How is a dispensation from form issued?

[clb1953]

My husband and I were married in the Episcopal church over 25 years ago. He is life long Catholic, but at the time I was an Episcopalian.

Before we married, we met with a priest which my husband had known for many years, and who was serving as the Chancellor of our Diocese at the time. We explained we would like to marry in my home church (Episcopalian) and would like him to witness our marriage along with my Episcopal priest. He told us he had a prior commitment on that day, but that everything would be copasetic for our marriage in the Episcopal church, and that we could go ahead. We attended the Catholic pre-cana conference, and were married in the Episcopal church. I then came into the Catholic church about a year later.

I am assuming from what I have read that the Monsignor had granted us a dispensation from form, but we never received anything in writing. Should we have received some sort of document or official notification? How would our marriage have been recorded in the Catholic Church?

Our current pastor believes our marriage may not be sacramental and that we should have it convalidated, which we will gladly do, but have we really been living in a non-sacramental marriage all these years? We are very active in our parish, and this thought is most upsetting and perplexing to us…

 

[1ke]

Your current pastor is correct.

The priest did not have the ability to grant a dispensation from Catholic form. That can only come from the Bishop. Yes, there is paperwork that your DH would have been required to fill out.

Contact the Church in which your husband was baptized-- that is where his sacramental records would be. Yours would be in the Church you were received into.

If proper paperwork had been completed and submitted to the diocese (which I doubt it was) then your husband’s sacramental records will show a marriage recorded.

So, probably you and your DH will need to go through the convalidation process.

I suggest you start with your current priest’s help in tracking down any paperwork at the diocese in which your husband resided at the time of your marriage. It is *possible *that the priest did obtain the correct permissions from the diocese, but it seems doubtful since your husband never received anything official.

No records = invalid marriage.

It should be a simple process to convalidate the marriage.

Sorry that the original priest was so off-base, that is quite odd for someone at that level in the diocese. Is is possible to contact this original priest, or is he no longer alive?

 

[clb1953]

He is still alive, but quite elderly and a little senile. So, I suspect he would not recall the specifics since it was so long ago.

Since he worked in the Office of the Bishop, we assumed he must have submitted the proper paperwork. My husband never had any doubts…

I guess I also wonder why this issue would not have come up when I was brought into the Church.

Fortunately our Pastor and my husband are old school chums, and he has agreed to perform the convalidation as soon as possible - I think this is the best thing to do and not waste time trying to track down records.

It still is pretty distressing to us, although he tells us based on the premise of invincable ignorance, we would not be considered to have been living in mortal sin all these years.

 

[puzzleannie]

can’t say what happened in OPs case but often the parties do not receive the official dispensation, the pastor does, and it is recorded in the marriage record, and reported to the Catholic pary’s baptismal parish so the marriage, with the fact of dispensation, can be entered there. To find the answer OP should contact his baptismal parish and find out what is there, or contact the parish where the marriage was recorded, because the fact of the dispensation should be part of the record.

when the non-Catholic party was received into the Church, the pertinent facts about the marriage would be entered into the sacramental record with the other details of his record-birthdate and place, parentage, date and place of baptism, facts of marriage, and date of profession of faith, confirmation and first communion. Since the pastor in question was at the time working in the chancery we assume things were done properly until proven otherwise.

 

[BlestOne]

I agree with Puzzleannie… we have had instances where we thought we didn’t have paperwork from the bishop about things and come to find out the pastor filed them in a file with other pertinent information. Granted it wasn’t about our marriage, it was about my dh joining the Catholic Church. Check it out first…

 

[1ke]

It has come to my attention that some of my information is not entirely accurate-- the priest in the diocesan office may have been given authority to grant dispensations by the bishop. I did not know he could delegate this authority. But, apparently he can.

SO, start with the chancery office and see what records they have.

 

[Brendan]

It has come to my attention that some of my information is not entirely accurate-- the priest in the diocesan office may have been given authority to grant dispensations by the bishop. I did not know he could delegate this authority. ** But, apparently he can. **

I know for a fact that Cardinal Maida’s Secretary ( a Msgr) is the one who reviews and approves the requests for dispensations.

I would be VERY surprised if any bishop personally attended to those requests. He would most likely appoint a priest with some expertise in Canon Law to review and process those.

 

[SeekerJen]

Does your husband remember signing any forms? Our priest filled out all of the “request for dispensation” forms when my non-Catholic husband and I were doing marriage prep. All I had to do was sign and then the priest sent them off to the Archdiocesan office (where apparently Cardinal Maida’s delegate took care of it). We never received official paperwork indicating that the dispensation was granted, but as our priest is very by-the-book when it comes to such things, he would have told us if it had not been granted.