- "The Catholic Church is suffering a severe credibility crisis among faithful young adults.....
"The Church needs...frank descriptions of the annulment crisis..., especially in the United States, the world leader in annulments. In the United States the annulment process is commonly viewed as the way large numbers of Catholics divorce and remarry....
"the Catholic Church says all the right things about the indissolubility of marriage. Yet, most folks both inside and outside of the Church, as well as those on the margins, will give greater weight to what the Church does with annulments when forming opinions on just how serious the Church is about indissolubility.
"Yes, I am very aware of the many websites, books, articles, media campaigns, and broadcasts explaining how declarations of nullity are not simply the way Catholics do divorce and remarriage. Yet most of these noble efforts lack effectiveness since most Catholics in the United States have firsthand experience of friends or family members getting undeserved easy annulments. They see Catholics divorcing and remarrying like the general public, except Catholics just need some expensive paperwork.
"I am not saying this is an accurate universal portrayal of annulments, but the fact is too many easy annulments have created a distorted perception of Catholic marital teaching. Church leaders, religious media personnel, and faithfully practicing older Catholics desperately need to go outside of the narrow circle of various Catholic media outlets to discover what tens of millions of Catholics, especially young adults, are really thinking about annulments.
"Equally important is to uncover why the marriage rate of young Catholic adults is plummeting. While easy annulments are not the only cause, they are certainly one of the primary reasons why thousands of young adults hold such a low view of a sacramental church wedding that they are increasingly avoiding it altogether....
"I am appalled by...mention that the declaration of nullity doesn’t mean that the children from such broken marriages are in any way illegitimate. The statement is completely true, yet fails to mention that annulments do not ameliorate the decades of a child’s suffering after the divorce as seen in higher rates of: depression and psychological disturbances, substance abuse, welfare dependency, school suspension, incarceration, cohabitation, out-of-wedlock child-bearing, and rates of divorce in future marriages....
"What Catholic marriages really need, especially in Europe and North America, is practical and effective assistance in healing hurting marriages in order to reduce the Catholic divorce rate" (Steve Wood, August 2014)
Thursday, February 27, 2020
Advertising "annulment info" sessions
I am NOT a canon lawyer, but I have read each of the annual addresses to the Roman Rota by Saint Pope John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI, as well as several by Pope Francis and Dignitas Connubii. As there is seemingly little attention to marriage prep and NFP instruction, how is advertising the possibility of
annulments truly in keeping with authentic respect for marriage? If it really were a good idea to have and advertise annulment information
sessions, why aren't there similar sessions on laicization and
dispensation from religious vows?
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