Speaking of recognizing inter-faith marriages

The welcome news that Tunisia has lifted its civil ban on Muslim women marrying non-Muslim men (the ban seems to have worked only against women’s freedom) occasions some thoughts on Roman canon law of inter-faith marriages.

First, in this matter, western canon law does not discriminate based on sex; whatever applies to males applies to females, and vice versa.

Second, in regard to Catholics marrying baptized non-Catholics (e.g., Protestants), while ecclesiastical “permission” for a “mixed marriage” is required (1983 CIC 1124-1128), such permission is routinely granted and, even if it were somehow overlooked during wedding preparations, the failure to obtain “permission” for a Catholic-Protestant marriage does not impact the validity of the marriage or its sacramentality.

But third, in regard to Catholics marrying non-baptized persons (e.g., Jews, Muslims, Hindi, etc.), that is, so-called “disparity of cult” situations, things are more complicated.

Not “permission” but rather a “dispensation” (from the impediment of “disparity of cult” set out in Canon 1086) is required for such marriages; the failure, even if accidental, to obtain said dispensation results in the canonical invalidity of the marriage; moreover, if a dispensation is granted, the marriage, though valid under canon law, is still not regarded as sacramental (even for the Catholic spouse), unless and until the non-Catholic spouse is baptized.

This lack of sacramentality in a Catholic marriage to a non-baptized person, plus the cultural difficulties that can accompany such marriages (see, e.g. Pontifical Council for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, instr. Erga migrantes (3 mai 2004), esp. nn. 65-68), pastorally supports the negative view that canon law takes toward weddings between Catholics and non-baptized persons, but—and besides the fact that this negative canonical view does not impact the recognition that American civil law accords these marriages—the canonical impediment of “disparity of cult” is, in practice, routinely dispensed, almost as routinely as “permission” for a Catholic to marry a baptized non-Catholic is granted. 

One might question the prudence of keeping on the books such a grave obstacle to matrimonial validity as “disparity of cult” if almost the only time it ever impacts a marriage is when dispensation from it is accidentally overlooked, but that question is for another day. I can think of good arguments pro and con; doubtless others could, too. But for now, let’s just be glad that one more unjust civil discrimination against women has been lifted somewhere, while keeping in mind that the Church’s concern for marriage, though it includes encouraging the just civil recognition owed to marriage itself and the spouses therein, runs more deeply yet.