The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1916-10-17

St. Louis, Mo-, Oct. 17.-A church law forbidding clergymen to solemnize a marriage for a person divorced for any cause arising after marriage, while the divorced partner lives, was recom- mended in the report of the Joint Com mission on Legislation on Matters Re- lating to Holy Matrimony, submitted to-day to the triennial convention of the Protestant Episcopal Church.
 The commission recommended, how ever. that where 1t is claimed a di- vorce has<been granted for causes aris- ing before marriage and satisfactory evidence, including a copy of the courts decree and record, is presented to the bishop of the dipcese, shall have the power to declare that such a decree. "being in fact a decree of an- nulment," is no bar to the marriage of either party.
 The present canon of the church permits a minister to perform the cer- emony in the case of the marriage of the innocent party to a divorce grant ed on statutory grounds, providing the clergyman has received the consent of his bishop.
 The report defined marriage, "ac- cording to God 8 design" as ''the life long union of one man with one wo- man to the exclusion of all others on either side"
 In it's report the commission pointed out that the whole subject of marriage, with it's responsibilities and obliga- tions, should be made a matter for careful instruction by the clergy much more frequently than is now common" It asserted that '"the teaching of true marriage is one of the best defenses against divorce and other evils which how afflict and threaten the nation"
 "In such instruction the distinction must be made clearbetween marriages which are allowed by the civil law, representing all that can be imposed upon people, of varying and of no re- ligious beliefs, and marriages which can be sanctioned and blessed by the Church as comformable to Gods will and the teaching of our Lord Jesus Christ" said the repoyt.
 At the same time care must be ta- ken to insist on the fact that true marriage is not a peculiar institution of the Christian Church. The teach
  men to Gods design, and His grace will enable them to rise up thereto; but marriage contracted without Christian rites must be regarded as sacred, and the contracting parties led to recognize the dignity and obliga- tions of the matter on which they have entered.
 The commission recommended also that the refusal of the church to bless and solemnize a marriage need not be followed by a permanent exclusion from the Sacraments, saying on this point. Reconsideration must be had of the good faith in which a marriage may have been entered upon, in ig- norance of the Church's law and while not subject to the Church's discipline; 1; and of the practical impossibility in many cases without greater wrong, of the breaking up of a family. In some such cases there must be a power of discretion, very carefully exercised, to admit or readmit persons to the Sac raments."
 Supporting its recommendation that the church should adopt law re- fusing to give the Church's blessing to the marriage of any person who has a divorced partner still living, the re- port said: With this provision the Commission feels justified in recom- mending an entire refusal to solemn ize with the Church's blessing the marriage of any person who has a di- vorced partner still living. The doubtfulness of the supposed exception in the Gospel according to St. Mat thew, the extreme difficulty of deter mining the innocence of either party to a divorce, and of maintaining the disciplinary safeguards of our existing canon, and the confusion which these introduce into the Church's law, make it clear that the wise course is to re- fuse the Church's rites of benediction upon any marriage after divorce, du- ring the lifetime of the other party to the original marriage.
 ''The annulment of a marriage, on the ground that, by reason of an ex- isting impeachment, fraud, or duress, it was void, must be distinguished from a divorce from any cause arising af- ter marriage; as of course must a di- vorce, which claims to dissolve the bond of marriage, be distinguished from a legal separation from bed and board.
 with regard to impediments to marriage arising from existing rela- tionship, the Commission is unable, in view of the many difficult problems at tending Table of Prohibited Degrees, to recommend special legislation on the subject. The civil law in all our states forbids the marriage of persons having a common parent, and in most states a marriage between a man and his niece or a woman and her nephew