Thesis – Canon 1095 | Ramblin' Rose

With so much debate on marriage and annulment at the Synod on the Family, I wish to share my Thesis completed for my degree in Theology.

MATRIMONIAL CONSENT: Analysis and Practical Applications of Canon 1095

Canon 1095 is the Church law that ‘permits‘ annulment. The interpretation and application of this Canon is at the core of the debate on divorce and annulment.

I did not realise what a hot topic this would become when I decided on it in 2011 because I could not understand or agree fully with the Church’s stance.

By the time I completed my research, I appreciated the wisdom of Canon 1095 and the real ‘nature of consent.’ I understood there is a big difference between:

Matrimonium in fieri (marriage in becoming) – the act of creating a marriage and

Matrimonium in facto esse (marriage in its actual existence) i.e. what the exchange of vows creates: the abiding state of marriage.

Marriage is indeed sacramental – and the church needs to be sacramental in its approach to marriage, as well as to failed marriages – in short, TO LIFE.

“The manner in which, not just jurisprudence, but the entire church responds to Canon 1095 will be the touchstone of the Christian commitment to marriage … and by extension the mirror of the state of the sacramental Church. ”

Concluding comments: Fernando, R., Matrimonial Consent: Analysis and Practical Applications of Canon 1095.

I post here the research that took me from the contentious Preamble and questions I had to my conclusion above – with a prayer that the deliberations of the present Synod will lead to a more sacramental Church.

Preamble for Approval to proceed with my Thesis

My Rationale :

The entire argument against annulment and divorce is based on the Biblical tracts :

What God has joined together let no man put asunder. (Mathew 19.6)
Whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. (Mathew 18.18)

They say “Marriages are made in heaven”. If this is correct, why do marriages fail?

Reality of failed marriages

We cannot avoid the reality that despite every effort and good will to the contrary, some marriages are just not meant to be and end up in (civil) divorce.

What is the status of these marriages?

The ecclesiastical position on these is ambivalent, even discordant because EITHER

You are unbinding that which is bound in heaven, if you grant divorce
Or , by not granting a divorce, you are (continuing) to keep bound on earth what is not to be bound in heaven – by refusing to unbind what has already come apart – in truth, in fact, and in reality; Where the ‘sacrament’ you are upholding is no longer a sacrament or a ‘source of grace” but even perhaps of un-grace or disgrace.
The present ecclesial position is a
- Refusal or failure to accept our humanity
- Refusal to accept that not everything that man proposes, including a particular marriage, is within God’s plan because
- If it is God’s work nothing can stop it, and
- Unless the builder builds, the labourer toils in vain.

Thus, I question:

Are we binding on earth what heaven does not want bound? (Or what has already been loosed in heaven according to the Divine Plan?)
Are we failing to practice the precept to ‘forgive seventy times seven’ the mistakes that people make?
Are we at odds with our mission to “set the captives free” – to set free those who have been bound due to their humanity, weakness and sin?
Does not ‘if your eye offends you pluck it out’ have an application to marriages that are a source of un-grace.
By not forgiving and releasing people from failed marriages and by trying to maintain at any cost the marriage ‘sacrament’, we are withholding from them the primordial sacrament, Jesus and the Eucharist. This appears to contrary to the precept that the ‘salvation of souls is the Supreme law’.
The witnessing nature of the ‘sacrament’ is totally devalued when people divorce and remarry under civil law, ignoring the dysfunctional ‘sacramental bond’ which the church refuses to unbind. (How many civil divorces have been sacramentally unbound?)

There seems to be a lacuna in Canon Law from point of view of faithful/laity.

I would like to study the church’s position on above in an attitude of ‘faith seeking understanding’.

APPROACH

Does Canon 1095 solve the problem of divorce in the Church?

Can it allay the doubts in minds of the laity? (C 1095 comes to conclusion that average person is incapable of valid marriage?) .

AREAS FOR STUDY –

Role of ‘true’ consensus.
Role of Psychological factors.
Spiritual Factor – There is no mention of spiritual factors /spiritual maturity in the Canon .. ?? Wording appears juridical and earth-bound. Though spiritual goal must be implicit, wording appears bent towards temporal ?
- Role of spirituality
- Augustine –“ let me know myself that I might know you” (and your will and plan)
- “For in this lay my sin – that I sought pleasures and honours and truths in his creatures rather than in him – in myself and the rest – and so fell headlong into sorrows , troubles and errors.” (Confessions )