Section — Merkelbach, Pastoral Questions
§ 4. Condition
- I. Notion.
A condition is a circumstance upon which both contracting parties, or one of them, wills the validity of his consent to depend.
- II. The liceity of appending a condition to matrimonial consent.
Although the Code of Canon Law is silent concerning this matter, several authors judge that it is not lawful to contract matrimony under a condition, except for grave motives and with the consent of the Bishop, because they think that such a manner of contracting is foreign to the practice of the Church and provides an occasion for many and grave inconveniences.
Certainly it is not lawful to contract in this way while the co-party is unaware, or while those things are omitted which are necessary for proving the appended condition in the external forum.
III. Concerning the influence of a condition on the validity of matrimony.
- a) "If (the condition) concerns the future and is necessary, or impossible, or base, but not against the substance of matrimony, it is to be regarded as not having been added." (Can. 1092, 1°.)
Notwithstanding the appending of this condition, matrimony is judged valid from the beginning, because such a condition is reputed by the law as not existing and as not seriously added.
But note that here there is question of a simple presumption of law, which must altogether yield to the truth. Therefore, if both contracting parties, or one of them, altogether wills his consent to depend upon such a condition, either the validity of the matrimony is suspended until the event is verified, or the matrimony is invalid from the beginning, according to the quality of the appended condition. If the condition concerns the future and is necessary or base, the validity of the matrimony is suspended; if the condition is impossible, there is no matrimony.
- b) "If (the condition is) concerning the future against the substance of matrimony, it renders it invalid." (Can. 1092, 2°.)
A condition of this kind excludes in the matrimonial contract some essential element. And therefore, by natural law itself, such a condition renders matrimony invalid, as being destructive of matrimonial consent itself. For these two things are mutually repugnant: to will to give something, and to be unwilling to give an essential element of that thing.
Conditions against the substance of matrimony are those which are opposed to the essential goods of matrimony, namely of offspring, fidelity, and sacrament.
Against the good of offspring: e.g., if you avoid conception or procure abortion.
Against the good of fidelity: e.g., if you commit adultery.
Against the good of sacrament: e.g., provided that I have the right of dismissing you at pleasure.
It makes no difference whether those conditions are brought into the agreement explicitly between the parties or not, provided that they altogether exclude the assumption of some essential obligation. But the existence of a pact more easily demonstrates the fact of an appended condition.
In practice, let the priest who must judge concerning the case of a condition of this kind attend to the fact that such appended conditions most often signify the will of not fulfilling obligations rather than of not assuming them. And if the matter is thus, it is certain that the matrimony is valid. (Cf. above n. 44.)
- c) "If (the condition is) concerning the future and lawful, it suspends the validity of the matrimony." (Can. 1092, 3°.)
Once the condition has been verified, the matrimony immediately becomes valid, without a new consent being required.
But if the condition is not verified by the event, the conditioned consent altogether vanishes.