Catholic teaching holds that marriage is for life. Yet 28 percent of U.S. Catholics divorce. To remarry in the church, and avoid what Catholicism considers adultery, they must secure annulments from tribunals holding their marriages invalid at the time of the wedding. With a success rate of nearly 100 percent, annulments have come to be viewed as entitlements.
By contrast, Catholic spouses striving to honor their vows find little support from a church that seems to have adopted a U.S. divorce culture mentality. Pope Leo alluded to this crisis during his recent address to the Roman Rota, which hears annulment appeals and regularly overturns decisions by U.S. tribunals.
“I think the prevalence of affirmatives has certainly added to people’s concepts that annulments is purely a process rather than a real trial,” said Father Andrew Larkin, a priest and defender of the marriage bond in Savannah’s tribunal. “But I think the divorce factor is huge. I think one of the things that is probably quite prevalent because of divorce culture is that most people have an erred view of marriage not being for the lifetime …. No-fault has come to define marriage and take away that indissolubility to the point now that it’s touching upon invalidity.”
Indeed, the view that marriage is not for life is specifically embedded in our nation’s no-fault divorce laws, which recognize an automatic right of divorce to any spouse who unilaterally claims the marriage is irrevocably broken. These laws are clearly unconstitutional. But most tribunals require entry of a no-fault divorce judgment before they will accept an annulment petition. In turn, they rely on these one-sided judgments as proof of irreconcilability, despite research establishing that most marriages are low conflict with good chances for reconciliation.
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