Francis spoke at a February 14-18 course sponsored by the Roman Rota, a Vatican tribunal that deals primarily with marriage cases.

The pope challenged the idea that canon law and the mission of spreading the Good News of Christ are separate realities.

He called on canon lawyers to promote and protect the primary right of the faithful to be evangelised and led to an encounter with Christ.

"Your work deals with rules, processes and sanctions, but since people and their salvation are the 'subjects and objects' of the church's law, their rights and concrete needs must be 'at the centre of your work,'" the pope told the course participants.

"We are accustomed to thinking that canon law and the mission of spreading the Good News of Christ are two separate realities. One might say, schematically: there is no law without evangelisation, nor evangelisation without law," Pope Francis said.

The pope cautioned against the idea of canon lawyers simply ticking off compliance and seeking convenient solutions to legal problems.

Instead, they must promote and protect the primary right of the faithful, which is to be evangelised and led to an encounter with Christ.

Canon lawyers must work for the good of individuals

"Canon law cannot be only about judicial procedures, but must also be about the pastoral care of souls," the pope said.

The goal of a canon lawyer cannot be "to seek convenient solutions to legal problems or to attempt certain balancing acts," which could result in "rigid formalistic and bureaucratic frameworks that neglect true rights," Francis said.

Canon lawyers and those involved in marriage preparation and family ministry must work together for the good of the individuals involved, the pope said. This includes ensuring that a marriage being planned will be valid and accompanying couples in crisis situations, "including directing them to the church courts when it is plausible that there is a ground for nullity".

"The most important principle, that of evangelisation, must not be forgotten," the pope said.

And since "reality is superior to any idea," the application of the law relies on the virtue of "juridical prudence that discerns what is truly just" for the individual involved and for the church community itself.

Sources

National Catholic Register

Vatican Publishing House

A permanent catechumenate would guide couples beyond their marriage in preparation and celebration, into the first year of their life together, Francis told the audience of priests, deacons, and lay people.

The serious journey of preparation for Christian marriage, should not be "reduced to a few meetings" he said.

"Marriage is not just a 'social' event, but a true sacrament that involves an adequate preparation and a conscious celebration.

"The marriage bond, in fact, requires an engaged choice on the part of the engaged couple, which focuses on the will to build together something that must never be betrayed or abandoned."

Francis said marriage preparation is best achieved through joint efforts by priests and married couples.

He stressed the importance and pre-eminence of the role of the parish priest.

Francis said often the roots of problems that come to light after the marriage has been celebrated.

Some of these relate to (previously unrecognised) immaturity.

Mostly the problems point to weakness of the Christian faith "and in the lack of ecclesial accompaniment, in the solitude in which the newlyweds are often left after the celebration of the wedding.

"Only when faced with everyday life together, which calls spouses to grow in a journey of self-giving and sacrifice, do some realize that they have not fully understood what they were getting into."

Francis says the extended preparation and accompanying tine will help couples "learn to correspond to the grace and strength of God, and will also develop the ‘antibodies' needed to face the inevitable moments of difficulty and fatigue in married and family life."

At the same time more effective pastoral care will help couples acquire the tools and support to live their vocation.

"And this can only happen through a process of growth in the faith of the couples themselves," Francis says.

If there are "serious problems" in a couple's relationship, Francis says "it is necessary to help them to revive the faith and rediscover the grace of the Sacrament; and, in certain cases—to be evaluated with righteousness and inner freedom—to offer appropriate indications to undertake a process of nullity."

Francis said people who realise theirs is not a true sacramental marriage and want to leave can get support from clergy and pastoral workers.

The support will include communicating legal norms and "above all in an attitude of listening and understanding," Francis says.

In previous annual addresses to the Rota, Francis has insisted on the need for improvements to instruction for couples.

Source

• Asia News
• Catholic News Agency
• Image: Elizabethannedesigns

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In a December 7 rescript, Francis allowed the Roman Rota to grant an annulment even if the grounds for doing so weren't the ones originally specified in the case under review.

Before 1994, the Rota was able to grant the annulment directly on such new grounds.

St John Paul II, however, required the Rota to assess only the grounds specified in the case.

This meant the person seeking the annulment potentially had to start the process again.

Observers said John Paul's decision reflected a desire in the 1980s and 1990s to tighten up the annulment process.

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In an address to the Roman Rota in January, the Pope said: "The sacraments are free. The sacraments give us grace.

"And a matrimonial process pertains to the sacrament of matrimony. How I wish that all processes were free."

The Pope also told the Rota that because contemporary culture portrays marriage as a "mere form of emotional gratification", people often marry without a true understanding of the sacrament.

Therefore, many such marriages might be invalid.

"The judge, in pondering the validity of the consent expressed, must take into account the context of values and of faith - or their presence or absence - in which the intent to marry was formed," Pope Francis said.

"In fact, ignorance of the contents of the faith could lead to what the code [of canon law] calls an error conditioning the will.

"This eventuality is not to be considered rare as in the past, precisely because worldly thinking often prevails over the magisterium of the Church," the Pope said.

This sort of error "threatens the stability of marriage, its exclusivity and its fecundity, as well as marriage's orientation to the good of the other, of conjugal love as a ‘vital principle' of the consensus, of mutual giving to establish a lifelong union," Pope Francis stressed.

The Pope also called for "pastoral conversion" of ecclesiastical structures.

This is so that justice can be offered to "all those who turn to the Church to shed light on their matrimonial situation".

He observed that the great challenge faced by the Church's canonical judges is "not to keep the salvation of persons enclosed within the straits of legalism".

"The function of law is guided toward the salus animarum [salvation of souls] on the condition that, avoiding sophisms distant from the living flesh of people in difficulty, it may help to establish the truth of the moment of consent: whether it was faithful to Christ or to the deceitful worldly mentality."

Sources

• Catholic Herald
• National Catholic Register
• Image: Mental Healthy

"Faith in God, sustained by divine grace, is therefore a very important element for living in mutual dedication and conjugal fidelity," he said.

The Pope was speaking to members of the Roman Rota, the Vatican tribunal responsible for marriage cases.

He said contemporary culture "poses serious challenges to the person and the family" and calls into question "the very capacity of human beings to bond themselves to another and whether a union that lasts an entire life is truly possible".

Modern culture, he said, promotes the idea that people can "become themselves while remaining ‘autonomous' ", leading to the widespread mentality that relationships "can be interrupted at any time".

The Pope said he was not suggesting a simple, automatic link between a lack of faith and the invalidity of a marital union.

Rather, he hoped "to draw attention to how such a lack may, although not necessarily, also harm the goods of marriage", given that a reference to the natural order willed by God "is inherent in the covenant of marriage".

"The indissoluble covenant between man and woman does not require, for the purpose of sacramentality, the personal faith of those to be married," he said.

What is required, as the minimum condition, he added, is the intention to "do what the Church does" when it declares a marriage to be a sacrament.

While the question of intent should not be confused with the question of the individuals' personal faith, "it is not always possible to completely separate them".

The Pope quoted Blessed John Paul II's speech to the Roman Rota in 2003, in which he said "an attitude on the part of those getting married that does not take into account the supernatural dimension of marriage can render it null and void only if it undermines its validity on the natural level on which the sacramental sign itself takes place".

Sources:

Catholic News Service

Catholic News Agency

Zenit

Image: Catholic Register