Convalidate Marriage

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celamore1

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On our 25th Wedding Anniversary last year 2017 . Me and my husband decide to get our marriage Convalidate It was so beautiful and very meaningful wedding were my son our Best Man and my daughter our Maid of Honor. We had a full service mass. And all friends and families participate in our wedding. It showed a good example for our children too. “What marriage is all about.” My question is are we having a Marriage Convalidate Certificate? or it just a formality since were already married
 
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My wife and I had our marriage convalidation ceremony in our parish 2 years ago next month and yes we received a certificate. We had previously completed RCIA so we also received our confirmation certificates as well.
 
How long before you guys received it we have ours done Nov 2017 and we still don’t have it.
thank you
 
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Almost certain it was the day of, although I have slept a few times since then. If not it was not more than a couple of Sundays later. I would ask your priest or Deacon next time you see one of them.
 
thank you Did they mailed it or you guys pick it up to your church?
 
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Check with your parish office. Something get lost in the mail. If the church issued anything they may have a record of it.
 
A couple having their marriage “Convalidated” via the Roman Rite of Matrimony is actually getting married for the first time to each other. Simple Convalidation is not retroactive back to the first marriage attempt. Therefore, your parish will issue a regular marriage certificate after recording the marriage in the appropriate registry. Note that the date on the wedding certificate will not be the date of your original marriage attempt, but the date of your wedding the Catholic Church.

Indeed, any couple who believes their previous invalid attempt at marriage to be the true marriage and approaches their marriage vows in the Catholic Church as mere “formality” has likely not been properly prepared and risks defective content due to simulation. Such faulty intention would make the second marriage attempt also invalid.
 
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The certificates were either given to us at our reception that we had invited our Deacon and priest to or at mass a week or 2 later it was handed to us by our Deacon.
 
TheOldColonel said:
A couple having their marriage “Convalidated” via the Roman Rite of Matrimony is actually getting married for the first time to each other. Simple Convalidation is not retroactive back to the first marriage attempt. Therefore, your parish will issue a regular marriage certificate after recording the marriage in the appropriate registry. Note that the date on the wedding certificate will not be the date of your original marriage attempt, but the date of your wedding the Catholic Church.

Indeed, any couple who believes their previous invalid attempt at marriage to be the true marriage and approaches their marriage vows in the Catholic Church as mere “formality” has likely not been properly prepared and risks defective content due to simulation. Such faulty intention would make the second marriage attempt also invalid.
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I don’t believe this is exactly right…how do we know that their first marriage was “invalid”? They may have both not been Catholic at the time, or one may have been Catholic and correctly when through the paperwork to get permission to be married in another church. If that were the case, the first marriage is be perfectly valid.

Not enough information here to just jump out and assume the OP’s marriage is/was somehow invalid.
 
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If the first attempt at marraige was valid, then it should never have been “Convalidated.” Since a priest saw a need to “Convalidate,” then it is most reasonable to assume the first attempt at marriage was invalid. This reasoning follows directly from Canon Law. Valid marriages are never “Convalidated.”
 
TC3033 said:
I don’t believe this is exactly right…how do we know that their first marriage was “invalid”?
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No, @TheOldColonel is correct. However, you make a good point: some folks have a blessing on the anniversary of their wedding, and they sometimes call these a “renewal of the vows” or another such thing.

A couple’s vows never ‘expire’, so they don’t need to be ‘renewed’. (The current Rite of Matrimony book has a really nice anniversary blessing (which is not a ‘renewal of vows’!)).

On the other hand, a ‘convalidation’ is precisely what happens in the case that a couple was not married validly in the Church and wishes to correct that situation. So, if the OP says it was a convalidation, then it was an actual marriage that is valid in the Church, following a wedding that was valid civilly.
’ They may have both not been Catholic at the time
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If they were both already baptized, then the marriage was already valid at the time of the original ceremony, so… no convalidation.
If one was unbaptized, then the marriage became valid at the time of the unbaptized spouse’s baptism, so… no convalidation.
, or one may have been Catholic and correctly when through the paperwork to get permission to be married in another church. If that were the case, the first marriage is be perfectly valid.
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If so, then… no convalidation.
Not enough information here to just jump out and assume the OP’s marriage is/was somehow invalid.
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If it was convalidated – and it sure sounds like it, based on the OP’s description – then we really can conclude that it previously wasn’t valid in the Church. (However, it’s possible that the OP is using the term incorrectly, I guess…)
 
Were both baptized Catholic since my husband was active duty during that time and deployed every 7 months getting married in church will takes awhile and lot of paper work we decide to do civil for a meantime until he get retired in the service we made our promise that we will pursue to do a church wedding on our 25th Wedding instead of renewing vows, and that’s what we did but the priest said they called that Convalidate since were already married. We do the full wedding mass last Nov 2017 for our 25th Wedding Anniversary. So we had both Civil & Church Wedding.
Our thoughts is since were both Catholic we just wants our marriage being sacred. I believe that getting married in Civil you married in the eyes of State but being married in Church you married in the eyes of Man and God and that’s what we like it. And feels good because we’re not only make our love strong but our faith too.
 
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Actually, mere misunderstanding does not invalidate a marriage attempt, according to Canon law.

Especially not in the scenario here where the concern was about misplaced paperwork and church procedure, not true doubt about ones intent.
 
Yes, live and do not worry with symbols 😄
 
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celamore1 said:
On our 25th Wedding Anniversary last year 2017 . Me and my husband decide to get our marriage Convalidate It was so beautiful and very meaningful wedding were my son our Best Man and my daughter our Maid of Honor. We had a full service mass. And all friends and families participate in our wedding. It showed a good example for our children too. “What marriage is all about.” My question is are we having a Marriage Convalidate Certificate? or it just a formality since were already married
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The Catholic sacrament of matrimony is the marriage not the civil marriage contract. Canon law states (CIC):
Can. 1160 A marriage which is null because of defect of form must be contracted anew in canonical form in order to become valid, without prejudice to the prescript of can. 1127, §2.
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The Catholic Church will keep a record of the marriage in the parish of the convalidation. It is not the legal record: civil marriages require a certificate.
 
runningdude said:
according to canon law.
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Please quote the Canon(s). Of course, you will not find a single canon stating what you claim. Rather Canon 1101 is quite clear on the matter.

If one or both parties approach their vows during the Roman Rite of Matrimony believing he or she or both are already married, then consent is excluded and merely simulated. Indeed, due to a belief (or misunderstanding) that the vows being said are not the true wedding vows, the intention to marry at that moment is lacking. Though the words be said correctly, one or both parties merely go through the motions of the Rite. Consent, in such a case, is defective. I have assisted at dozens of annulment hearings where annulments were granted on precisely this ground.

Those who prepare couples for marriage have a serious duty to dispel such misunderstanding regarding the vows. Unfortunately, many are allowed to approach Convalidation under the false assumption that they are already married and that marriage in the Church is a mere formality.

"Canon 1101
  1. The internal consent of the mind is presumed to be in agreement with the words or signs employed in celebrating matrimony.
  2. But if either or both parties through a positive act of the will should exclude marriage itself, some essential element or an essential property of marriage, it is invalidly contracted.
When two people stand up before God, the Church and society and exchange vows their words and actions are presumed to be truthful. Truth is the conformity of what the person says or does with what they know and will interiorly. When consent is given falsely and touches on one of the essential elements or properties of marriage that consent is invalid. The person is said to simulate consent.

Marriage itself. Total simulation occurs when one or both of the parties positively intends to not marry. This could be done in order to obtain the sexual rights of marriage, or even to obtain the civil effects of marriage (tax advantages, immigration visa, etc.)."
 
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This case is actually pretty clear cut, if what the OP has written is accurate. There was an obligation to marry in the Church, which was not fulfilled. The couple were not considered by the Church to be married until their convalidation 25 years after the civil ceremony.
 
Ya, you guys are right.

I hear the word get used so many times when people are talking about renewing their vows from a valid marriage I get myself confused some times.
 
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