Case LX: An Unbaptized Marriage Candidate in the Confessional

Livia, the religiously brought up daughter of a wealthy manufacturer, is about to marry Titus, who for several years has been bookkeeper in her father’s office. The wedding is to be celebrated in the spirit of the Church; Livia and Titus are to receive Holy Communion at the Nuptial Mass. Two hours before the ceremony they both come to confession. Titus, who for some time has regularly received the Sacraments at Easter time, begs the priest, in his confession, for advice and assistance, confessing that he is an adventurer, having secured his position with the aid of forged papers, and that he is a Hebrew. In deference to the views prevailing in the home of his employer, and particularly out of consideration for the daughter of the house, he has pretended piety, even going to the Sacraments; he avows he had not unwillingly entered the confessional, as he had been comforted there and had recognized in the priest, bound in secrecy through the seal of confession, a sympathizing friend and a consoler for his greatly perturbed soul. He had even felt that, through his humble admission of errors, not only had his soul been comforted, but relieved from guilt through the absolving words of the minister of God. Now he had resolved to make this awful revelation, safe from all betrayal, hoping for assistance, advice, mercy! He, however, states his unalterable will: 1. That he will not desist under any circumstances from marrying Livia; 2. That although he is certainly not an irreligious man, he can have no faith in a personal God, in Christ, in dogmas. And now the priest shall say what is to be done.

1. May the priest impart this information to the bride or to her father? To this question we must reply a positive No!

Evidently no seal of confession exists here; Titus has never sought sacramental absolution. Yet perhaps a natural obligation to secrecy, a sort of official seal of secrecy, binds the priest. A revelation would also result in the most scandalous stories about revelations from the confessional, thereby bringing the Sacrament of Penance into ill repute, all the worse as Titus would not escape punishment by the law. Compared with this the great misfortune of the deceived bride and her family can not be taken into account. Every man has the natural right in the state of distress to seek counsel and consolation, and the Church imposes upon the one entrusted with this confidence the strictest silence.

To be sure in such a case the strict obligation of secrecy can not be viewed as absolutely certain. Per se, ex natura secreti, it follows not. Propter scandalum evitandum, therefore per accidens it might follow. S. ALPH., Theol. Mor., Lib. 4, Tract 6, n. 971: An entrusted secret can be disclosed, at least without grave sin... for a just cause, namely if keeping the secret would tend toward harm to the community, to another innocent person, or even to the one entrusting it; because then the order of charity demands that it be revealed; hence even if you had sworn, you could then disclose it. Thus commonly, etc. If it can be hoped that a scandal arising from publishing the secret, namely the opinion that the seal of confession had been violated, may be removed by explanation, and that the people would accept such explanation, then the confessor would have to act as due consideration for averting the damnum injustum from Livia would suggest. If the confessor can not entertain this hope then he will per accidens, propter scandalum horrendum, propter bonum commune, namely the conservation of confidence to the Holy Sacrament of Penance, be obliged to secrecy.

Of course the obligation of secrecy for the priest would be much plainer, if Titus had revealed his secret, in the form of a confession, only after long years of wedded life with Livia, after they had been blessed with children, then the revelation in a certain sense would no longer serve as avertendum damnum, but place Livia in a position which would actually mean a damnum emergens and deliver her, besides, to most serious qualms of conscience.

May the priest arrange for a sanatio matrimonii in radice? Even if this is possible from a dogmatic standpoint, the priest must not apply for it without Livia’s knowledge; for Livia’s consent is by no means to be presupposed. If Titus should be found out and be brought to court, Livia would perhaps find consolation in the fact of not actually being the wife of the adventurer and in having exclusive right to the children; it might eventually be her only compensation if some honorable man would then take this unfortunate woman for his wife.

Rudolf Hittmair, D.D.