I'm just returning to Blogdom after the Canadian election and the first things that hits me is Kathy Shaidle's following protest about Michael Schiavo attempting a new marriage in the Catholic Church. Yes Kathy, I understood how you feel. It's similar to how I felt during the election every time a pro-abort Catholic politician received Holy Communion.
With this in mind, a debate arose between my colleague Dr. Ed Peters who states that canon law would not permit Michael to attempt this second marriage in the Catholic Church and my fellow Terri-culture-warrior Fr. Rob Johansen who says there is very little a pastor can do in this type of case to refuse the marriage.
For the record, I understand where Fr. Rob is coming from and I very much appreciate what he did to help Terri, her family, and Monsignor through this whole sordid affair, but in terms of canonical interpretation I must side with Ed Peters. Like Kathy Shaidle, I believe this marriage is a sham.
The law is clear: "One who, desirous of marrying a specific third party, is the mandans behind a current spouse's death, incurs a canonical impediment known as crimen" (1983 CIC 1090 ยง 1).
This is a scandal. Even if a dispensation was granted from the Holy See, which we do not know, Mr. Schiavo should not have been allowed to remarry in the Catholic Church without some act of public repentance.
It's things like this that give anti-Catholics the ammo they need. How can Catholics be so strict about pre-marital sex, birth control, abortion, yet let a guy that fought for his wife to die and lived with his girlfriend, fathered two kids out of wedlock get married in a Catholic church with no problems? What the hell? No wonder everyone thinks we're crazy. The church is it's own bad pr.
Check out Jimmy Akin's blog...there's a very interesting dicussion on this.
Christine, you're right. But keep in mind that some of the same people who'll attack the Church over this also supported Michael's "efforts"...
But I do wish the Church would have told Michael and his new wife to go elsewhere.
When I think of what my husband and I had to go through in order to get married in the eyes of the Church (he was a Baptist at the time and we had originally gone to the court house for a civil ceremony)and Michael Schiavo gets a lovely Catholic wedding (with a Mass or without?) with no trouble at all, it just galls me.
A blogger, who's name escapes me at the moment said that there are times in every Catholic's life when his or church makes them sad and this was one. I was shocked when Joseph Kennedy and his lover got a church wedding. This is worse.
I just had another thought. Did Jodi belong to this church? Did she and Michael go through months of Pre-Cana? Did Bishop Lynch approve of it?