Family Forum / Marriage / Marriage / March 2008

And by the way, once you have visited the sacred South Pole, you are
not a virgin anymore (ie you are f.cked).

Vickie

Sacred South Pole??? That's a hoot! You crack me up sometimes!

On a different note, could you explain the ins/outs of annulments as far as
Catholics go? I've wondered how that works and how it differs from legal
annulments... I would think annulments would only be logical if the marriage
was never consumated--but if not mistaken, have heard tell of folks being
married for years--and even have kids--and still getting an annulment. Is
this accurate? and if so, what the...?

Bo

Eh... while I do think the whole thing is silly, I can see that for
someone who is Catholic it can be a healing process. There's a whole
process - including copious paperwork to fill out and interviews with
priests  -  that forces the person to examine why the marriage failed.
The process may be more important than the ultimate outcome (i.e.,
anyone who commits to going through it probably winds up with an
annulment eventually).

With that said, it unfortunately encourages the person to do some
"magical thinking" about the *reasons* for that failure...

For example, annulments all boil down to the idea that something was
wrong and so God never graced the marriage ceremony with his presence.
So it may have been legal but it was unofficial in the eyes of God,
because he forgot to show up.

Which restores a person's faith... because afterall, if God joined two
people together, how could God allow those two people to fail so
miserably???

Ugh...

The wierd thing is, I very much do think God was there at my wedding.
I was going through a period of time when I felt very spiritual and in
touch with God. So this is why I checked off the "no contest" box on
the annulment form: if I had admitted that to the Church, my ex
would've never had his annulment.

Unless he made the case that I was simply manic and crazy when we got
married... which means that anytime I do feel God is present in my
life, I must be out of my mind...

Which makes me lose my own faith. :-(

(it's early in the morning for me so I don't know if any of that made
any sense... not enough coffee yet!!)

jen

You are underestimating the size of the "it" in "it never happened".

To hilariously oversimplify, the Roman Catholic position is that when
a man and woman are officially married, their standing with the cosmos
is permanently altered.  (You might compare various Eastern rituals,
designed to bring you back into balance with the cosmos if you are out
of alignment, or to earn merit for you, thus reshaping the cosmos by
"pulling" on it to improve your situation in it.)

ANYWAY, there is no "marriage Geiger counter" (or e-meter) which you can
use to tell if a marriage "took".  The idea is that if two people who
(a) can be married, and (b) properly intend to be married, do go on to
actually (c) get married, then it always "takes".

Annulment is based on the idea that at the time of the marriage, they
may not (a) be able to be properly married, or (b) may not properly intend
to be married.  If that is the case, then their standing with the cosmos
did NOT change, and so "it never happened".  (Again, this isn't unique
to Roman Catholics; many rituals have complex requirements in order for
them to "work", and sometimes they are completely re-done if an element
of form is incorrect.)

For example, Roman Catholics would say that Oedipus was never validly
married to his mother, since you cannot properly marry your mother.  No
other element matters -- whether he or anyone ever *found out* that the
marriage was invalid, whether the ceremony was somehow improper, no
matter how truly they intended to form a family and have children --
none of that matters.  The couple were not a couple that can validly
marry, so (in the RC view) no marriage happened.  Period.

Similarly, suppose you were making a movie about the process of getting
married, and you had your actor and actress go down to the courthouse
and fill out the forms to show what that's like, and then stage a full
ceremony, and then had the preacher sign the form and mail it in, and
then only belated realized that he wasn't supposed to actually MAIL it,
they'd be considered legally married.  But if the actor and actress never
intended to actually GET married, they aren't in the eyes of the Vatican.
They did not have an intent to get married, and (per the RCC) it can't
happen without intent.  (I note that a judge would probably issue an
annulment too, if the mixup was explained.)

As with anything that has some sensible justification, there is no
limit to the ways that people can abuse the idea of annulment for their
own ends.  But it is certainly possible to imagine a situation where
a marriage was not actually marriage -- and such situations do present
themselves, but I won't discuss specifics because my point here is not
to gossip.  If someone married for money and then got a quickie divorce
out in Vegas, for example, and never wanted to be married but just was
after a big payout, that wouldn't be a marriage.  It has actually
happened that people got married without discussing children (!), and
got an annulment because the spouse who intended never to have children
did not have a proper intent to get married in the first place, at least
per the RCC.

*

I'm not Roman Catholic, and so may have been somewhat unfair in part of
my description here, but I tried to get it straight.

My own view is that divorce is bad, but it's not impossible, but I do
see the distinction the Vatican is trying to draw.

Darren Provine ! kilroy@elvis.rowan.edu ! http://www.rowan.edu/~kilroy
"That's the thing about Easter: you don't always find things in the
place you left them." -- Edmund Zelley, hunting for a piece of paper

I think the Catholic Church recognizes (some) marriages that take
place outside of the church.   They certainly wouldn't recognize it
without the annulment though.

I'm impressed that you were willing to do that.  It does sound like
the right thing to do, but like your mother, I'd find it infuriating.

Have you had her take this online quiz that sweeps through ASM every
couple years?