timestamp='1287528454' post='2180807']
It is the incapacity of couples, the inadequacy of most diocesan marriage prep courses, and the desire of priests to not offend people.

We did our marriage prep 5 years ago. It was done quickly over a weekend. It was run by lay people who were trained in Kumbya theology. There was no NFP training, no marriage chastity discussion at all. There was no clergy involvement at all, except for a small talk by a brother who is the Medieval history professor at the seminary. The preparation our priest gave us involved filling out a form, sending us to a Catholic psychologist to make sure we were both competent to marry in the church, and nothing else.

I think there were just as many invalid marriages 100 years ago with people being forced into marriage, not knowing what marriage involved, etc. The difference was that culturally, people simply didn't divorce then.

Right now, I think valid marriages are the exception. Most people are just clueless. When you find a truly sacramental marriage, it is that one that everyone in church looks at and just marvels at.
[/quote]
You're unfortunately right about the state of marriage prep in some places.

[CatherineM]

[quote name='Archaeology cat' timestamp='1287597146' post='2181057']
I'm confused by the bolded - does that mean they don't have a valid marriage? I mean, say they were immature about what marriage meant and was, but stay together and follow Church teaching as they go along and learn more - what does that mean for them?.
[/quote]
People stay married all the time who don't really love each other. I had an aunt and uncle who only stayed married by him having a job out of town and just coming home on weekends. I've known people who stayed together because of finances, but lived in different parts of the house. There are also people who didn't know what a sacramental marriage meant, went into it planning to use birth control, and only married in church because their parents insisted. Later, they can mature, go back to church, reconciliation, etc. I have known priests to remarry couples like that. That's certainly what I'd do.

You have to remember that marriage is a sacrament that the couple confer on each other. Just as I think we renew our sacrament to each other living a good married life together, I think people can bring a sacrament into a marriage where one wasn't before. The priest is just a witness. I saw a lot of broken people in the tribunal. The saddest ones were where one party believed they had a good marriage, and the other was living a lie. I never saw a couple there that I thought had a good marriage and should have stayed together. Even on the cases that were turned down because they couldn't prove their case, I didn't feel that there was a "marriage" there.

We plan to renew our vows every five years. Mainly just to irritate his family though. His mom is still telling him in every phone call and letter that they will be there for him when I leave him. She's always telling him that I'm going to divorce him and take everything including his underwear. That's just scary.

[Deacon Joe]

You will probably never get an answer that will satisfy you or anyone else. How could you? I do agree that marriage prep is lax in some places, maybe many places, I don't have any way of knowing that myself. I doubt anyone will ever go back and look at all the previous Declarations of Nullity. They may tighten things up, hopefully, but doubtful they would re-look at previous cases. I do marriage prep and I've been told that I'm very tough. I have had several couples put a hold on their marriages after my prep classes. I know that most failed marriages are due to poor preparation. It is an issue that needs to be addressed both the prep and the amount of Declarations of Nullity that are being heard. Just a thought, probably, due to poor prep, many more marriages are invalid.

[quote name='MichaelFilo' timestamp='1287524135' post='2180791']
Well, we understand that culpability is not important, because God will forgive you for something you believed to be true.

Well, mistakes do change the function. For instance, if the tribunal is purely investigative then it can be wrong on the facts or the conclusion, and if so then it could say something is invalid which is valid. The problem is multiplied when you understand the sheer volume of Catholics out there with annulments today vs any time in Church history. Can the tribunals really be at a point today where so many more people, nearly 100 times as many, without making errors. If they are being lax about the standards of maturity then they are declaring things invalid which are valid. If that is the case then many people who believe their marriage was never valid, well, was. If it is not an issue because they do not know better then we are faced with a problem, that the validity of the marriages is not really the issue but rather the declaration of the tribunal.

Furthermore, if today the pope saw that this cannot go on, he could ask for the tribunals to relook into previous declarations. Could they then say there was a mistake, that they were too lax, and the marriages were indeed valid?

I mean, here is the real issue. Today, to get married in the Church, you must undergo some level of classes or meetings or preparation with a priest. How many priests are just failing so horribly that this canon "For matrimonial consent to be valid it is necessary that the contracting parties at least not be ignorant that marriage is a permanent consortium between a man and a woman which is ordered toward the procreation of offspring by means of some sexual cooperation." is not being met. The very next line says "2. Such ignorance is not presumed after puberty" should indicate how lax the actual implementation is. how can 59,000 Catholic couples a year not know these things? You don't even have to be Catholic to know them. So we have a dilemma, because it boggles the mind how in actuality so many more marriages are invalidly done today then in the past.

My concern, then lies, in the fact that validity doesn't matter as long as the tribunal says it is so. If that is the case then how can I stand as a Catholic and say divorce is wrong when God has brought two parties together when the Church in the states has decided that quite a large percentage of those getting married aren't capable of even that base knowledge? It seems like a cop-out because it is one. I mean, 97% of all annulments being granted should be an indicator of either the poor efforts of the tribunals or the absolute mental incapacity of Catholic couples and priests.
[/quote]

[MichaelFilo]

But that is the point. You don't get to retry marriage until you get the right fit. Love is not a precondition for marriage to be valid.

In terms of numbers, the US has 5% of all the Catholics in the world and 80% of all the annulments. I don't know how anyone can imagine that is a good thing.

"Real marriage" is not always successful. No more than "true repentance." A valid marriage is no promise of success. A valid confession is no promise of success. A valid baptism is no promise of success. It is a weak criterion that the couple should seem to be working out. If real marriage meant successful then we have a divorce courts to try and find one.

The other thing is 97% of all applied for annulments are approved. Now, it stands to reason that in a culture that has many broken families and marriages many more people will want to apply for annulments because they want out too. Do we really even care about validity anymore?

[quote]I never saw a couple there that I thought had a good marriage and should have stayed together. Even on the cases that were turned down because they couldn't prove their case, [b]I didn't feel that there was a "marriage" there.[/b] [/quote]

Not to be mean Catherine, because your input has been so vital to me, but it seems that laxity is exactly the problem. You were in those tribunals and you have admitted that you correlate valid marriages with successful ones, that is to say, you could tell they were unhappy and that indicates to you that it was invalid. You've also admitted the vague requirement of "maturity" whereas the church has listed the three premises for maturity and they are all presumed after puberty. I believe you did everything in line with the best training you've received but that is exactly the problem. If the training dictates that successful marriages are valid and unsuccessful marriages are invalid then we have divorce tribunals, nothing more.

People who truly believe there is nothing wrong with this confuse me to no end. I am willing to bet the Greek Orthodox grant less divorces per capita in the US than we do annulments.

[CatherineM]

I never said unsuccessful marriages aren't valid, and successful ones are. Successful marriages don't end up in the Tribunal, since one of the requirements to apply for an annulment is having a civil divorce. When I talk about immaturity, I'm not really talking about people that are young. I've met 15 year olds who are more mature than some of the 40-somethings I met in the Tribunal. You would be shocked at the number of people I met, who went into marriage, thumbing their nose at all the requirements to be married in the Church. They have already been living together, been using birth control, and have no intention to change either. I had a case where a couple was required to live separately for 3 months (priests often require some length of time for co-habitating), and lied to the priest about it because they thought his requirements were silly. Many truly believed that marriage shouldn't be for life, but just until something else comes along. The problem isn't in the tribunal, it is in the North American culture.

I think another reason we have so many more than Europe, is that in Europe, people just stop going to church when they become divorced. In the US, we are spoiled. We are used to getting our way. We are used to not having to accept consequences for our actions. We as a society are less grown up. I'm not surprised at the number of annulments. I'm frankly amazed that any marriages last. Working in divorce courts or annulment tribunals will make you like that.

[MichaelFilo]

That is a bit of the problem, isn't it. No person can thumb their nose at the requirements for marriage, they know they must be married for life, have sex, and marry a person of the opposite sex. I didn't realize being on birth control invalidated that. Co-habitation maybe bad, but that is no reason that the marriage is invalid. Even a requirement to live separately doesn't constitute an additional canonical duty. I understand these are all bad things, but the canons seem to have a very low bar understanding of the requirements for marriage to be valid.

Today we have more training in the faith than people did 300 years ago when literacy was low and life was agrarian. Somehow, I feel, if those people understood, we would too.

I don't know about the European thing. They tend to marry a lot less anyway. Church attendance is low to begin with (3% of Catholics in France attend Mass weekly compared to the US's 33%) but I doubt there is a norm to divorce and stop going.

The tribunals are part of north American culture, as I've pointed out, that the sheer number of annulments to Catholics is phenomenal.

[MissScripture]

[quote name='CatherineM' timestamp='1287601975' post='2181069']
People stay married all the time who don't really love each other. I had an aunt and uncle who only stayed married by him having a job out of town and just coming home on weekends. I've known people who stayed together because of finances, but lived in different parts of the house. There are also people who didn't know what a sacramental marriage meant, went into it planning to use birth control, and only married in church because their parents insisted. Later, they can mature, go back to church, reconciliation, etc. I have known priests to remarry couples like that. That's certainly what I'd do.

You have to remember that marriage is a sacrament that the couple confer on each other. Just as I think we renew our sacrament to each other living a good married life together, I think people can bring a sacrament into a marriage where one wasn't before. The priest is just a witness. I saw a lot of broken people in the tribunal. The saddest ones were where one party believed they had a good marriage, and the other was living a lie. I never saw a couple there that I thought had a good marriage and should have stayed together. Even on the cases that were turned down because they couldn't prove their case, I didn't feel that there was a "marriage" there.

We plan to renew our vows every five years. Mainly just to irritate his family though. [b] His mom is still telling him in every phone call and letter that they will be there for him when I leave him. She's always telling him that I'm going to divorce him and take everything including his underwear. That's just scary.[/b]
[/quote]
Not that this applies to your husband, but stuff like that is why a lot of people don't view marriage as till death. I mean, when you are hearing from the world, including your family, that ending it is inevitable, then it's really difficult to believe otherwise.


[quote name='MichaelFilo' timestamp='1287612744' post='2181125']
That is a bit of the problem, isn't it. No person can thumb their nose at the requirements for marriage, they know they must be married for life, have sex, and marry a person of the opposite sex. I didn't realize being on birth control invalidated that. Co-habitation maybe bad, but that is no reason that the marriage is invalid. Even a requirement to live separately doesn't constitute an additional canonical duty. I understand these are all bad things, but the canons seem to have a very low bar understanding of the requirements for marriage to be valid.

Today we have more training in the faith than people did 300 years ago when literacy was low and life was agrarian. Somehow, I feel, if those people understood, we would too.

I don't know about the European thing. They tend to marry a lot less anyway. Church attendance is low to begin with (3% of Catholics in France attend Mass weekly compared to the US's 33%) but I doubt there is a norm to divorce and stop going.

The tribunals are part of north American culture, as I've pointed out, that the sheer number of annulments to Catholics is phenomenal.
[/quote]
Co-habitation can invalidate it, because generally with co-habitation comes sex, and when people start having sex before marriage, their ability to FREELY commit is diminished, and if you're not committing of your own free will, no marriage is really occurring. The reason sex is FOR marriage is because it ties you to that person, and as much as the culture would like to deny it, you bond through sex. So, when you're not following the "rules" for it, you bond incorrectly and lose some of your free will.

I don't quite understand what you mean when you say "No person can thumb their nose at the requirements for marriage." Do you mean that everyone should easily understand them?

[MichaelFilo]

So easily that the Church believes you can do it once you hit puberty.

I don't understand how premarital sex can diminish anything about your understanding that you are committing to a lifelong marriage to a person of the opposite sex which will involve sex. I can understand that it will cloud your judgment, but a completly clear judgment is the sort of criterion that would make marriage nearly meaningless because culture can cloud your judgment and everyone is subject to that.

[IgnatiusofLoyola]

[quote name='CatherineM' timestamp='1287601975' post='2181069']
People stay married all the time who don't really love each other. I had an aunt and uncle who only stayed married by him having a job out of town and just coming home on weekends. I've known people who stayed together because of finances, but lived in different parts of the house. There are also people who didn't know what a sacramental marriage meant, went into it planning to use birth control, and only married in church because their parents insisted. Later, they can mature, go back to church, reconciliation, etc. I have known priests to remarry couples like that. That's certainly what I'd do.

You have to remember that marriage is a sacrament that the couple confer on each other. Just as I think we renew our sacrament to each other living a good married life together, I think people can bring a sacrament into a marriage where one wasn't before. The priest is just a witness. I saw a lot of broken people in the tribunal. The saddest ones were where one party believed they had a good marriage, and the other was living a lie. I never saw a couple there that I thought had a good marriage and should have stayed together. Even on the cases that were turned down because they couldn't prove their case, I didn't feel that there was a "marriage" there.

We plan to renew our vows every five years. Mainly just to irritate his family though. His mom is still telling him in every phone call and letter that they will be there for him when I leave him. She's always telling him that I'm going to divorce him and take everything including his underwear. That's just scary.
[/quote]

If it weren't so sad, when I picture you taking everything from your husband, including his underwear, it's so absurd, I had to laugh at images of you collecting your husband's old, worn-out underwear from the bottom of his underwear drawer. And, the ironic thing is, what does it say about your husband that you secretly intend to leave him? Your husband's mother clearly adores her son, so why would any wife, especially a "gold-digger" like you LOL) even think about leaving such a Prince, especially a wife who is so clearly inferior to her husband, and could never catch a man in the future anywhere as good as "The Prince." I had a MIL like that, and people thought my ex and I were exaggerating, when we told stories about her, but sadly we weren't.

I have no idea what the answer is to the issue of annulments, although clearly better marriage preparation is needed. When we look at preparation for marriage, even programs that are considered very good, don't even come close to the preparation for first communion and for confirmation, much less for the sacrament of the priesthood. If a man wants to become a priest, he has to go through years of college and post-graduate study before he is ordained. Even religious Sisters/nuns, who take non-sacrament vows still must go through years of preparation before final vows. So, perhaps it isn't surprising that many marriages don't work out, even when both members of the couple honestly try. Religious life is very hard, but so is marriage. Somehow I think people feel that, because celibacy is not required in marriage, that marriage is easier than religious life. Marriage also requires sacrifices, major changes to your way of life, and not only responsibility to your spouse but to children who are entirely dependent on you. But couples (and mothers-of-the-bride) already resent things like 6-month waiting periods, and the mandatory classes and meetings with the priest that ARE required. I suspect that requiring even more preparation, and ideally, waiting time, would not be welcomed by many couples, even if the same couples went through classes for a year or more before they were allowed to be confirmed.

Speaking as a divorced person with a Catholic ex-husband, I have never sought an annulment, for many reasons, one of which is that it just doesn't "fit" to have a tribunal declaring that my marriage essentially never existed. From my point of view, I was really married, but unfortunately nonnegotiable issues arose that ended the marriage, completely against my will. Also, as the years go by, the chances that I will ever remarry get smaller, so remarriage to a Catholic is unlikely to ever come up as an issue for me. My ex-husband has never sought an annulment, and probably never will, since, even if he finds a life partner, homosexual marriage is unlikely to ever be allowed in the Catholic Church. I do find it ironic at times that, although I have been single now for quite awhile, in the eyes of the Catholic church I am still married.

I was married for 13 years before we separated, and although our marriage wasn't perfect, it was as good, and in many ways better, than many marriages I saw around me. I stood before the altar with best of intentions, knowing what the vocation of marriage meant, but I had no idea of the changes the future would bring, and that there were some things about my future spouse that he had never told me, even after dating 4 years---but they were things he was hardly aware of himself--and had our lives unfolded differently, they might not have become issues. And, in my case, I was presented with a fait accompli, and given no chance to try to work on the marriage--in essence, I was given no choice but to end the marriage.

Another very difficult thing about the annulment process is that it applies even if the marriage was not Catholic. So, if my ex-husband and I had married in the Episcopal church, I would still face the same issues of annulment, even as a non-Catholic, if I ever wanted to marry a Catholic. Even if my first marriage had been between two non-Catholics, if it was performed in a Christian church, I would have to face annulment proceedings, if I wanted to remarry a Catholic man. Not surprisingly, this is a tough issue for for non-Catholics to deal with. My marriage preparation at least was thorough enough that I understood the consequences if we ever divorced, but I also had no intention of getting a divorce.

A couple of other thoughts--brought up by some earlier comments. One was on the relatively high number of annulments in the U.S. versus European countries. One thing I have learned is that, in different countries, and among different groups of people within a country, even if they are Catholic, there can be very different expectations of marriage than we have in the U.S. For example, in the U.S., I think the general expectation is that both partners will be faithful. Although many wifes in the past tolerated adultery on the part of their husbands (and many still do), my gut feel is that, nowadays, wives (and husbands) are far less likely to tolerate adultery by their spouse, at least in the U.S.

For example, in France, although many French are at least nominally Catholic, I have met several, well-educated, intelligent French who hold a completely different view of adultery than I do. One of the reasons they have fewer divorces (and thus annulments) in France is that, even now, in many circles, adultery by both parties in a marriage is accepted, even expected. My memory of this incident is pretty faded, but, wasn't there a funeral of a prominent Frenchman (maybe even a former Prime Minister) within the past several years, where both the wife and mistress came to the funeral, as well as children from both relationships, and the wife and mistress were quite cordial to each other? I had a French roommate in college from a very affluenct, educated family, and she said that she would not divorce her husband were he to commit adultery. She said she would rather be married and unhappy, than be divorced. I think there is more divorce in France, now, but one guess about the reason for that is that perhaps women are less amenable nowadays to being "the mistress" and instead want the full recognition and rights of marriage.

I have no answers, because any possible solution that seems realistic to me would require changing the Church teachings on divorce, and I don't see that happening, and have no idea whether the majority of Catholics would want that anyway.

In some ways, although I know this would never happen and I'm not really being serious, I could envision the sacrament of marriage having more parallels to the process of becoming a priest, or a religious. If the church would recognize a civil marriage for a period of 5-7 years (and allow the couple to take communion during this time, as long as the the couple continued to undergo periodic "marriage formation" classes) before the church allowed a sacramental marriage, the issue of annulment would probably be far less. With seminarians, and religious in formation, although they make promises, even vows, of their intentions, there are procedures in place for them to leave religious life. And, there is no shame (at least in my mind) if a seminarian or a religious in formation before final vows finds that God is now calling them somewhere else. At the time the individual entered the seminary or monastery, the person was following God's will and God wanted them there at that time. But, sometimes God wants an individual to learn certain lessons from the formation process, but has other plans in mind for the individual's long-term future. Since marriage is a very important sacrament, having a similar process for marriage would emphasize the importance of the commitment, and the sacrifices required in marriage, just as sacrifices are required in religious life. I know this idea has gaps (I was just fantasizing), and I do fully realize that it will never happen because it goes against church teachings. But, it illustrates the amount of preparation before allowing lifetime vows (and the sacrament of ordination) compared to the relatively small amount of preparation before the lifetime vow of the marriage sacrament.

So, all I am left with is that, even more marriage preparation and time is definitely needed (even if it's not 5-7 years as in my fantasy above), but with more emphasis on the seriousness of the sacrament, the sacrifices involved in married life, and the expectations of the Church for married couples.

Edited October 20, 2010 by IgnatiusofLoyola

[MissScripture]

[quote name='MichaelFilo' timestamp='1287615834' post='2181139']
So easily that the Church believes you can do it once you hit puberty.

I don't understand how premarital sex can diminish anything about your understanding that you are committing to a lifelong marriage to a person of the opposite sex which will involve sex. I can understand that it will cloud your judgment, but a completly clear judgment is the sort of criterion that would make marriage nearly meaningless because culture can cloud your judgment and everyone is subject to that.
[/quote]
You're not freely committing (and therefore, you committment means very little) so there never was a commitment MADE to a lifelong marriage, etc. If you don't commit there CANNOT be a marriage, and if you're free will is hindered, then you are not offering a true committment.

[quote name='IgnatiusofLoyola' timestamp='1287616979' post='2181148']
If it weren't so sad, when I picture you taking everything from your husband, including his underwear, it's so absurd, I had to laugh at images of you collecting your husband's old, worn-out underwear from the bottom of his underwear drawer. And, the ironic thing is, what does it say about your husband that you secretly intend to leave him? Your husband's mother clearly adores her son, so why would any wife, especially a "gold-digger" like you LOL) even think about leaving such a Prince, especially a wife who is so clearly inferior to her husband, and could never catch a man in the future anywhere as good as "The Prince." I had a MIL like that, and people thought my ex and I were exaggerating, when we told stories about her, but sadly we weren't.
[/quote]
I think PM needs a "Mother-in-law Support Group!" MILs just don't make sense to me!

[CatherineM]

[quote name='IgnatiusofLoyola' timestamp='1287616979' post='2181148']
If it weren't so sad, when I picture you taking everything from your husband, including his underwear, it's so absurd, I had to laugh at images of you collecting your husband's old, worn-out underwear from the bottom of his underwear drawer. And, the ironic thing is, what does it say about your husband that you secretly intend to leave him? Your husband's mother clearly adores her son, so why would any wife, especially a "gold-digger" like you LOL) even think about leaving such a Prince, especially a wife who is so clearly inferior to her husband, and could never catch a man in the future anywhere as good as "The Prince." I had a MIL like that, and people thought my ex and I were exaggerating, when we told stories about her, but sadly we weren't.
[/quote]
I'm not a very good gold-digger in that I make more money than my husband does. My MIL doesn't love my husband, she just truly hates me.

[CatherineM]

Lying to a priest during marriage prep is grounds for annulment. How can a full commitment be built on a lie?

[MichaelFilo]

[quote name='MissScripture' timestamp='1287617438' post='2181151']
You're not freely committing (and therefore, you committment means very little) so there never was a commitment MADE to a lifelong marriage, etc. If you don't commit there CANNOT be a marriage, and if you're free will is hindered, then you are not offering a true committment.
[/quote]

Well, there is a mileau of things that you can argue that keep you from freely committing. Your parents fighting all the time as a kid, for example. You being worried about an upcoming job offer. You are afflicted with a head cold. Evidently there has to be these following requirements:

An understanding that it is life long
An understanding it is to a member of the opposite sex
An understanding that it is going to involve sex.

I maybe aloof, it's true, but how many people really don't know that? Your free will is not hindered by anything but coercion. Sex may affect your choice but so can such a long list that marriages will never have to be valid again.


In terms of American understanding, maybe Americans are a special breed of dumb but the understand of those three requirements seem to be super-easy to meet. So easy that it is presumed after puberty.

The French may tolerate it because they know adultery is not grounds for divorce because there is no grounds for divorce.

It is a hard teaching, but so is most of Catholic sexual morality.


[quote]Lying to a priest during marriage prep is grounds for annulment. How can a full commitment be built on a lie? [/quote]

The marriage is based on an "I Do" not the relationship to the presiding priest, right?

Edited October 20, 2010 by MichaelFilo