For a marriage to be valid, the man and the woman must be faithful catholic , to contract marriage freely, to have a full conscience of what they are doing (to be, in term of maturity, adult). Fidelity is very important too.
In a secular country like France, the two last conditions and the first are hardly fullfilled, for many reasons (moral and cultural). What the Pope is saying on the subject is, therefore, not surprising.

When he says that some cohabiting couples are in real marriage, It could be plausible too. A priest once said to me that, what it is important for a marriage to be theologically valid is the contract between between the spouses. The role of the priest/deacon/bishop is to be a witness of this contract. In fact, the sacrament of marriage is given by the spouses to each other.
I'm not a specialist of the subject, be careful with what I said^^.

A catholic, in some case, can contradict the pope. I know that an article of the canon law talf of this.
One should know that there is a hierarchy within the pope's teachings. Not everything is equally important and a lot of domain can be disputed within the Church (say, economical question, some open theological or pastoral question).
 

Last edited by Jean65 (6/21/2016 5:59 pm)

I'm going to look more into this, since the media always misunderstands or over-sensationalizes Papal statements and since my views on marriage are certainly different from the Catholic church's (though, as someone sympathetic to DH Lawrence on marriage, I am certainly less permissive than the culture would tolerate today).

Francis was not speaking ex cathedra, I take it?

Jean65 wrote:

For a marriage to be valid, the man and the woman must be faithful catholic

This is not correct. Neither biblically nor in terms of cannon law is a marriage invalid because the members are not Catholic (or Catholic but out of communion: such a marraige would simply be valid but not licit, as a Mass delivered by an excommunicated priest).

Sacramental marriage is admitted to all validly baptised (which includes even protestants), and natural marriage to everyone else who marries in accords with natural law.

There are impediments to validity in the case of mixed marriage between and already baptised Catholic and not (validly) baptised person, though these are not to be generalized beyond their formal conditions.

More from Ed Peters:

The canonical norms on marriage (norms encapsulating two millennia of deep reflection on human nature and the doctrines of Christ) do not, repeat, not hold that “ignorance” about permanence in marriage, or a diminished appreciation of permanence therein, or some imperfection in one’s grasp of the concept of permanence itself, renders one’s marriage null. This must be clearly understood: In regard to permanence in marriage, there is no simple ignorance-equals-nullity line in canon law. To be sure, a link exists between ignorance about permanence of marriage and the nullity of marriage, but that link is not immediate; to result in nullity, this ignorance must “determine the will” (Canon 1099, etc.). This middle term in the nullity argument, omitted by Francis and overlooked by those who at first blush are taken with his comments, is absolutely vital for the cogency of the argument. It is not enough to show that one was “ignorant” about permanence in order to prove nullity. One must also show that said ignorance vitiated the will with which a marriage was attempted in order for that marriage to be declared null.

In this post I think he belabors too long the point that it would be incredible if Pope Francis's statement were applied globally and not just to "the West," since I think most people making the points Peters is targeting would just say it applies in the West and that the pope was speaking loosely.

seigneur wrote:

Greg wrote:

Popes are errant. Catholics believe that they are sometimes, at specific times, infallible, but they also believe that in any other case they can err.

This is no different from what anybody believes about anybody: Sometimes people speak the truth, but most words are either lies or irrelevant. Does this require a doctrine of infallibility?

Alexander is entirely right here. Being infallible and being right are not the same thing. The Catholic Church's idea is that, when the pope speaks on certain topics with a certain form, you can be assured that what he says is true, where you cannot be so assured in general when other people speak on those topics. That's quite unlike your barber giving you the (correct) time when you ask.

seigneur wrote:

As to marriage, it looks like the pope's statements made his church irrelevant. Thus far, marriages needed the Church's blessing in order to be real and true and proper, but now all it takes for a real marriage is to have cohabitation with fidelity.

Well, at worst, the pope's statements would make the Church irrelevant, if they were authoritative. But there are questions of interpretation, first. But even if his statements are irreconcilable with what the Church has previously taught, he could still just be wrong. He isn't speaking ex cathedra. He wasn't writing in an encyclical or in a legislative document.

Alexander wrote:

seigneur, seriously, read the Church's teachings on the Pope. I linked to them just yesterday. It doesn't take long to read.

I have read of course that document and much other relevant material. Can you assure me of the infallibility of those teachings? Nobody has been able thus far.

Alexander wrote:

Excuse my snappiness, but I just discovered a little over half my country has made a very silly decision.

Yay for Brexit? You are fully excused.

Last edited by seigneur (6/24/2016 3:47 am)