Article — Noldin, Summa of Moral Theology
Article One. On Dispensation Itself.
605. 1. If an impediment stands in the way of a matrimony to be contracted, this must first be removed, so that matrimony can be validly and licitly entered. Moreover, matrimonial impediments, whether diriment or impedient, can be removed in three ways: a. by removal of the cause (bond, disparity of cult, abduction); b. by lapse of time (age); c. by dispensation, which is the ordinary mode of removing matrimonial impediments.
Dispensation is the relaxation of a law in a special case.2 Where dispensation is treated, speech can be only about impediments of ecclesiastical law; for impediments of divine law can be removed by no human power.
- The faculty of dispensing is granted for the external forum or for the internal forum. The internal forum is twofold, sacramental and extrasacramental.
a. Dispensation for the external forum has force also for the internal forum, but one who has received power of dispensing for the external forum cannot use it for the internal forum only.
b. If someone has used the power of dispensing in an occult impediment for the sacramental internal forum, and afterward the impediment becomes public, the matrimony is indeed valid, but a new dispensation must be sought for the external forum. But if the power of dispensing has been given for the non-sacramental internal forum, a new dispensation for the external forum is not necessary.3
- Since matrimonial impediments are invalidating or prohibiting laws of the universal Church, no one can dispense in them except the supreme pontiff and one who has received from him a special faculty of dispensing. A faculty of this sort is granted to ordinaries and, in certain circumstances, also to inferior ministers, parish priests and confessors.
Article Two.. On the Power of Dispensing.
The power is to be considered: a. of the supreme pontiff; b. the power of the bishop; c. the power of the parish priest and confessor.
1 Zitelli, De dispensationibus matrimonialibus (Rome, 1887). Ballerini-Palmieri VI, De dispensationibus, q. 734 ff. Wernz IV, De dispensationibus impedimentorum matrimonialium, n. 806 ff.
2 Cn. 80.
3 Cn. 1047.