Case 28. Subjects of the Law of Clandestinity

Caius and Caia, Anglicans and joined in marriage for a year, ask Paul, the local parish priest, to receive them into the bosom of the true Church. Paul finds them excellently instructed in the Catholic faith; Caia indeed had been baptized as a Catholic but, because of the death of her Catholic mother, had from infancy been brought up by her father in the Anglican religion; and although they are cousins, they doubt nothing concerning the validity of their marriage. He further asks what he must do so that they may remain in the Church as Catholic spouses. Hence it is asked:

1. How must one proceed in receiving adults into the Church?

2. Are heretics subject to the laws of the Church, especially matrimonial laws?

3. What is to be said of the case?

The first question was answered above, p. 287, and the second, p. 280.

3. The case. The marriage of Caius and Caia was invalid on account of the impediments of clandestinity and consanguinity in the second degree in the collateral line. For the decree Ne temere binds all persons baptized in the Catholic Church, even when they contract marriage with non-Catholics, and Caia was baptized in the Catholic

Church. Paul therefore should ask the bishop for a dispensation from consanguinity in the second degree in the collateral line, and in the meantime leave the couple in good faith. When he has received the dispensation, if there is no good reason to the contrary he should tell them of the impediment and at once marry them in presence of two witnesses after he has received them into the Church.