Marriage before God vs. marriage before Caesar

[LilyM]

This is a pious legend, not rooted in any fact.

I never thought it was anything else, hence my calling it a story. My point was that in certain situations, and the situation in the St Valentine legend is one that isn’t utterly impossible, Catholic priests can perfectly morally conduct marriages outside of, and even contrary to, civil law.

A real-life exampleof such a situation is when the Prince Regent of England, the future King George IV, married a Catholic widow by the name of Maria Fitzherbert. This marriage was contrary to English law, as a member of the Royal Family could neither marry a Catholic nor marry without the consent of the King (which the Prince didn’t obtain).

Certainly the restriction on marriage to Catholics is incredibly unjust and discriminatory, and though in George and Maria’s case they were married by an Anglican rather than Catholic clergyman, in such a case it would have been entirely permissible for a Catholic clergyman to contravene the law and marry them.

 

[NewEnglandPriest]

My guess is that the marriage by the army chaplain was to guarantee the marriage was legal under United States law.

But the Military Chaplain could have done both the US marriage and the Catholic marriage at once.