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HolyCow21
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Before I read this I had already made the above reply. Sorry about the initial reply. It’s been deleted.
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1ke
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I think you overstate the position.
It is not at the *whim *of the bishop. The bishop will take the request-- which must be accompanied by an explanation of the reason the request is being made-- under consideration. If, in his prudential judgment, the reason has merit he will allow an exception to canonical requirements.
Reasons might include the number of guests attending not being able to fit in any Catholic church building in the area (i.e. when the Pope says mass in a sports arena due to 50,000 people attending), the fire example given in one of the previous posts where the Catholic Church burned down and so permission is given to go elswhere, some specific circumstance of the bride/groom possibly related to family situations (such as was considered for allowing my sister to exchange vows in the hospital when her father was confined there with a terminal illness but he died before the wedding.)
To call it a whim and conclude it’s not “that important after all” is wrongheaded. The exceptions are allowed so that people with serious, legitimate issues can receive a pastoral response from their bishop. It is allowed, it is not the norm. And, when allowed there are guidelines to ensure proper reverence.
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Rence
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With all due respect, my opinion was ask for, and I gave it. If at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter to YOU what I think, and if YOU don’t like what I think, YOU don’t have to read it. I’m sure that the person who asked wanted an honest answer, which was given by me
Can YOU please keep ME out of the discussion? I’m not the topic of this thread. All of my responses had nothing critical to say about what another person thinks, all of my responses answered the questions pertaining to the original post and the question asked about why I felt the way I felt. Can we play nice and be kind to each other? I’d sure like to! :grouphug:
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Rence
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Actually, I was mistaken about my mom’s second marriage. In a previous post I said that she was only married in Church and the priest signed the marriage certificate. That was false. I asked her again yesterday. She and her husband-to-be went to city hall first and got the marriage license, and produced it for a priest a few weeks later, and they were married in Church. I’m sorry you don’t know of any priest who would marry a couple who had a marriage license in hand, but obviously there are priests who do because not only did my grandmother do it that way years and years ago, but my mom did it twice. So again, it obviously happens.
It was kinda funny though when I asked mom why she did it this way, because she gave me a blank look. Apprently they wanted to get the license and the name change stuff done all at the same time and out of the way so that they wouldn’t have to mess with it after the wedding
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mikeghiorso
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If there needs to be a reason, it could be stated thusly: the Church has the Sacraments where the People of God gather to worship (with the possible exception of the Anointing of the Sick). We celebrate Sacraments where we gather as community.
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Phemie
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Actually, I was mistaken about my mom’s second marriage. In a previous post I said that she was only married in Church and the priest signed the marriage certificate. That was false. I asked her again yesterday. She and her husband-to-be went to city hall first and got the marriage license, and produced it for a priest a few weeks later, and they were married in Church. I’m sorry you don’t know of any priest who would marry a couple who had a marriage license in hand, but obviously there are priests who do because not only did my grandmother do it that way years and years ago, but my mom did it twice. So again, it obviously happens.
Now you’re confusing me.
If the couple has a marriage license, they are not married and the priest will marry them and in Canada & the US it will be a legal as well as a religious marriage. I don’t know a priest who, in this situation will perform a strictly religious wedding and not register it with the state.
If they have a marriage certificate, they are already civilly married and he will still witness their exchange of vows in a convalidation – their civil marriage will then becomes a valid and, if they are both baptized, a sacramental marriage.
It was kinda funny though when I asked mom why she did it this way, because she gave me a blank look. Apprently they wanted to get the license and the name change stuff done all at the same time and out of the way so that they wouldn’t have to mess with it after the wedding
So your mom and her husband had a civil wedding first because name changes can’t occur with a strictly religious wedding. Then they had a convalidation.
Let me give you an example. In one case, a priest in my parish went to one of the missions and performed weddings for two couple whose license had expired (in our province it’s only good for 30 days).
Because of this he had to return later, witness their vows again (they were already religiously married but it wasn’t recognized by the state and things became a big mess) and when the bride signed with her ‘married name’, the province rejected the license since it wasn’t her legal name. The paper work had to be redone. It took 6 months to straighten out the mess and in the meantime the couple was in a legal limbo.
There would have to be a very serious reason for a priest to perform a non-legal but religious wedding and the only reasons I can come up with are those that have to do with secret marriages: the State imposes laws that violate natural law, such as forbidding racial intermarriage.
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Tantum_ergo
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No problem–I went off and made myself a cup of tea (relaxing). . .Honestly, I hope that some of the replies (the good ones, and there have been a lot) will help. It hurts (even when a person is really being nice and doesn’t mean to hurt) to feel misunderstood, whether we ‘should’ feel that way or not. So I hope that now the dust seems to be settling down a bit that things will start to get better.
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PatriceA
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Actually your opinion was not asked for, the OP asked for clarification on Church teachings regarding having outdoor weddings.With all due respect, my opinion was ask for, and I gave it. If at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter to YOU what I think, and if YOU don’t like what I think, YOU don’t have to read it. I’m sure that the person who asked wanted an honest answer, which was given by me
I’m confused though about your mother’s situation and why you keep presenting it as an example as if its a normal practice within the Catholic Church when it comes to wedding ceremonies. Are you saying she entered into a second marriage with a different man, or that she had two wedding ceremonies, one civil and one in the Church, to the same man? There seems to be more to your mother’s situation that may have given reason to why the priest allowed the timing of events to take place. But how your mom had a Church wedding, is not what the Church usually permits. There has to be extraordinary circumstances for the timing of events as they took place with your mother.
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Rence
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They got married in city hall first, brought the documentation to the priest and got married in Church, and no one blinked twice about it.
No one has ever said the word, “convalidation” and I’ve never even heard the term before until I read it on this forum.
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Rence
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Actually, opinions were asked. Sorry about that
In post #24 and post #32, which you must have missed, and to which I replied.You are correct that the OP asked for a clarification on Church teachings on outdoor weddings in their first post on this thread though.
I presented it as if it’s a normal practice, because it’s not abnormal a practice to me.
My grandparents got married at city hall first, lived separately with their own families, took the paperwork to the priest and got married (the same two grandparents) in Church.
My mother and father got married at city hall first, lived separately with their own families, and then three months later the priest married them (documentation presented to priest) - yes, the same two people.
My mother, years later was divorced, and her marriage annulled…she remarried. Again, they went to city hall to get married, had separate residences, and brought the documentation to the priest, and got married in Church.
I don’t know what people do “normally”, I know that’s how my family has done it. There were no extraordinary circumstances for the last wedding (I was there, I was the maid of honor). Not only that, she asked for permission, and was granted, to have her wedding at her grammar school parish, rather than our current parish at the time of the wedding. There were no problems with that at all - yet I read about drama for trying to have weddings outside one’s parish.
As far as I know, there were no extraordinary circumstances about what my grandparents did what my mom did the first time, they just chose to do it this way. Mind you, they didn’t have big civil wedding parties, or live together before they were married by a priest. They just went to city hall and did it first, then did the whole shabang in church with a reception to follow.
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Phemie
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I think most Catholics speak of having their marriage ‘blessed by the church’ but the proper term is convalidation. Different dioceses have different requirements for it, just like different dioceses require different things for marriage preparation.They got married in city hall first, brought the documentation to the priest and got married in Church, and no one blinked twice about it.
While the Church recognizes that a legal marriage exists it doesn’t deem it valid. A lot of Catholics don’t realize that when they seek to reconcile with the Church after having been married civilly, they don’t just receive a blessing but have to have an actual wedding ceremony. Many times it’s just them and two witnesses in front of the priest but some couples choose to make the religious wedding a big celebration to underline its importance in their lives.
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Phemie
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When it comes to marriage outside one’s parish, my experience has been that there is rarely drama about it. I’d say that 50 percent of the couples we see in our parish marry ‘back home’. It involves paperwork but rarely drama and I’ve never, in 13 years of working with this, known such a request to be refused. The process does take time but that’s part of the reason why we ask couples to contact the parish at least 6 months before their preferred date.
Just to give an example, if a couple in our parish wants to marry in a parish outside our diocese then our pastor must:
*]Do all the paperwork that’s involved with any wedding. In this paperwork he will include the name of the priest and the parish where the couple wish to marry.
*]Send all the paperwork to our Bishop who will look it over to make sure everything that is necessary is there. He will give his consent to the marriage taking place in the other parish and then he will forward the file to either
*]the Bishop of the diocese where the marriage is to take place, who will consent and forward to the priest who is to witness the wedding, or
*]the priest who is to witness the wedding who will then send it to his Bishop for permission to celebrate the wedding and wait to get the file back with the Bishop’s signature.
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dixieagle
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Just wondering if it’s possible you have confused “marriage license” with “marriage certificate”. In order to be married in any venue (in the US) where I’ve lived, any couple has to get a marriage license at at city hall, or the courthouse, within a specified period of time before the wedding. Simply getting the license does not constitute a “civil marriage”, only the license to marry. There is then a marriage “certificate” issued and signed by the priest, attesting to the Church wedding, which is also recognized by civil authority.Actually, I was mistaken about my mom’s second marriage. In a previous post I said that she was only married in Church and the priest signed the marriage certificate. That was false. I asked her again yesterday. She and her husband-to-be went to city hall first and got the marriage license, and produced it for a priest a few weeks later, and they were married in Church. I’m sorry you don’t know of any priest who would marry a couple who had a marriage license in hand, but obviously there are priests who do because not only did my grandmother do it that way years and years ago, but my mom did it twice. So again, it obviously happens.
It was kinda funny though when I asked mom why she did it this way, because she gave me a blank look. Apprently they wanted to get the license and the name change stuff done all at the same time and out of the way so that they wouldn’t have to mess with it after the wedding
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Tietjen
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Whim? :banghead:
In the interest of not offending you further (or seeming less than charitable), I will simply say that there is more to the Bishop’s decision in these circumstances than a “whim.”
No need to apologize. My being “good” is for God to judge and God alone; as it is in your case. I would suggest however, that rather than use words like “whim” or phrases like “I* know, I know, you have nothing to do with guilt, it’s my own conscience, etc etc. Spare me*” or “So besides the answers that try to bring about guilt for not wanting to do it the way The Church instructs…” you leave room for the possibility that maybe… just maybe the Church knows what she is doing. Perhaps, through the 2000+ years of the Church’s existence and through the promise by Christ that the Holy Spirit would guide the Church until the end of time, it has some credibility; even in matters that you might not understand or agree with.
Then I ask for your forgiveness for assuming that I was speaking with a female.
Apparently, your mother was given the Church’s position on the matter by 2 separate priests. She apparently relayed what they said to you and you in turn came here because you either (or both) didn’t agree with or didn’t understand the Church’s position on the matter. After attempting to gain support/knowledge/understanding from members of this forum you continued to reject what was said by replying with words like “…spare me” and “the bishop’s whim” and “… not wanting to do it the way the Church instructs…” (when addressing your personal feelings on the matter.) Therefore, when you have been presented the reasons and you continue to refuse to accept those reasons, there is little else to say accept “tough.”
It becomes obvious that you need to learn the faith better if you are bowing to me. Still, I wish you well too. I had hoped that you would have gotten something out of this conversation (if not through my replies then someone else’s) but apparently not. God bless and take care.
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NHInsider
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In my understanding it is the norm in many countries outside the US, where the priest is NOT an agent of the state.
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NHInsider
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It’s still at the Bishop’s discretion, that’s why my daughters had two different outcomes to their requests, because they were married in different dioceses.
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NHInsider
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To clarify, both daughters wanted to marry not in the church building because they wanted their inlaws to attend, and to attend without a great deal of unpleasantness. D#1 needed dispensation from canonical form only, and her priest and that diocese worked out the “sacrament in the chapel, civil ceremony on the hill” plan.
D#2 needed dispensation from canonical form AND dispensation from disparity of cult, because her husband is not (yet) baptised. Our parish priest considered the situation serious enough that he went to the Chancery to plead their case and get permission to witness their wedding, which was denied - so that’s why they went the convalidation route instead. It is my understanding that in our diocese they have simply established a “no dispensations for outdoor weddings ever for any circumstance” policy - again, because of the plethora of requests.
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Phemie
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I’m not sure about the situation in case # 1 since you don’t say if the groom was Catholic or not, but in my diocese, case #2 would easily have seen the Bishop grant dispensations from form and for disparity of cult and the priest would probably have had nothing further to do with the wedding. He definitely wouldn’t officiate though he could certainly attend and give a blessing. The exchange of vows would be witnessed by either a minister from another Church or a judge or a JP.
Since it would be a valid marriage, the Catholic party would then bring in the marriage certificate to the priest to have the marriage entered in the parish register and the info would be forwarded to the baptismal parish if he/she had not been baptized here.
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