Can a Mormon marry a Catholic in the Catholic Church?

  • Thread starter Thread starter christianley
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
C

christianley

Guest
A Mormon friend’s son is being married in the Catholic Church – he’s a returned missionary and seems to have been active in the LDS Church. Since he is unbaptized, I am surprised he can marry in the Catholic Church. Isn’t he going to have to promise to raise his kids Catholic?
 
A Mormon friend’s son is being married in the Catholic Church – he’s a returned missionary and seems to have been active in the LDS Church. Since he is unbaptized, I am surprised he can marry in the Catholic Church. Isn’t he going to have to promise to raise his kids Catholic?
The Catholic Church, for whatever reason, does allow Christians to marry all sorts of non-Christians. Of course then the Cardinals issue warnings to Italian women about the dangers of marrying Muslims, put two and two together there guys, but at any rate if they have received a “dispenstation” it is permitted.

Reason 1,009,987 why I’m Orthodox…
 
A Mormon friend’s son is being married in the Catholic Church – he’s a returned missionary and seems to have been active in the LDS Church. Since he is unbaptized, I am surprised he can marry in the Catholic Church. Isn’t he going to have to promise to raise his kids Catholic?
It saddens me that the church allows this. I understand that the church does not want to alienate the Catholic woman by not allowing her to marry her sweetheart in the Catholic Church, but I think it seems like tacit approval of marrying a non-Christian, which gives scandal and sends a very wrong message to our young people. This marriage is surely doomed to misery and perhaps to divorce.

Countless Catholics have posted on this forum bemoaning the fact that they married a non-Christian in good faith, only to have that non-Christian break his promises and insist on raising the children muslim or mormon or JW, and insist that the Catholic spouse convert. Too many Catholics have been spited or shunned by non-Catholic in-laws who consider them infidels or pawns of Satan. And far too many have “compromised” by raising their children with no faith at all.

It really saddens me.
Paul
 
A Mormon friend’s son is being married in the Catholic Church – he’s a returned missionary and seems to have been active in the LDS Church. Since he is unbaptized, I am surprised he can marry in the Catholic Church. Isn’t he going to have to promise to raise his kids Catholic?
If one applies to the Bishop for a dispensation for disparity of cult and receives the dispensation, then yes, one may marry a non-Christian.

Mixed marriage is discouraged (see the numerous Church documents regarding the dangers of mixed marriage). But, the Church recognizes that all persons have free will.

Regarding the rearing of the children, it is the Catholic who makes the promise to raise their children in the Catholic faith. The non-Catholic must sign a form acknowledging they have been apprised of the Catholic’s responsibility and promise. The non-Catholic does not make any promise themselves.
 
Seems to me, it could be a lot worse. She could be marrying him in the Mormon church. The fact that they’re doing it on the Catholic side is a good sign, IMO.
 
Seems to me, it could be a lot worse. She could be marrying him in the Mormon church. The fact that they’re doing it on the Catholic side is a good sign, IMO.
I agree. Knowing the Mormon marrying the Catholic, I think there is more chance he will become Catholic than that she will become Mormon.
 
Some of you seem to think that any form of mixed marriage is bad and evil. This is not always so…my mother is Catholic and my father is Jewish and no problems have resulted. I am a proud and practicing Catholic…anyway, yes seeing as the Mormon has consented to marry in the Church there is a better chance of him converting than the wife!
 
It saddens me that the church allows this. I understand that the church does not want to alienate the Catholic woman by not allowing her to marry her sweetheart in the Catholic Church, but I think it seems like tacit approval of marrying a non-Christian, which gives scandal and sends a very wrong message to our young people. This marriage is surely doomed to misery and perhaps to divorce.
I’ve heard the alienation argument before. In the Orthodox Church Christians may not marry non-Christians under any circumstances. Instead of alienating anyone members of the parish try first to date and marry within the Church. Sometimes that doesn’t work, and they simply know that they need to make it clear that they will only date people with valid baptisms. It’s never been an issue.
 
Some of you seem to think that any form of mixed marriage is bad and evil. This is not always so…my mother is Catholic and my father is Jewish and no problems have resulted. I am a proud and practicing Catholic…anyway, yes seeing as the Mormon has consented to marry in the Church there is a better chance of him converting than the wife!
Our pastor, a wonderful, conservative, deeply spiritual and hard-working priest, comes from a mixed marriage family in which his mother is not Catholic. Somehow, this family produced two priests. His brother has a parish near New Orleans.

May God bless you as you discern your vocation, AdvanceAlways. I’ll pray for you!.
 
I agree. Knowing the Mormon marrying the Catholic, I think there is more chance he will become Catholic than that she will become Mormon.
And the kids will be what? Confused?😦

Is mommy right? Is Daddy right? Why? Why cant I go to Temple with daddy?
Maybe mommy is wrong…Daddy is sooo nice. 🤷

Adults can handle this better than children.
 
Some of you seem to think that any form of mixed marriage is bad and evil. This is not always so…my mother is Catholic and my father is Jewish and no problems have resulted. I am a proud and practicing Catholic…anyway, yes seeing as the Mormon has consented to marry in the Church there is a better chance of him converting than the wife!
Mixed marriages work when one or both spouses are nominal followers of their religions. If both then religion would simply be a non-issue. In the other case it’s simply a matter of one being the truck (driving force) and the other the trailer (unconcerned with where it is pulled). The real issue is that the nomial spouse is quite likely to began to take a greater interest in their religion as they get older, and become more set it in. The practicing spouse is also only going to become more dedicated. It’s easy to agree to things when children are an event waiting to happen at some future point. It’s a little different when you actually have them and now you want them to take part in your religious background. Imagine a dedicated Catholic and an Orthodox Jew fighting it out over everything from the kids not going to a Yeshiva to having ham sandwhichs for lunch. Parental unity is very important, the kids need to grow up knowing that dad is going to back mom’s decisions and the other way around. If that doesn’t happen it’s only natural that the kids are going to find a parent they’ve decided they need to listen to and the other ceases to be an authority figure.
In this case imagine how confusing it would be to children to learn from mom that God is an all powerful being that created everything, there never was a time He was not nor will there ever be. Then from dad they learn that God is a guy who was a mortal sinner on another planet, instead of creating the world a consul of gods was neccessary, and this “god” has a body and lives on a planet orbiting Kolob.
 
Just a little bit of “trivia”, one of my best friend’s parents are of “mixed” faith tradition. His father is Russian Orthodox, the mother is Roman Catholic…they “compromised” and both now attend an Episcopal Church most Sundays. They attend Easter and Christmas at the RCC and Pascha and Orthodox Xmas(Epiphany?) at the ROC.

All the children are baptized as Episcopalians, all the children have been catechised in both the RCC and ROC…and told to make their own choices now as adults.
 
Just a little bit of “trivia”, one of my best friend’s parents are of “mixed” faith tradition. His father is Russian Orthodox, the mother is Roman Catholic…they “compromised” and both now attend an Episcopal Church most Sundays. They attend Easter and Christmas at the RCC and Pascha and Orthodox Xmas(Epiphany?) at the ROC.

All the children are baptized as Episcopalians, all the children have been catechised in both the RCC and ROC…and told to make their own choices now as adults.
I hate to say this, but this is not acceptable to the Orthodox Church. Attending services in a heterodox church is unacceptable, in this case would mean automatic excommunication for the Orthodox spouse and I’m not sure how the Catholics would handle this. Having your children baptized by the heterodox is another serious sin and would again be an automatic excommuncation. Orthodox parents are under full obligation to raise their children in the Church, no expections ever. You could marry a Roman Catholic in the Orthodox Church as the RC baptism is acceptable. However, an Orthodox Christian is required to attend Othordox services and raise their children in the Church. So this isn’t a compromise, as far as the Orthodox Church is concerned this person has left the Church. He would have to cease these practices, confess these serious sins, and perform the required pentence (probably a number of years of excommunication) and only then could he receive the Eucharst in the Church.
 
People can give anecdotal stories of mixed marriage that worked. It does not change the Church’s teaching on the subject or the very real peril to one’s soul and the soul of one’s children if one chooses to enter into one.
 
:blessyou:
People can give anecdotal stories of mixed marriage that worked. It does not change the Church’s teaching on the subject or the very real peril to one’s soul and the soul of one’s children if one chooses to enter into one.
 
The Catholic Church, for whatever reason, does allow Christians to marry all sorts of non-Christians. Of course then the Cardinals issue warnings to Italian women about the dangers of marrying Muslims, put two and two together there guys, but at any rate if they have received a “dispenstation” it is permitted.

Reason 1,009,987 why I’m Orthodox…
What warning do they give italian girls about marrying Muslims?

The main reason I can think for this would be that in Islam is it simply accepted that all children will be raised Isalmic. She had to promise or at least accept this.

Under islamic law (if they move to a muslim country) he can still marry 3 more women, if he divorces her she cannot have custody of her children because she is not a muslim, she cannot inherit anything from him as all assests must follow the Muslim line. There is a long list of discriminations like this that Isalm holds against non-Muslims… including non-Muslim wives.

Further a Muslim woman cannot marry a non-Muslim man, period. It is apostacy. Hence the misguided mercy killings we see when some Muslim girls make the grave mistake of wanting to date/court or marry a non-Muslim man.

IMHO, it is a form of aprthied that goes along with the all the aparthied type Islamic laws.

One of my neices married a Muslim. She was a cradle Catholic who was promissed that she did not need to convert. Her family was not allowed at the marriage ceremony… not even her mother and father, because they are catholic and hence infidels. Why she would insult her family this way I have no idea. Learning this I refused to go to the reception/dinner.

Of course over time she has converted to Islam.
 
I am Roman Catholic and my husband is Byzantine Catholic. The Byzantine Catholics are in communion with Rome. We attend mass in either Church. There are Byzantine priests and Bishops who serive in the Vatican.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top