Vatican tightens annulment rules

[emad]

Church council tries to stunt growth of U.S. 'divorce mentality'

Chicago Tribune
Feb. 9, 2005 12:00 AM

Alarmed by the rising number of annulments granted in the United States, the Vatican today released new instructions for tribunals that encourage them to uphold existing church law and avoid falling into contemporary society's "divorce mentality."

The document "Dignity of Marriage" disappointed some progressive American bishops who had hoped to make the annulment process easier and faster.

Instead, observers said, the instructions are the most recent example of Pope John Paul II's displeasure at the large number of American annulments. advertisement

In 1968, fewer than 400 annulments were granted by U.S. marriage tribunals, according to Vatican officials. By 2002, annulments in the United States had soared to approximately 33,000. A total of 55,000 annulment cases were processed that year worldwide.

http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/news/articles/0209vatican-marriage09.html

[rpannier]

1. My older brother got his last year.

I guess he was lucky.

[Ravenseye]

2. Just do what Henry did.

Make yourself the head of your own church, then have your wife beheaded.

Simple as that. :)

[emad]

3. Vatican tightens code for annulments: Guardian

Sophie Arie in Rome
Wednesday February 9, 2005
The Guardian

Facing an increasing number of marriage annulments, the Vatican yesterday made its first move in 70 years to try to ensure that Catholics do not win the Church's blessing to end their marriages for the wrong reasons.

"This code aims to help make it easier for the tribunals to ascertain the truth," said Cardinal Julian Herranz, head of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, presenting an updated book of legal guidelines called Dignitas Connubii (The Dignity of Marriage).

The Catholic church does not recognise divorce, and annulment is the only way for Catholics to remarry before the church. More than 500,000 annulments are granted by Roman Catholic diocesan tribunals each year, most of them in America.

Although civil divorces rule that a marriage has failed, church annulments require proof that a true marriage never existed.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/pope/story/0,12272,1408899,00.html

[displacedtexan]

4. Ah, back to the good old days when John Wayne...

donated $5 million to the church days before his marriages were annulled!

[arwalden]

5. So If A Woman Is In An Abusive Marriage...

... the church expects her to REMAIN in that marriage? And even if she gets a divorce, the church expects her to NOT EVER get married again and become a lonely spinster?

That doesn't seem very fair.

[JVS]

6. Maybe their advice is to pray. There is a patron saint of battered women

I'm not sure about the Catholic Church, but I know that even the conservative Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod considers abuse to fall under "unfaithfulness to the marriage" and thus reasonable grounds for divorce and allows remarriage. Perhaps the loose dealing with annulments is the Catholic way of doing the same without coming right out that there are reasons other than adultery to dissolve a marriage