Case 31. Impediment Dispensed

Titius, a missionary priest, had two parishioners related in the second degree mixed with the third degree of consanguinity who, after entering betrothal and having an illegitimate child, wished to contract marriage. Titius said that he would seek a dispensation because of the child to be legitimated and because of the smallness of the place, which he soon obtained from the Bishop. On the following Sunday the banns were proclaimed in church and at length the marriage was contracted, but not before the death of the child, nor was any mention of the obtained dispensation made to the spouses. Having heard these things, Paul, another missionary, began to doubt the validity of the marriage. Hence it is asked:

1. Is a cause for a matrimonial dispensation admitted, and what kind?

2. For whom is smallness of the place a canonical cause?

3. How must a matrimonial dispensation be executed?

4. What is to be said of the case?

1. Are causes for dispensation admitted in matrimonial impediments and what sort?

Not, of course, for impediments of natural or divine law, nor for all impediments of ecclesiastical law, but the Church does admit causes for dispensation from the remoter degrees of consanguinity and affinity, public honesty, spiritual relationship, occult crime, etc. Canonical causes are required for dispensations, such as: smallness of the place, advancing age of the woman, deficiency or absence of dowry, etc., as put down in the Instruction of Propaganda May 9, 1877.¹

1 Manual of Moral Theology, vol. ii, 339 ff.

2. For whom does smallness of place serve as a canonical cause?

For the female petitioner alone, as a general rule.²

2 Ibid., 343.

3. How is a matrimonial dispensation to be executed?

No special form is prescribed for the execution of a dispensation. In the internal forum the priest should carefully note and execute the clauses of the rescript, and tell the penitent that he is dispensed. In the external forum, the bishop after the causes alleged for the dispensation and the other particulars have been verified, and the dispensation drawn up and signed, will either execute the dispensation himself by calling the parties before him, absolving them from censures, and telling them that they are dispensed; or he will commit these duties to the parish priest.³

3 Gasparri, De Matrim., vol. i, n. 392 seqq.

4. The case. The impediment under which the parties labored is one of those which are called minoris gradus, and from which bishops can usually dispense by special faculties granted to them by the Holy See. We presume, 'therefore, that the dispensation was granted by the bishop. It took its effect and removed the impediment when the document was signed by the bishop. At that time apparently the child was alive, so that both causes alleged for the dispensation subsisted when it was granted, and although one of them ceased before the marriage, this fact did not affect the validity of the dispensation. The marriage, therefore, was validly contracted, although the parish priest should have executed the dispensation in the manner described above.