Forest-Pine said:
I maintain that this is something a member of the clergy needs to answer.
Well, I’ll give this a shot as a cleric from the perspective of the law, and hope it’s not too dense. Here goes, for what it’s worth.
The nature of marriage exists in the partnership of the whole of life (Gaudium et spes, no. 48). Consequently, canon 1151 states that spouses have the duty and right to perserve conjugal living.Pastoral means are to be used to help them maintain communal life.
Separation is a last resort. The term “separation” in one context means a temporary separation of bed and board for a reason recognized in law. However, it can also be permanent. Permanent separation could be effected by civil divorce, but a couple could separate and not have a civil divorce.
Separation is not the same as a declaration of nullity, which is usually investigated following civil divorce. However, it is possible that a couple does separate permanently, and then later approaches a tribunal for the investigation.
Separation can happen in several ways. Translations of the texts of the canons are available in full on the internet, and have been posted earlier.
Canon 1152 addresses the provision for separating from conjugal life by the innocent and non condoning spouse of an adulterous partner. Permission is not required, but the law envisions that the innocent spouse bring the matter before the Church later by a suit for separation. Church authority is to investigate the circumstances and determine if the innocent spouse can forgive the misdeed and restore conjugal life (see also canon 1692). Such suits are seldom filed by the faithful, as far as I can tell. However, the law recognizes adultery as a legitimate ground for permanent separation.
**Canon 1153 permits separation in other situations. **Here the law says that normally the local ordinary (usually the diocesan bishop, but it could be the vicar general) needs to give permission. A priest can’t give such permission unless he has been delegated the power to do so.
However, separation can be done even on the authority of one spouse under certain conditions of grave or serious danger or the case in which “common life has been otherwise rendered too difficult” and there is danger of delay: “§1. If either of the spouses causes serious danger of spirit or body to the other spouse or to the children, or otherwise renders common life too hard (“vel aliter vitam communem nimis duram reddat”) , that spouse gives the other a legitimate cause for separating in virtue of a decree of the local ordinary, or even on his or her own authority if there is danger in delay.”
The gravity or seriousness of the danger of body or spirit to a spouse or children would have to be weighed in the individual case. Most would see physical abuse or sexual abuse or flagrant alcoholism or drug use as presenting a grave and serious danger. This difficulty is not just a matter of overall dissatisfaction with the marriage, but something more serious, and we’d have to consider that on a case by case basis.
When we hear of a priest giving permission for separation, what is really said, is that after listening to a spouse, he agrees that the danger or difficulty exists so that the spouse, using the authority the canon gives him or her, can legitimately separate.
If the reason for separation ceases, then conjugal life is to be restored unless Church authority determines otherwise (c. 1153 §2).
In some cases, civil divorce is the only way in which the spouses can secure their legal and financial status and provide for the children. While civil divorce does not have any effect on the bond of marriage, Church law does not impose any sanction on divorce. However, no right to marry again is given by civil divorce.
The canons on separation do not use the term “dispensation,” which is, as correctly defined earlier, a relaxation of a merely ecclesiastical law for a just reason in a particular case by a competent ecclesiastical authority. The commentaries use the term “permission” and not “dispensation” as well.
In these situations, no law is relaxed at all (setting aside canon 1151) but the law on separation is merely applied. What is given either by the local ordinary or by the law itself (by even the authority of the departing spouse, “etiam propria auctoritate”) is an application of the canons themselves and not a dispensation from them. It’s a discernment that, yes, there is a just reason to separate.
Since conjugal living in canon 1151 is necessary for the partnership of the whole of life, it is considered as originating in natural law. The Church couldn’t dispense from it anyway. But natural law also teaches that no one is bound to the impossible, and the canon just sets the conditions down in which it is morally impossible to continue conjugal living.
