Article I. Who Are Bound to the Prescribed Form

Those bound to observe the prescribed form are:

754. 1. "all baptized in the Catholic Church and those converted to her from heresy or schism, although either the former or the latter afterward defected from her, whenever they enter matrimony with one another";

2. "the same persons, if they contract matrimony with non-Catholics, whether baptized or non-baptized";

3. "Orientals, if they contract with Latins bound to this form." -

"Non-Catholics, whether baptized or non-baptized, if they contract among themselves, are nowhere bound to observe the Catholic form of matrimony; likewise those born of non-Catholics, even if baptized in the Catholic Church, who from infancy grew up in heresy or schism or infidelity or without any religion, whenever they contract with a non-Catholic party."⁷

Explanation. To 1. It is not so clear how the words "baptized in the Catholic Church" are to be understood. Saving a better opinion, all those who at the time of baptism were destined for Catholic worship by parents or guardians or others legitimately disposing of them are judged to have been baptized in the Catholic Church.⁸ Hence, for example, an infant of Catholic parents, baptized in necessity by a Jewish physician, is judged baptized in the Catholic Church. But if an infant of Protestant parents is baptized by the same physician, that infant is not judged baptized in the Catholic Church. If Catholic parents were to have an infant baptized by a Protestant minister and afterward educated in heresy, the infant is not judged baptized in the Catholic Church. But if parents who entered matrimony with a dispensation from the impediment of mixed religion or disparity of worship (but not Catholic parents) were to have an infant baptized in the Catholic Church but afterward educated in heresy, the infant is judged as a heretic.⁹

To 2. Mixed marriages, in which one party is Catholic but the other non-Catholic (whether baptized or non-baptized), must be celebrated in precisely the same essential form as purely Catholic marriages.

⁷ Code of Canon Law, can. 1099.

⁸ Van den Acker, Decr. "Ne temere"², p. 101 f., thinks almost the same; Cappello, De sacr. III, n. 411; Wernz-Vidal, Ius can. V, n. 551.

⁹ Cf. Holy Office, November 17, 1835, and April 6, 1859, and Pontifical Commission, July 20, 1929 (Acta Ap. Sed. XXI, 573); this declaration is not extensive but declarative (Pontifical Commission, July 25, 1931: Acta Ap. Sed. XXIII, 388).

756. To 3. Although the Code of Canon Law ordinarily does not bind Orientals, nevertheless it binds them here accidentally because of the Latin party. This follows from those things which we said above concerning the individuality of the matrimonial contract. For if there is an impediment on the part of one contracting party, the matrimony can no longer be validly contracted. But in these cases there is an impediment on the part of the Latin Catholic, who cannot contract unless the prescribed form is observed. Therefore such mixed marriages are invalid.¹⁰

Note. In former times there was much dispute concerning the validity of marriages celebrated by non-Catholics without the Tridentine form; today this controversy is ended, since the marriages of non-Catholics, if they contract among themselves, are valid, provided that no diriment impediment other than the defect of the required assistance of the parish priest stands in the way, for example, the impediment of bond, impotence, relationship, and so forth. Schismatics¹¹ are also held as non-Catholics, as are those born of non-Catholics (among whom are included those born of apostates and of those who are or were enrolled in an atheistic sect^11a), even if baptized in the Catholic Church, who grew up outside the Catholic religion from infancy.

From what has been said it follows that the following are certainly not bound by the prescribed form, provided that they contract among themselves:

a) all born and educated in heresy or schism;

b) all Catholics of an Oriental rite.¹²

¹⁰ "Whether a matrimony contracted by a Catholic of the Latin rite with a Catholic of an Oriental rite is valid when the form established by the Decree Ne temere has not been observed? - Negatively." Thus the Sacred Congregation of the Council, March 28, 1908, ad 1.

¹¹ Sacred Congregation of the Council, March 28, 1908.

^11a Pontifical Commission, February 17, 1930 (Acta Ap. Sed. XXII, 195), and July 30, 1934 (Acta Ap. Sed. XXVI, 494).

¹² "Whether Catholics of an Oriental rite are also bound by the Decree Ne temere? - Negatively." Thus the Sacred Congregation of the Council, February 1, 1908, ad 1. Sometimes, however, the Decree Ne temere was extended to the faithful of an Oriental rite. Thus, for example, by the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith on May 5, 1911, this Decree was extended to the Ruthenian dioceses of the Province of Galicia.