No children, no rights in the catholic church?

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truthquester said:
A friend of mine can’t naturally have children due to turners syndrome and her local church told her that she is no longer welcome there because of it, they won’t even let her have her wedding in the church. Is it common practice amongst catholics to kick someone out of the church because they can’t have children???
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To answer this exact question, I say that she may of misunderstood. I have never met a priest that has ever done such a thing. If this has happened then she needs to go to another Catholic Church and talk to another priest. Pray that this mistake does not split her from the true religion. Be strong and Pray!
 
Maybe the confusion relative to the priesthood is with the prohibition against recieving the sacrament of holy orders for men who had had vasectomy. Requests for dispensation have to go to the Office of the Pennitentiary in Rome.

I have never heard of a prohibition against the sacrament of matrimony based on infertility outside of unsubstantiated claims here on CAF.

-Tim-
 
truthquester said:
Maybe you misunderstood my question. This is actually happening, this poor woman is being denied services from her parish and the priest told her it was because she can’t conceive.
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Is it possible that you may not have the whole story? Is it possible that your friend may understandably be too emotional to be able to share the information fully?
She wouldn’t be “kicked out” simply because she can’t conceive.
Please convey to her our prayers and compassion.
 
truthquester said:
A friend of mine can’t naturally have children due to turners syndrome and her local church told her that she is no longer welcome there because of it, they won’t even let her have her wedding in the church. Is it common practice amongst catholics to kick someone out of the church because they can’t have children???
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Is it possible that you may not have the whole story? Is it possible that your friend may understandably be too emotional to be able to share the information fully?
She wouldn’t be “kicked out” simply because she can’t conceive.
Please convey to her our prayers and compassion.
 
Not to derail the OP’s thread, but there has to be more to this than meets the eye. It reminds me of my nephew’s wedding last year. His wife to be was a professed Catholic and claimed that the priest would not consider marrying them in the woman’s home parish (he served 2 parishes as is becoming the norm where I was raised) only the parish that was 12 miles away so they were married in an ELCA Lutheran church that my nephew was a member of. I can only think that there was more to that story than was told too.
 
It is my understanding that marriage (and sexual acts) need to be open to, procreation.
This is not necessarily the same thing as able to.
Someone correct me please if that is incorrect.
Which is a a huge relief for a certain 52 year old guy and his 55 year old wife (sorry dear).
 
TimothyH said:
I have never heard of a prohibition against the sacrament of matrimony based on infertility outside of unsubstantiated claims here on CAF.
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Canon Law is very clear that infertility is not an obstacle to marriage. Impotence is, however.
 
truthquester said:
A friend of mine can’t naturally have children due to turners syndrome and her local church told her that she is no longer welcome there because of it, they won’t even let her have her wedding in the church. Is it common practice amongst catholics to kick someone out of the church because they can’t have children???
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I have not heard of such an incident. Please explain precisely the priest said and his reasons for doing so. I find it highly improbable that the priest would expel her from the parish simply for having Turner’s Syndrome. Expelling members of the parish is a process that is highly fraught with emotions and contention, and most priests don’t even do it for parishioners who openly teach heresy and live in sin, so I find it hard to believe that this priest did it for something that is not even a sin or worth the punishment. The whole point of the Church is to be a hospital for sinners, anyway.

Also, I should alert the misinformed here that Turner’s Syndrome is not an impediment to marriage. Impotence is an impediment to marriage, but sterility is not. Turner’s Syndrome begets sterility, not impotence - the ovaries are dysfunctional, but the genitalia are still present, though infantile. If anyone really wants the final word on it, they have to ask a canonical lawyer with a doctor’s expert (name removed by moderator)ut.

Can. 1084 §1. Antecedent and perpetual impotence to have intercourse, whether on the part of the man or the woman, whether absolute or relative, nullifies marriage by its very nature.
§2. If the impediment of impotence is doubtful, whether by a doubt about the law or a doubt about a fact, a marriage must not be impeded nor, while the doubt remains, declared null.
§3. Sterility neither prohibits nor nullifies marriage, without prejudice to the prescript of ⇒ can. 1098.

It may not be relevant here, but just in case anyone was wondering, Canon 1098 states that:
Can. 1098 A person contracts invalidly who enters into a marriage deceived by malice, perpetrated to obtain consent, concerning some quality of the other partner which by its very nature can gravely disturb the partnership of conjugal life.
Jerok said:
From what I understand you have to be able to have sex to be married in the Catholic Church, or to become a priest. So in some way, we discriminate against those who are born unable to have intercourse by making sure they never love another human through marriage.

Marriage - must be able to have sex!
Priest - must be able to have sex!

How they determine if a priest is able to have sex, I’ll never know :eek:
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St_Francis said:
If the priest is known to be impotent, say, through lacking the physical necessities or having been married and incapable, then he would not be able to be ordained. They don’t require proof that they are able to.
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As regards the ability to have sex as a requirement for Holy Orders, please cite the canons that substantiate your assertion. This is a list of all the canonical impediments to Holy Orders, and none of them specifiy impotence or any other inability to have sex. 🙂
 
Joseph and Mary were married and they didn’t have relations with each other.
 
TimothyH said:
Maybe the confusion relative to the priesthood is with the prohibition against recieving the sacrament of holy orders for men who had had vasectomy. Requests for dispensation have to go to the Office of the Pennitentiary in Rome. …
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Perhaps. However, that “impediment” has nothing to do with the man’s fertility. It is an impediment (or may be–it is still a topic of debate in canonical circles) due to its being a kind of grave mutilation (c. 1041.5).

I will join my voice to the chorus of others saying there is no reason to say someone has “no rights” in the Church because of infertility. There is also no reason to say that a priest must be fertile and potent.

Dan
 
catholicguy123 said:
No, this is not a Catholic practice. That sounds like a priest that is doing his own thing (and very wrongly).** She just can’t marry.** If she is being denied The Eucharist or something similar to that, then there must be something more in the situation. Specifically if shes doing something immoral. But based upon the information you have given us, this is my answer.
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To clarify:

She can marry even if she is infertile (can’t have a baby).

She can not marry if she is unable to have sex.
 
StJudePray4Me said:
To clarify:

She can marry even if she is infertile (can’t have a baby).

She can not marry if she is unable to have sex.
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Either way No priest should turn a person away from the church entirely due to any such medical problem, he should counsel them on just why marriage is not possible. If they are incapable of engaging in the Marital Act there is nothing to prevent them from having the inevitably chaste relationship with their chosen partner. It’s simply wrong to call it marriage.

If a civil wedding for social and finincial reasons is appropriate it may be possible to square that with cannon law with appropriate dispensations - but it’s still not a sacramental marriage.
 
I think there is A LOT missing from this story, and it is unhelpful to speculate here.
 
Can someone clarify the difference between the terms “open to” procreation, and “unable to”. Does “open to” apply to the sacrament of marriage or only to the morality of the sexual act itself?
If the standard for marriage is “unable to”, it seems any potential spouse who is “unable to” procreate is unqualified for marriage. Sometimes people are unable to procreat then through the act of faithfully giving themselves openly to their spouse they discover they are indeed able to, because they were open to it. :whacky:
 
truthquester said:
Maybe you misunderstood my question. This is actually happening, this poor woman is being denied services from her parish and the priest told her it was because she can’t conceive.
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That’s nuts. The church marries people who are in their 80’s. They’re unlikely to conceive. Are you sure you got the entire story?
 
StJudePray4Me said:
To clarify:

She can marry even if she is infertile (can’t have a baby).

She can not marry if she is unable to have sex.
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According to Wikipedia, some people with Turners Syndrome have undeveloped or underdeveloped reproductive organs.

As another poster mentioned, there is A LOT missing from this story. I’ll reserve judgment.
 
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