Fertility and Marriage Validity

Canon Law Made Easy ^ | April 24, 2014 | Cathy Caridi, J.C.L.

[Weiss White]

Q: If God established marriage for the procreation of children, does it affect the validity of a marriage if one spouse is infertile? What if you know for sure that you can’t have children, can you get married in the Church anyway? How does that work? –Donna

A: As we’ve seen before in this space, the Church holds that marriage is, by its very nature, ordered to the well-being of the spouses and the procreation and upbringing of children (c. 1055.1). As Vatican II’s Constitution on the Church in the Modern World stated nearly 50 years ago, “By its very nature, the institution of marriage and married love is ordered to the procreation and education of offspring, and it is in them that it finds its crowning glory” (Gaudium et Spes 48). And both Gaudium et Spes (50) and the Catechism (1652) observe that “children are the supreme gift of marriage.”

At the same time, of course, we all know that some marriages are childless because at least one of the spouses is simply unable to have children. Could infertility have an effect on the validity of a marriage celebrated in the Catholic Church?

[Weiss White]

I can only post an excerpt because this material is copyrighted

[RJS1950]

In the middle ages kings and nobles used the supposed infertility of a spouse as a reason to annul a marriage or to take on a mistress.

[humblegunner]

“I can only post an excerpt because this material is copyrighted”

Interesting that you never post from any other source.

http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/by:weisswhite/index?tab=articles

[ShadowAce]

The premise is false, so the conclusion is also.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I was never aware that the aristocracy needed any particular reason for adultery.

[loungitude]

Interesting that you never post from any other source.

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Is there some obligation for this poster to do so?

[redgolum]

No but they needed a reason to get a new wife in order to have a heir.

One of the reason Henry VIII went off is because he tried to do what his French rival did and wasn’t allowed to. Of course Henry already HAD a child from his first wife, and Louis did not.

[humblegunner]

Is there some obligation for this poster to do so?

It's curious that they do.

Makes one wonder about motivation.

Truth and info dissemination.. or profit?

[ansel12]

[Mrs. Don-o]

But childlessness has never been a reason for a finding of canonical nullity in marriage. That didn't constitute the grounds put forward by Henry VIII, either. His purported grounds were that Catherine had been his deceased brother Arthur's wife in a valid, consummated marriage. (Deuteronomy 20:21). He ignored the fact that Deuteronomy 25:5–10 requires a brother to marry his brother's widow if the brother died without issue, in a so-called levirate marriage.

In any case, Catherine said this was inapplicable because she and Arthur had never had intercourse. He was only 15 at the time of their marriage, and at a low level of health and vigor even then; he died several months later, and Catherine said they had lain together, but he had never been able to achieve intercourse.

I tend to believe Catherine, inasmuch as she was a person of well-known, very strict religious principles and would not have lied about Arthur and then committed affinity-based-incest with Henry; whereas Henry was well-known as a shameless royal horndog, and sired half a dozen children out of wedlock, including Henry Fitzroy (Richmond), to whom he gave a dukedom.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Am I to take it that profit and truth-telling are mutually exclusive? "Profit = bad" would seem to undermine the moral argument for a free enterprise system, and the publishing in particular.

It would undermine the rationale for quarterly freepathons, too. Icky money being exchanged and all.

[humblegunner]

How about someone USING Free Republic as a free advertising tool?

Would that be OK?

Like spray painting your own phone number on a billboard someone else paid for.

How “free enterprise” is that?

[Mrs. Don-o]

If it’s not prohibited and doesn’t destroy, limit or impede anybody else’s use (unlike spray-painted graffiti), it does no harm. You seem to be enforcing a law that doesn’t exist. If it is otherwise, I would like to know about it.

[humblegunner]

I’m not enforcing anything, I’m expressing an opinion about a fact.

The poster excerpts from a single source. Fact.

I called motive into question. No more than that.

[MMaschin]

This is the way I look at it.

If someone is to accept the belief in God, and that he is the Creator, then our existence must have meaning.

What could this reason for existence be? I doubt it's have as much fun as you can before you die. I think the only true meaning of life, would be to evolve somehow. Evolve how? The most logical is to evolve spiritually.

How do we evolve spiritually? My belief is that in order to evolve spiritually, we simply need to sin less.

What is sin? I believe sin is synonymous with selfishness. Every sin is selfish, and every selfish act is sinful. The more selfish the act, the greater the sin.

When is sex sinful/selfish? When the sex is for ones own personal pleasure. The easiest way for a couple to have unselfish sex, is for sex to be for procreation.

In my opinion, it's the intent of a person towards their partner that makes a sexual act sinful of not. If a persons reason for sex is to feel physical pleasure, it is sinful, if for procreation, or the physical pleasure of your partner, then not. I believe that is the true reason behind the Church's stance against contraceptives, and homosexuality - by explicit intent a person is saying they do not want a child to result from the union. That dramatically increases the likelihood that the union is sinful.

The Church wants people to grow spiritually, and when it comes to sex, intent towards procreation is the easiest way.

[Mrs. Don-o]

Well, free speech unto thee. I don't see the point of patrolling around the threads calling other FReepers' motives into question. Especally when the "bad motives" you're searching for in such a officious manner, are neither immoral nor illegal nor generally frowned upon in this forum.

"J'accuse"--Each of use could do that to all of us, but that would only multiply what is already a needless irritant.

Officious. That's the word.

[humblegunner]

Oh, let’s can the polite dancing.

The poster is here to promote a blog.
It doesn’t make comments other than those making excuses
for promoting the blog. The poster wants hits from us.

You side with that behavior because the topics are those of interest to you.

The motives are clear, else the poster would post from other sources.

Officious.

[Mrs. Don-o]

OK. So?

[RJS1950]

They needed the excuse to get the approval of the Pope so they weren’t “living in sin”. Some, like Henry II didn’t give a damn.

[Mrs. Don-o]

I am no student of royal adultery, but my impression is that the indissolubility of the king's (duke's/prime minister's) marriage was the one thing he wanted to maintain, in order to insure that his ladies on the side would stay on the side. Henry VIII had lots of other men's wives, who knew they would never be on the throne.

It was the younger Boleyn girl who would not put out until King Henry ditched his wife. She did not want to be the King's mistress: she wanted to be Queen. Got her way. Lost her head. Amazing the centuries of trouble which ensued.