In May I will be with a prolife pilgrimage group in Italy. I would like to stay longer after it is concluded (since I’ll already be there). So, I have my tin cup out in the form of the wavy flag. Click! (Full disclosure: I may have to go again in October.)
Thanks: ME, DH, WH, KG, FC, TG, AH, HL, AB, DS, MB (MI), MB (CA), LD, IG, Fr. PV, GR, MP, PO’F, JL, AR (OH), AR (MA), DD,
From a reader…
QUAERITUR:
Do personality disorders prevent a marriage from being valid?
For example, if a couple married in the Church, and one and/or both of them are later diagnosed with a personality disorder (such as Obsessive Compulsive Personality Disorder, or Narcissistic Personality Disorder), would their marriage be considered valid?
I ask because my spouse was recently diagnosed with OCPD, and I am concerned about validity.
“Later diagnosed…”.
A first principle: Marriages enjoy the presumption of validity. That is, they are presumed to be valid unless sufficient proof to the contrary is offered.
To prove invalidity, the person raising the doubt or making the allegation about the possible invalidity of his or her own marriage bears the burden of proof. He or she must supply either 1) evidence either of incapacity to contract marriage on the part of one or both of the parties, or 2) proof that one or both of the parties simulated matrimonial consent, either totally or partially.
There are a few other grounds for nullity, but the main grounds are incapacity or simulation.
A diagnosis of a mental illness at some point after the wedding does not automatically render a marriage null on the spot.
Remember: it is the condition of the people at the time of the marriage that matters. Something that is diagnosed after doesn’t necessarily mean that one or both of them were in that condition at the time of the marriage.
Moreover, the process to investigate a matrimonial bond (as to its possible invalidity or nullity) can take place only when the Tribunal has arrived at certainty that there is no longer 1) hope of reconciliation between the parties, 2) nor is there hope of 2) reestablishing common life as spouses.
Typically, at least in these United States, the proof that there is no longer any hope of reconciliation between the parties is when one of the parties produces a divorce decree from a civil/secular court.
No longer any hope.
Note that there is a difference between “there is no hope” and “it would be really difficult”.
This quote from Pope Benedict XVI’s 2009 Allocution to the Roman Rota is helpful (my emphases and comments:
In our meeting today, I wish to draw the attention of those engaged in the practice of law to the need to handle cases with the depth and seriousness required by the ministry of truth and charity proper to the Roman Rota. Indeed, responding to the need for procedural precision, the aforementioned Addresses provide, on the basis of the principles of Christian anthropology, fundamental criteria not only for the weighing of expert psychiatric and psychological reports, but also for the judicial settlement of causes. In this regard it is helpful to recall several clear-cut distinctions. First of all, the distinction between “the psychic [psychological] maturity which is seen as the goal of human development” and, on the other hand, “the canonical maturity which is the basic minimum required for establishing the validity of marriage” (Address to the Roman Rota, 5 February 1987, n. 6). Second, the distinction between incapacity and difficulty, inasmuch as “incapacity alone, and not difficulty in giving consent and in realizing a true community of life and love, invalidates a marriage” (ibid., n. 7). Third, the distinction between the canonical approach to normality, which, based on an integral vision of the human person, “also includes moderate forms of psychological difficulty”, and the clinical approach, which excludes from the concept of normality every limitation of maturity and “every form of psychic illness” (Address to the Roman Rota, 25 January 1988, n. 5). And finally, the distinction between the “minimum capacity sufficient for valid consent” and the ideal capacity “of full maturity in relation to happy married life” (ibid.).
Via Caritatis Wine GIFT CARDS HERE
In May I will be with a pilgrimage in Italy. I would like to stay longer after it is concluded (since I’ll already be there). So, I have my tin cup out in the form of the wavy flag.
First, I had a note from a reader/watcher who picked up on my donkey comments in my commentary at 1 Peter 5.
She wrote, riffing on my remarks, …
I laughed when I read your article on 1P5 because we have a donkey colt and an older donkey.
The donkey colt, Daisy, is very sweet and generally obedient, docile, and patient!
But the older donkey, Tulipa is 4 years old, can be very willful, moody, and downright stubborn!
I love the analogy and I can relate to it very well!
Here is Tulipa on the left and Daisy on the right. Lovely animals!
And now this…
The Donkey
BY G. K. CHESTERTON
When fishes flew and forests walked
And figs grew upon thorn,
Some moment when the moon was blood
Then surely I was born.
With monstrous head and sickening cry
And ears like errant wings,
The devil’s walking parody
On all four-footed things.
The tattered outlaw of the earth,
Of ancient crooked will;
Starve, scourge, deride me: I am dumb,
I keep my secret still.
Fools! For I also had my hour;
One far fierce hour and sweet:
There was a shout about my ears,
And palms before my feet.
Fellow hams, here’s a reminder about ZedNet for Sunday 10 April ’22 – evening at 2000h EST. (0100h ZULU Monday).
We now have the site running: http://zednet.xyz
Zednet exists on the…
Fellow hams who have access locally to a Yaesu System Fusion repeater, a repeater on the BM network, or a multi-mode hotspot registered with BM can get on and have a rag chew…. 24/7/365
Want to get involved? WB0YLE provided a Bill Of Materials, with links, for what you need. HERE THIS WAS UPDATED on 22 March 2021
I created a page for the List of YOUR callsigns. HERE Chime in or drop me a note if your call doesn’t appear in the list.
For an image of what the Zednet “interconnections” are, click HERE.
Too many people today are without good, strong preaching, to the detriment of all. Share the good stuff.
Was there a GOOD point made in the sermon you heard at your Mass of obligation for Palm Sunday?
Tell about attendance especially for the Traditional Latin Mass. I hear that it is growing. Of COURSE.
Procession today? 1962? Pre-55?
Any local changes or (hopefully good) news?
Those of you who regularly viewed my live-streamed daily Masses – with their fervorini – for over a year, you might drop me a line.
I have some written remarks about the TLM Mass for this Sunday – HERE
About the VEILING OF IMAGES AND STATUES you saw in church, let’s have a POLL, continued from last week. If you haven’t answered yet, please do.
Pick your best answer. Anyone can vote, but only registered and approved members can comment.
Photo by The Great Roman™
Click!
There’s a back story, too.
From chess.com. These endgames are tough. White to move.
Photo by The Great Roman™
Daily Fervorino HERE
Easter will soon be here…
OPPORTUNITY
10% off with code:
FATHERZ10
From Chess.com
Black to move
We are today one week from Good Friday. As such it is the feast of our lady of Sorrows.
I wrote seven posts on the Seven Sorrows of the Blessed Virgin. Please visit my “Our Lady of Sorrows Project” page: HERE
Today it is possible in the older form of the Roman Rite to celebrate Mass for the feast of Our Lady, counter intuitively with white vestments and even a Gloria.
Mary as Sorrowful mother is often depicted in art as being pierced through the heart with daggers or swords, (rhomphaia – a curved, long-handled Thracian blade) as an echo to the prophecy made by Simeon at the time of the presentation of the Lord in the temple. He foresaw that in the passion of the Lord, our lady would be so much in union with her divine son’s will, that she too would feel great anguish.
The Collect of the Our Lady of Sorrows
Orémus.
Deus, in cujus passióne, secúndum Simeónis prophétiam, dulcíssimam ánimam gloriósæ Vírginis et Matris Maríæ dolóris gladius pertransívit: concéde propítius; ut, qui transfixiónem ejus et passiónem venerándo recólimus, gloriósis méritis et précibus ómnium Sanctórum Cruci fidéliter astántium intercedéntibus, passiónis tuæ efféctum felícem consequámur:Let us pray.
O God, in Whose Passion the sword, according to the prophecy of blessed Simeon, pierced through the soul of Mary, the glorious Virgin and Mother, mercifully grant that we, who reverently commemorate her piercing through and her suffering, may, by the interceding glorious merits of all the saints faithfully standing by the Cross, obtain the abundant fruit of Your passion. Through Jesus Christ, thy Son our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end.R. Amen.
This is Thursday in Passion Week. Today in the Gospel a penitent woman washes Christ feet with her tears. One week from today is Holy Thursday when Christ washed the feet of his Apostles.
The first reading today is from Daniel (3:25, 34-45.). The people are penitent in the 70 year exile of Babylon.
This is the chapter about the fiery furnace and Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego (the Babylonian names of Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah). The Mass reading is the deuterocanonical Prayer of Azariah which is before the Canticle of the Three Children (recited for Lauds of Sundays and feasts).
One of the things that strikes you as a priest when reading this first lesson from Daniel 3 is the attitude of self-recognition as priest who is victim, sinful intercessor and the necessity of humble submission to God. The passage in Daniel 3 describes the humble, broken heart attitude of one who longs to fulfil the sacrifices prescribed by God, but who cannot; their Babylonian overlords are their jailers of tradition. Azariah, who would not worship the pagan idol, now in the midst of the flames of the furnace raises his broken heart to God for the sake of the entire people who have sinned.
There are familiar words in the passage…. familiar if you celebrate the Traditional Latin Mass.
In Daniel 3 today we read the phrase: “in ánimo contríto et spíritu humilitátis suscipiámur… and … “sic fiat sacrifícium nostrum in conspéctu tuo hódie, ut pláceat tibi…”.
During Mass, just before the priest invokes the Holy Spirit over the gifts on the altar, the bread and wine, he says:
“In spíritu humilitátis et in ánimo contríto suscipiámur a te, Dómine: et sic fiat sacrifícium nostrum in conspéctu tuo hódie, ut pláceat tibi, Dómine Deus.
Let us, in the spirit of humility and contrite heart, be taken up by You, O Lord, and thusly let it our sacrifice be made in Your sight today that it pleases You, O Lord God.
The early use of this prayer is attested in the Amiens Sacramentary (9th c.) which is a scion of the Gregorian Sacramentary (7th).
This prayer does remain in the Novus Ordo, and a shorter version of the Daniel 3 reading is on Tuesday of the 3rd Week of Lent, but unless the priest is saying the Novus Ordo and the readings in Latin, he isn’t going to make the connection with the offertory prayer.
Finally, the offertory prayers of the Novus Ordo are one of the most dramatic examples of how innovations were forced into the Novus Ordo. This, in spite of the fact that in Sacrosanctum Concilium the Council Fathers commanded nothing should be changed that was not a) organically a development from previous rites and b) truly for the good of the people.
An immense blow was delivered to priestly identity through the changes to the offertory.
Hence, great strengthening of priestly identity comes from priests learning the TLM.
That’s why certain people behave so cruelly towards the people who desire the TLM.
Meanwhile…
… be a Custos Traditionis.
From Fr. Gihr’s great commentary on the Mass about the offertory prayer of “self-offering of the Priest and Faithful”:
In order perfectly to appreciate the full sense of these words, and to recite them in the proper spirit, we should remember by whom and in what place they were spoken for the first time. They are taken from a longer, humble, penitential prayer, recited by the three young men in the Babylonian furnace. Since, faithful to God’s law, they would not adore the statue of the king, they were cast into a furnace heated seven-fold. Praising God, they walked about in the flames which did them not the least harm. And because they were prevented from offering exterior legal sacrifices, they offer themselves as a propitiatory sacrifice for their sins and for those of their people, in order to obtain mercy. “In a contrite heart and humble spirit let us be accepted (in animo contrito et spiritu humili tatis suscipiamur); so let our sacrifice be made in Thy sight this day, that it may please Thee (sic fiat sacrificium nostrum in conspectu tuo hodie, ut placeat tibi)” (Dan. 3, 39—40). In similar words, the celebrant here prays that the Lord would graciously receive him and the faithful people, for the sake of their humble, penitential sentiments, as a spiritual sacrifice; and if so accepted, then the Eucharistic Sacrifice, when offered by them, in the sight of God, with these dispositions will be such as God will behold and accept with pleasure from their hands.
The three young men were ready to offer their lives cheerfully in sacrifice to God by a bloody martyrdom; after their example we should present ourselves to God to suffer a life of perpetual sacrifice and an unbloody martyrdom. “As gold in the furnace He hath proved them and as a victim of a holocaust He hath received them” (Wis. 3, 6). Thus should we also, filled with humility and compunction, offer ourselves to God as a holocaust in the furnace of suffering and tribulation, of persecution and temptations. A sacrifice to God is an afflicted spirit; a contrite and humbled heart He does not despise (Ps. 50, 19). Yes, a heart penetrated with penitential love and sorrow, a mind bowed down with compunction will always be favorably received and accepted by the Lord. It is the best disposition that we should bring with us to the altar. When the Lord breathed forth His spirit amid the darkness that enshrouded Mount Calvary, many of the beholders were seized with such fear and sorrow, that they returned to their homes striking their breast (Luke 23, 48). Should not we also be penetrated with regret and contrition, with a penitential sorrow, as often as we celebrate in the Mass the remembrance of Christ’s bloody death? “During this holy function,” writes St. Gregory the Great,1 “we must offer ourselves with compunction of heart as a sacrifice ; for when we commemorate the mystery of the passion of our Iyord, we must imitate that which we celebrate. The Mass will be a sacrifice for us to God, when we have made an offering of ourselves. But we should, moreover, after retirement from prayer, endeavor as far as we are able with God’s assistance, to keep our mind in recollection and renewed strength, so that passing thoughts may not distract it, nor vain joy find its way into the heart, and that thus our soul may not, by carelessness and fickleness, again lose the spirit of compunction it has acquired.” Our entire life should be a cheerful, uninterrupted offertory. We should present ourselves in body and soul2 as a living sacrifice, holy, pleasing to God (Rom. 12, 1). “All the prayers and acts of divine worship, all the charitable and benevolent works, all the practices of mortification and penance, all the labor and fatigue, all the trials and sufferings of her militant children; all the pains and torments, all the patience and longing of her children suffering in the other world; all the virtues and merits, all the holiness and glory of her children already in heaven; the fruitful sweat of the Apostles, the vivifying blood of the martyrs, the devout tears of the anchorets, the chaste, loving sighs of the virgins, the great deeds and still greater fortitude of all the saints, — all these the Church places on her Divine Victim, all these she pours into the chalice of His holy sacrificial Blood” (Laurent).
The Holy Mass is the great heart of the whole body of the Church: whatever the Church, with her members, believes and hopes and loves and suffers and cares and prays for, all this she collects in Holy Mass into the common heart, and in and with the selfsame Sacrifice she carries it up to the throne of God. Whatever moves and affects the soul in joy and sorrow, in prosperity and adversity, in distress and death — we place upon the altar during the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we place it directly upon the Heart of our Redeemer who is present, and we are sure of consolation and relief. Yes, all the children of the Church should unite in the offering, all the faithful should be incorporated into and offered along with the one, great and eternal Sacrifice. To all the events in the life of her children the Church would, by this Sacrifice, impart consecration, and there by increase the happiness of her children, alleviate their distress, bless and sanctify their whole life and their death, so that at all times they may live unto the Lord and die in the Lord (Rom. 14, 8).1
Coat of Arms by D Burkart
A Daily Prayer for Priests
They find you a pro-life agent in your area who commits to giving a portion of the fee to a pro-life group!
PLEASE subscribe via PayPal if it is useful. Zelle and Wise are better, but PayPal is convenient.
A monthly subscription donation means I have steady income I can plan on. I put you my list of benefactors for whom I pray and for whom I often say Holy Mass.
In view of the rapidly changing challenges I now face, I would like to add more $10/month subscribers. Will you please help?
For a one time donation...
Help Monks in Wyoming (coffee – UPDATED LINK) and Norcia (beer) and the wonderful "Soap Sisters" of Summit, NJ!
Please follow me on Twitter!
Visits tracked by Statcounter
since Sat., 25 Nov. 2006:
