Boris Johnson, annulments, and (non) scandal
Y’all know how I feel about divorce and seemingly ubiquitous annulments. There is certainly scandal in the annulment process in the Catholic Church today, but I don’t see the twice-divorced British Prime Minister’s Catholic marriage as scandalous. Why? Because canon law is clear that his previous civil marriages were objectively invalid from the start—emphasis on objectively.
According to Church law, a baptized Catholic—and Johnson is and was a baptized Catholic—has an obligation to be married in the Catholic Church (unless he has received a dispensation from the bishop). For both of Johnson’s previous marriages, he was married outside the Church. Those cases constitute an open-and-shut type of annulment, so much so that it’s sometimes called a “short form” annulment and is simply a matter of paperwork. We are talking about a process that can be started and completed in two weeks.
I am not scandalized by something that is objectively clear in Church law. There is no way around it. The previous two marriages were never valid.
That does not mean that I believe that either of those invalid marriages couldn’t have been made valid. They presumably could have, and even should have. Especially the civil marriage which spanned 25 years and produced four children. I wish with all my heart that Mr. Johnson and the mother of his children had convalidated (made valid) their marriage instead of going their separate ways, especially knowing what their children are facing as a result of the family destruction. The devastation to the children, even into their adulthood and old age, is the same as for the children of a true marriage. That is a subject I’ve covered elsewhere, and plenty.
But they did not choose to stay together and get married in the Church, so their union (and Johnson’s other civil marriage) amounted to fornication, to be blunt. Because that is the case, there was no previous (legitimate) spouse or marriage that would have impeded Mr. Johnson from marrying his new (and only) wife. Assuming no other impediments, he was free to marry Carrie Symonds in the Church, and marry they did.
I must add that their marrying in no way implies that they themselves are in a state of grace, or that the grace of the sacrament is operable in their lives at the moment. Only those free of mortal sin can access the graces of the Sacrament of Matrimony, but either way, they are still validly married.
Now, you may disagree with the current canon law precept that holds Catholics—even bad or non-practicing ones—to a higher obligation than non-Catholics. I don’t like it, myself. I would much prefer that first marriages by Catholics outside the Church be considered illicit not invalid, but I don’t get to make that call. That call is under the clear jurisdiction of the Church, and if the law is imprudent or worse, well, that is on the lawmakers, not the faithful.
Here’s something interesting. It’s not only devout Catholics who've been upset and even scandalized by the Johnson marriage, but “Catholic left” dissenter and LGBTQ activist Fr. James Martin is aggrieved by the marriage as well. Why? Well, he believes it’s not fair that Johnson can get married in the Church but homosexuals “cannot have their civil union blessed even in private by a priest because [as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has stated] ‘God does not and cannot bless sin.’” Martin is trying to create a parallel where there is none.
Martin, who is not a stupid man, surely knows that the reason Johnson and his wife were able to marry in the Church is because Johnson was never validly married before. This is the man’s first marriage. By contrast, the reason two homosexuals cannot marry in the Church is because two people of the same sex cannot marry, ever. It’s an ontological impossibility. The very nature of marriage is male and female. There is no bridegroom without a bride, and without the possibility of consummation. Period. Fr. James Martin is well aware that the issue here is not one of “offering mercy” or a recognition and accommodation of “complex lives.”
But Martin’s disingenuousness and deceptions are legendary, and we’ve already discussed his willingness to openly, brazenly misrepresent Scripture and the words of Jesus Christ and John the Baptist to make his disordered points. So no one should fall for his false analogy with the Johnson wedding, either.
What is scandalous, in my opinion, is that, these days no one seems to know what constitutes a valid marriage in the first place. I attribute that to the usual (and really unconscionable) lack of catechesis, or worse: that no one really cares.
But for those who do care, I have found that this little graphic is a great aid. Keep in mind as you read it that there are two kinds of valid marriages—natural and sacramental—and that will help you get clarity. If you have any problems sorting out what the chart means, we can discuss it further in the comment section.
Meanwhile, don’t be scandalized by the valid marriage of Boris Johnson. That is a mere distraction from the real scandal in the annulment process, especially in America, which is not the “defect of form” annulments like Johnson had, but the “formal process” annulments—i.e., the longer investigations into even sacramental Church marriages, which are almost always decided on what we could call subjective grounds, and which often declare Catholic marriages null after 20, 30, even 40+ years and many children. This is the scandal, often with the abandoner “moving on” to a new, big Catholic wedding in short order. The following articles give you just a hint of what really offends God, and shocks the conscience:
When Even the Church Abandons the Abandoned Spouse
Tribunal Psychologist: “I Could Conceivably Make a Case for Any Marriage Being Null.”
Husband, Wife, and Other Woman: With Whom Will You Stand?
May God have mercy on us all.
