The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1902-03-08

1hls year, and every year at TINS time
the papers are full of stories of dis
appointed SWANS scouting the countr!
to ind priest willing to marry love
lorn couples stranded on foreign
shore. And those soandalous exhlbi
lions go on all during Lent, and are
renewed in Advent.
And the trouble is not that they can
not obtain the consent of their parents
1t is not that they are not free to mar
ry properly and openly They simply
cannot wait until Lent or Advent /:
over, and they take Father Time by
| the forelock. Lent lasts nearly tive
months and Advent one month Ina
means three months in the year when
! Hymen must shut up shop. But why
have those impatient couples to wait
! They can be married in Lent or Ad-
vent Just as well as at any other time
of the year. But there Will be trouble
| getting dispensation There can DC
no trouble about a dispensation, since
no dispensation is required. The young
people do not know this; and they
should be told
The catechisms they have learned
| are partly responsible for this error
In them they were taught that it was a
sin to contract wedlock ''at prohibited
times. Now there are no prohibited
times; no times when Catholics, Tree
to marry, cannot get married. The law
before the council of Trent was very
strict but it was much mitigated by
that body. Since then only the sol
emnization of marriage: that IS. the
solemn nuptial mass and the noisy
wedding festivities are prohibited
Priests can marry privately and with
out nuptial mass on any day OF the
year. The prohibition against solemn
izing marriages in Lent and Advent
applies to the priests, and not to the
people, and should not be found in the
catechism. The people have right 10
the sacrament; it is for the priest to
say how solemnly it shall be admin
istered
But is there not dispensation re-
quired? A very respectable publica-
ton, much read by priests and intend
ed almost exclusively for them. said, IN
a recent number, that a dispensation
was required to get married in Lent or
Advent. 1t is true the pope may pro
hibit marriages for other reasons than
those contained in the impediments.
Bishops can do the same. PARISH
priests, when investigation is neces.
sary, may force the postponement OF
a wedding. In some countries. notably
III bSiSlulil- MARRIAGES dlS -
by the bishops in Lent and Advent,
and therefore a dispensation is required
to get married in those times. There
is no law in this diocese, and, as far
as we are aware, in any diocese of the
United States forbidding marriages in
Lent or Advent: therefore; here and
throughout the country no dispensatlon
is required to get married during those
CLOSED seasons"
The children should be instructed
during their preparation for first COM
munion that that question about pro
hibited times" has strayed into their
catechism without meaning for them
or anybody else, except the priests.
The people should be told from the pull
pit that marriages and baptisms are
sacraments to be administered on any
of the 365 days of the year. The young
people contemplating matrimony
should be told that there is no fast
from wedlock and no holiday for Cupid.
1t is a pity that monstrous miscon-
ception of the church's laws should be
allowed to wreck so many young lives
and strew with thorns and overhang
with remorse and shame the entrance
of so many good young people into the
state. The clergy should see
to it that their people are disabused,
and the sooner the better.
Another matter which it might be
well to animadvert upon here is as to
the duty of priests towards runaway
couples. People who have left their
homes with the intention of not return
ing are transients in the eyes of the
law-vagi vel peregrini. When they
lose their domicile in their parish they
lose their domicile in the diocese.
They can be married by any priest in
whose jurisdiction theymay happen to
be. This applies to runaways still in
the diocese of their former residence
as well as to those who are away from
both parish and diocese This is true
where the decree "Tamatsi" prevails
as well as elsewhere. We do not see
how any priest can refuse to marry
two Catholics who are without domi-
cile and to whose union there is no
impeachment.
But what is to be done in cases 4
where dispense ton is necessary? Can
the bishop in whose diocese they for
the time being are dispense them from
mpediments diriment and others? If
the priest can marry them the bishop
can dispense them. The last PROPOSE
ton is not maintained by all theo-
Iogians, but we think it too self-evi-
dent to be disputed.