The reform of the canonical marriage by Pope Francesco.

It is a historical decision that intervenes to amend a procedural formula, the canonical, that is the procedure for the causes of declaration of dissolution of the marriage, unchanged for three centuries, from Benedetto XIV’s reform, Pope Lambertini.

The reform is present in two Motu Proprio; the type of acts that contains all of the decisions that the Pope takes without the suggestion of the Curia. The first <<Mitis Iudex Dominus Iesus>> is for the Churches with a Latin rite, the other one, <<Mitis et misericors Iesus>>, for the Churches with an Oriental rite.

Pope Francesco says: <<In the world there is a great number of religious>> who suffer for the ending of their marriage. These people, who more often lives a new relationship, asks their conscience whether to go to a priest and demand if their marriage were or not valid. If there were already something in their heart or in the acts hindering the beneficial effect of the sacrament received. And so to tarnish the opera of Christ’s grace. This religious << more often  are shifted away from the legal structures of Church due to the physical or moral distance; charity and mercy require that Church itself as a mother, become close to the sons who think of themselves as separated>>.

Therefore, this reform, constitute an implicit answer to the requests of divorced and remarried people who cannot yet take Eucharist, many of which find themselves in the conditions listed by the Pope in his motus proprio: the reform keep in mind the principal cause of why it is required the dissolution of the marriage, that is the wish of perfection a new stable union with all the sacraments.

The reform policies, it should be recalled are the ones indicated by Benedetto XVI, who at the beginning of his pontificate, had started a thought about the Church, to << soothe the pain of these people>>. 

Basically, what the Pope intends to do, is not introduce hypothesis of invalidity of marriage (Pope himself precised it), but make sure the process is quick and simple, so that,<< the heart of the religious who attends the clarity of their state is not oppressed by the darkness of doubts>>.  The major worry of the Pope, is the <<salvation of the souls>> and so, being divorced that are in a new union, the reintegration of these people in the ecclesiastic community.

From here goes the need to reduce, simplify, but even give the bishop new responsibilities, including-as for the original Church- to be a judge among the religious beyond his jurisdiction.

Briefly the news:

1. Until now to get an invalidity of marriage, occurred attempt to two grades of judgement if there were concordance, the first grade and an appeal. If otherwise there is not concordance, there is the recourse to the Roman Rota. With this reform, if the case does not present particular difficulties in the interpretation, it will be sufficient the <<moral assurance>> reached by the first judge. The constitution of the “unique judge, cleric however”, is recalled to the responsibility of the bishop in the pastoral job of his legal responsibility.
2. Bishop will take a central role in the judgement: <<it is hoped in big as well as in small diocese, the bishop offer a sign of the conversion of ecclesiastic structures and do not leave delegated to the Curia’s offices the legal function in the marriage subject>>. This is truer in the “short process” that was established to solve the cases of invalidity more evident.
3. This typology of short process – in addition to the documental still in act – is used in the cases in which “the said invalidity of marriage is supported from particular evident issues”. In this process the judging function is exercised by the bishop himself, to guarantee the unity. << I have seen – says Pope Francesco- how much a shorten judgement could damage the principle of indissolubility of a marriage>>. That is why it needs to be the bishop that is the “judge” as guarantor for the Catholic union in faith and discipline.
4. Among the causes of invalidity there are also violence and abortion. These are, as the chapter V in Motu Proprio says, the circumstances, that is, the causes that could determine the invalidity of the union:<< the lack of faith that could generate the simulation of the agreement or the error that determines the willing, the short period of wedding coexistence, the abortion caused to purposefully not procreate, the persistence in a extramarital relationship in the same period of the marriage or right after, the wilful concealment of sterility or of a contagious illness or even sons born by a previous relation or last of an imprisonment>>. Through all the other causes there are also << physic violence given to receive the accordance, the lack of use of reason proven by medical documents>>.
5. For cases particularly complex there is still the last possibility to recall an instance to Roman Rota.
6. In the cases of oriental churches there are special rules (Motu Proprio is the “Mitis et misericors Iesus”) under the peculiar ecclesiastic and disciplinary arrangement.

The reform will be active from 8^th December. In the press conference it has been highlighted the choice made by the Pope, of three “Marian” dates for this Motu Proprio: signed on the 15^th August (day of the Virgin Mary), presented the 9^th September (day of the nativity of Mary) and in effect from 8^th December (Immaculate Conception).