Case 18. Fear

Anna, converted to the Catholic faith some years ago, comes to Caius, a missionary, and says that while a Protestant in northern Ireland she married Titius, a Protestant, having been driven to this by continual entreaties and even by threats of expulsion from her father’s house. Afterwards she bore him two sons, but finally, because of his cruelty and because she had never loved him, she left her husband in Ireland and came to England. Now she cohabits as a wife with Titius, a Catholic, and each would like to enter marriage so that they may receive the sacraments. Caius, however, does not know whether it is lawful to admit them to marriage, and asks what he must do. Hence it is asked:

1. What is the impediment of fear, and by what law is it established?

2. Can a marriage invalid because of fear be validated, and how?

3. To whom does it belong to treat such matrimonial causes?

4. What is to be said of the case?

1. What is the impediment of fear, and by what law is it established?

Fear is a perturbation of mind arising from present or future danger. When marriage is contracted through grave fear caused unjustly by a free agent with a view to extorting marriage, ecclesiastical law makes the marriage null and void. Whether it is also void by natural law is a disputed point among divines.¹

1 Manual of Moral Theology, vol. ii, 320.

2. Can marriage, void through fear, be revalidated, and how?

Yes, such marriage may be revalidated when the fear ceases by expressing free matrimonial consent.²

2 Ibid., 321.

3. To whom does it belong to treat of such matrimonial causes?

To the bishop as judge of first instance in the external forum. “ Questions concerning the validity of marriages are called causes; these pertain solely to the external forum and must be juridically determined by the Ordinary. Therefore, recourse must be had to the ordinary when it is about entering into a new marriage where there is doubt regarding the validity of a marriage already contracted ... But as regards marriages already contracted, we most gravely admonish and command in the Lord all priests who have the care of souls that, although it may be most certainly established to them that some marriage was invalid, they openly declare to all concerned that they have no authority to pronounce judgment in a matter of this kind: but before they presume to proceed to a new marriage, they must recourse to the ordinary and await his legal judgment. ” (IV Cone. West., d. 15).

4. The case. Caius may not admit Ann to a fresh marriage until it has been proved that the former marriage was invalid. It is possible that it was invalid to begin with; whether it afterwards became revalidated by the expression of free marital consent on the part of the woman or not, does not appear from the case as stated. Caius should therefore question Ann with a view to finding this out, and so discovering whether there is a prima facie case for invalidity or not. If he finds that there is solid ground for thinking that the former marriage was and remained null and void, Caius should send all the particulars of the case to the bishop, who after examining the evidence will pass sentence in accordance with it. The case will then be sent to the higher ecclesiastical court if the bishop's sentence was in favor of invalidity. The woman will be free to marry again after two concordant sentences have been given in favor of the nullity of the marriage.