F
Fil73
Guest
I am new to Christianity, and I followed the call to the Catholic Church in the fall of 2018. I completed RCIA in April 2019. However, I was not fully received because I had a marriage prior to my current wife.
I have gone through the annulment process (a very long 18 months). While I don’t have the “final” decision, I was forewarned by my parish priest that the Tribunal is voting “non-affirmative”. My warning came on March 4, and I have been on a roller coaster of emotions ever since.
My argument is with the Error Concerning Sacramental Dignity (Canon 1099). I even spoke with the presiding judge of the Tribunal on March 6, and when I mentioned this to him, he almost immediately dismissed it. While I don’t remember exactly what he said, it was basically something like “People of all religions get married, and we can’t assume their marriages aren’t valid because they have different beliefs.” Again, totally paraphrasing, but that’s pretty close.
My background is not another religion, but a complete LACK of religion. I was not raised in a church of any kind, considered myself an atheist at a very young age (around age 10), and I had absolutely no knowledge or understanding of the teachings of Jesus concerning marriage. Both of my parents were believers, but they weren’t really “practicing” believers. However, I was baptized at a very young age.
To me, marriage was just a legal contract. I married my first wife because I was joining the US Army, and they required me to be married if I wanted her and our daughter to travel with me. There was no religious context to my getting married. I used to argue about getting married, saying things like “I don’t need a piece of paper saying that I love you”, and similar things like that. In fact, I never actually understood why marriages were done in churches (I guess I assumed that it was some kind of tradition). The very fact that a judge at a courthouse can marry people just reinforces the idea that marriage is just a legal contract (at least that’s the way I felt back then).
Therefore, knowing that I had absolutely no knowledge of the teachings of Jesus prior to my first marriage, how could I have possibly entered into a sacramental marriage? At the time of my first marriage, I did not believe in God, I had no religious background of any kind, I had no understanding of the Church’s teaching of marriage, I had no marriage counseling prior to the marriage, and yet the Tribunal is saying that I had a sacramental marriage? This doesn’t make any sense to me.
I have been all over the internet looking for a good explanation of the Error Concerning Sacramental Dignity, but all I find is information that reinforces my understanding that this absolutely applies to my situation. Yet the Tribunal says it doesn’t.
If my situation doesn’t fall under the Error Concerning Sacramental Dignity, then what does? I need to know, for a fact, that this does not apply to me so I can move on in peace, knowing that the Tribunal is making the correct decision.
Thank you, and God Bless you all.
I have gone through the annulment process (a very long 18 months). While I don’t have the “final” decision, I was forewarned by my parish priest that the Tribunal is voting “non-affirmative”. My warning came on March 4, and I have been on a roller coaster of emotions ever since.
My argument is with the Error Concerning Sacramental Dignity (Canon 1099). I even spoke with the presiding judge of the Tribunal on March 6, and when I mentioned this to him, he almost immediately dismissed it. While I don’t remember exactly what he said, it was basically something like “People of all religions get married, and we can’t assume their marriages aren’t valid because they have different beliefs.” Again, totally paraphrasing, but that’s pretty close.
My background is not another religion, but a complete LACK of religion. I was not raised in a church of any kind, considered myself an atheist at a very young age (around age 10), and I had absolutely no knowledge or understanding of the teachings of Jesus concerning marriage. Both of my parents were believers, but they weren’t really “practicing” believers. However, I was baptized at a very young age.
To me, marriage was just a legal contract. I married my first wife because I was joining the US Army, and they required me to be married if I wanted her and our daughter to travel with me. There was no religious context to my getting married. I used to argue about getting married, saying things like “I don’t need a piece of paper saying that I love you”, and similar things like that. In fact, I never actually understood why marriages were done in churches (I guess I assumed that it was some kind of tradition). The very fact that a judge at a courthouse can marry people just reinforces the idea that marriage is just a legal contract (at least that’s the way I felt back then).
Therefore, knowing that I had absolutely no knowledge of the teachings of Jesus prior to my first marriage, how could I have possibly entered into a sacramental marriage? At the time of my first marriage, I did not believe in God, I had no religious background of any kind, I had no understanding of the Church’s teaching of marriage, I had no marriage counseling prior to the marriage, and yet the Tribunal is saying that I had a sacramental marriage? This doesn’t make any sense to me.
I have been all over the internet looking for a good explanation of the Error Concerning Sacramental Dignity, but all I find is information that reinforces my understanding that this absolutely applies to my situation. Yet the Tribunal says it doesn’t.
If my situation doesn’t fall under the Error Concerning Sacramental Dignity, then what does? I need to know, for a fact, that this does not apply to me so I can move on in peace, knowing that the Tribunal is making the correct decision.
Thank you, and God Bless you all.
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), I don’t understand how you can “do what the Church does” — facere quod facit ecclesia — when two people have the notion that other people can marry and that the union is not indissoluble, or, way back in the back of their minds, they have the notion that “if my spouse here takes a knock on the head, their personality totally changes, and they become a child molester or an ax murderer, then, yes, I can divorce them, and when the judge lays down the gavel, this sacrament will be dissolved and will cease to exist”.