Seriously? Canon Law?
What about second marriages (death of spouse, of course!)
I’ve been married so long a second marriage would never enter my mind if my spouse should die. But, if it did, how on earth could I protect my children? (Right, children at 40!)
I guess I’d have to do trusts hmmmm.
"Q: Does the Church allow prenuptial agreements for second marriages? I am entering a second marriage after the death of my wife and wished to execute a prenuptial agreement in order to protect assets accumulated by my late wife and me for our minor children.
A: Prenuptial agreements are a matter of civil law, so canon law does not rule them out in principle (for example, to determine how property would be divided among the children of a prior marriage upon the death of one spouse). But in practice prenuptials may run afoul of Church law in a number of ways. For example, they cannot subject a marriage to a condition concerning the future (e.g., an agreement about the dividing of assets in case of divorce). The Code of Canon Law provides: "A marriage subject to a condition about the future cannot be contracted validly" (CIC 1102). The Canon Law: Letter and Spirit, a commentary on canon law, explains that condition may be defined as "a stipulation by which an agreement is made contingent upon the verification or fulfillment of some circumstance or event that is not yet certain." It goes on to state that "any condition concerning the future attached to matrimonial consent renders marriage invalid." For example, a marriage would be invalid if the parties stipulated that they must have children or they have the right to divorce and remarry someone else."
As Prokopton’s post at 39 points out, pre-nuptials aren't automatically invalidating, but as my post at 41 points out, they are viewed with suspicion, and the particulars of them can make it impossible to validly contract a Catholic marriage.
Use of pre-nups to protect the inheritance rights of children IN THE EVENT OF ONE'S DEATH are not generally invalidating. However, use of pre-nups to guard assets IN THE EVENT OF DIVORCE are invalidating. That's because entering into a pre-nup that specifically deals with what happens in the event of divorce is a mental reservation about the indissolubility of marriage through divorce.
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