Sacrament of marriage and the ministry of priests

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What is the basis of the Eastern understanding that the priest, and not the mutual consent of the couple, confers the sacrament of matrimony? Certainly in Roman Law, even as used in Byzantium, this was not the case. Justinian, a Byzantine Catholic Emperor, certainly recognizes marriages contracted by the couple alone in his codification of Roman law. This has always been the Latin understanding, both before and after the schism. I am really curious to know where the Byzantine teaching dervies from…
 
I am not an Eastern, so forgive me if my (name removed by moderator)ut is presumptuous.

I have a theory.

The Alexandrian Tradition has always recognized the fact that marriage is justified by God’s Natural Law (e.g., Origen, Clement, etc.). It was raised to the level of a Sacrament by Christ, evinced by 1) his comparison between marriage and the relationship between Christ and his Church, and 2) his teaching on its indissolubility. Hence, it is recognized in Coptic Orthodoxy, and in Oriental Orthodoxy in general, that the priest, representing Christ, is the proper minister of marriage - and, hence, likewise, explicitly adheres to the teaching of the indissolubility of marriage.

Part of this justification based on Natural Law is the idea that man’s free will must be involved in the contract of marriage. In this regard, the Oriental Tradition in general is in agreement - i.e., the free volition of each spouse is a necessary element of the marriage contract (anyone who wishes to do so can find this information on each respective Oriental Church’s websites). By virtue of this, as well as the ancient laws of the Church, annulment is recognized as a legitimate ecclesiastical practice under limited circumstances in the Oriental Orthodox Churches.

One can see, as in many other things, that the Oriental Tradition is a via media between the Latins and the Easterns.

I think perhaps that the estrangement between West and East has resulted in a polarizing effect between the the two bases for marriage in the early Church - namely, Natural Law and Christ’s Law.

I am not saying that Natural Law and Christ’s Law are mutually exclusive in either the Western or Eastern Church. I’m just saying that the polarization is reflected in several aspects of each Tradition’s teaching on marriage.

Interestingly, the Eastern Orthodox generally reject the concept of Natural Law. Having somehow divested herself of belief in the Natural Law, the only thing left was to assert that the one absolutely necessary condition of marriage within the Eastern Orthodox Church was the sanctification of the Church - hence, the teaching that the priest is the minister of marriage without recognition of the legitimacy of annulments, nor the teaching on the indissolubility of marriage.

I am not so much interested in how the Easterns have come to recognize the priest as the minister of marriage (since that is also present in the Oriental Tradition). I am more interested in knowing how (or why) the Eastern Tradition has rejected the early Church’s belief in Natural Law, and how (or why) the Eastern Tradition does not recognize Christ’s teaching on the indissolubility of marriage. Understand that I am basing my views on the Eastern Tradition’s understanding of marriage from what many Eastern Orthodox members (or former members) have said about the issue in the past in these forums. If I am mistaken, please correct me.

Blessings,
Marduk

P.S. Brother Tyler, I hope you don’t think I have hijacked the thread. The title of the thread seems sufficiently broad to include my questions. If you feel otherwise, please ask the Moderator to delete my post.🙂

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Since marriage is a sacrament, and requires a priest to celebrate the sacrament and confer his blessing to seal the marriage, the Christian east has generally held that it is the blessing of the priest (as with any sacrament) that effects the epicletic conferral of the sacrament.

Justinian’s recognition was intended as economia to those who were not Christians but could legally consider themselves married according to the eyes of the state. It was not intended to co-opt the sacramental nature of marriage nor the preference that the Church be the place of the sacramental bond, not the courthouse.
 
The blessing of the priest is certainly very important in the Latin Church, and indeed necessary under canon law; however, a Latin Catholic may marry without a priest with a dispensation from his ordinary. How does the East view these marriages? My great-uncle is a Catholic in good standing married to a Protestant woman. They were married (I believe) by either a Baptist minister or a justice of the peace (can’t remember which), and certainly not in a Catholic church, but with a dispensation from my uncle’s bishop. My concern is this - either the Eastern Church is correct and he is not married and thus living in sin yet receiving holy communion with his bishop’s permission, or the Latin Church is correct and valid marriages are possible without the priestly blessing. This is very confusing for me.
 
I don’t know how our Eastern Catholic brethren do it.
But something strange goes on in modern Eastern Orthodoxy.

Indeed, the EOC would not normally recognize such marriages. They might do so under the principle of “economy” (I put that in quotes because as yet I do not understand how economy according to them can supply the grace to accomodate a Sacrament). The interesting thing is, if your uncle divorced the Protestant woman and then married an EO woman, the EOC would indeed recognize the prior marriage, and consider the marriage to the EO woman the SECOND marriage. Strange, huh?

I’ll try to get a link to the EOC teaching on the matter by this weekend (hopefully sooner), if someone has not done so by then.

Blessings,
Marduk
 
That the priestly blessing is not an absolute requirement of true marriage between Christians is proved by the Council of Trent’s toleration of past clandestine marriages.
Tametsi dubitandum non est clandestina matrimonia libero contrahentium consensu facta rata et vera esse matrimonia quamdiu ecclesia ea irrita non fecit
Although is not to be doubted that clandestine marriages contracted by free consent are made authoritatively and truly to be marriages as long as the Church has not made them void…
…eos sancta synodus anathemate damnat qui ea vera ac rata esse negant…
…the holy Council condemns with anathema those who deny they are true and authoritative…
Some translate rata as “valid” and irrita as “invalid,” which is acceptable but not the only possible meanings. The more precise terms are validus and invalidus. For example, validus is used in Session 24, Canon 9 condemning those who hold that clerics or those with solemn vows of chastity may contract a valid marriage.
It is taught by Pope Leo XIII (Arcanum, 23-24) and other Popes that the Sacrament of Matrimony is not some second thing added to Christian marriage. Rather, the marriage-contract itself is the sacrament, for Christ sanctified marriage itself.
23. Let no one, then, be deceived by the distinction which some civil jurists have so strongly insisted upon - the distinction, namely, by virtue of which they sever the matrimonial contract from the sacrament, with intent to hand over the contract to the power and will of the rulers of the State, while reserving questions concerning the sacrament of the Church. A distinction, or rather severance, of this kind cannot be approved; for certain it is that in Christian marriage the contract is inseparable from the sacrament, and that, for this reason, the contract cannot be true and legitimate without being a sacrament as well. For Christ our Lord added to marriage the dignity of a sacrament; but marriage is the contract itself, whenever that contract is lawfully concluded.
24. Marriage, moreover, is a sacrament, because it is a holy sign which gives grace, showing forth an image of the mystical nuptials of Christ with the Church. But the form and image of these nuptials is shown precisely by the very bond of that most close union in which man and woman are bound together in one; which bond is nothing else but the marriage itself. Hence it is clear that among Christians every true marriage is, in itself and by itself, a sacrament; and that nothing can be further from the truth than to say that the sacrament is a certain added ornament, or outward endowment, which can be separated and torn away from the contract at the caprice of man. Neither, therefore, by reasoning can it be shown, nor by any testimony of history be proved, that power over the marriages of Christians has ever lawfully been handed over to the rulers of the State. If, in this matter, the right of anyone else has ever been violated, no one can truly say that it has been violated by the Church. Would that the teaching of the naturalists, besides being full of falsehood and injustice, were not also the fertile source of much detriment and calamity! But it is easy to see at a glance the greatness of the evil which unhallowed marriages have brought, and ever will bring, on the whole of human society.

Once this is accepted, the position held by all Catholic theologians practically follows, as sententia certa. Marriage as such is a contract, and the essence of a contract (i.e., that which makes it a contract) is the consent of the parties. Since marriage between Christians and the Sacrament of Matrimony are one and the same thing, the essence of the sacrament must be the same, i.e., the consent of the parties. From this it follows that the betrothed are the ministers of the sacrament.
The blessing of the priest may be made a necessary condition for canonical validity, but this does not imply that the blessing is the essence or even the efficient cause of the sacrament. Earth and sky may be necessary conditions for a horse’s existence, but they are not what makes a horse a horse, nor do they cause the horse to be. Likewise, the execution of a contract may require certain conditions, such as the presence of witnesses or a notary, but the essence of the contract remains the consent of the parties who thereby bring it into effect.
The modern Orthodox may find it scandalous to speak of the Sacrament of Matrimony in such worldly, juridical terms. Yet to refrain from this is to ignore in this case that Christ has the power to sanctify the earthly, not by adding something alien to it, but by operating within its essence.
 
S.T. Supplement, Q. 45, A. 5

On the contrary, Given the cause the effect follows. Now the sufficient cause of matrimony is consent expressed in words of the present. Therefore whether this be done in public or in private the result is a marriage.

Further, wherever there is the due matter and the due form of a sacrament there is the sacrament. Now in a secret marriage there is the due matter, since there are persons who are able lawfully to contract–and the due form, since there are the words of the present expressive of consent. Therefore there is a true marriage.

I answer that, Just as in the other sacraments certain things are essential to the sacrament, and if they are omitted there is no sacrament, while certain things belong to the solemnization of the sacrament, and if these be omitted the sacrament is nevertheless validly performed, although it is a sin to omit them; so, too, consent expressed in words of the present between persons lawfully qualified to contract makes a marriage, because these two conditions are essential to the sacrament; while all else belongs to the solemnization of the sacrament, as being done in order that the marriage may be more fittingly performed. Hence if these be omitted it is a true marriage, although the contracting parties sin, unless they have a lawful motive for being excused. [Clandestine marriages have since been declared invalid by the Council of Trent (sess. xxiv). It must be borne in mind that throughout the treatise on marriage St. Thomas gives the Canon Law of his time.]

Reply to Objection 1. The maid is in her father’s power, not as a female slave without power over her own body, but as a daughter, for the purpose of education. Hence, in so far as she is free, she can give herself into another’s power without her father’s consent, even as a son or daughter, since they are free, may enter religion without their parent’s consent.

Reply to Objection 2. In penance our act, although essential to the sacrament, does not suffice for producing the proximate effect of the sacrament, namely forgiveness of sins, and consequently it is necessary that the act of the priest intervene in order that the sacrament be perfected. But in matrimony our acts are the sufficient cause for the production of the proximate effect, which is the marriage bond, because whoever has the right to dispose of himself can bind himself to another. Consequently the priest’s blessing is not required for matrimony as being essential to the sacrament.

Reply to Objection 3. It is also forbidden to receive baptism otherwise than from a priest, except in a case of necessity. But matrimony is not a necessary sacrament: and consequently the comparison fails. However, clandestine marriages are forbidden on account of the evil results to which they are liable, since it often happens that one of the parties is guilty of fraud in such marriages; frequently, too, they have recourse to other nuptials when they repent of having married in haste; and many other evils result therefrom, besides which there is something disgraceful about them.

Reply to Objection 4. Clandestine marriages are not forbidden as though they were contrary to the essentials of marriage, in the same way as the marriages of unlawful persons, who are undue matter for this sacrament; and hence there is no comparison.

It is likewise erroneous to consider the priest the minister of the sacrament;
Syllabus of Errors, St. Pius IX
  1. The Sacrament of Marriage is only a something accessory to the contract and separate from it, and the sacrament itself consists in the nuptial benediction alone. – Ibid.
 
Since my contention is that the Eastern churches are mistaken in their sacramental theology, it pertains to the OP.
 
I started this thread in 2008. Best for TradCath123 to start a new discussion in a new thread I think.
 
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