CHAPTER II
: DIRIMENT IMPEDIMENTS IN GENERAL
Can.
1073 A diriment impediment renders a person incapable of validly contracting a
marriage.
Can.
1074 An impediment is said to be public, when it can be proved in the external
forum; otherwise, it is occult.
Can.
1075 §1 Only the supreme authority in the Church can authentically declare when
the divine law prohibits or invalidates a marriage.
§2 Only the
same supreme authority has the right to establish other impediments for those
who are baptised.
Can.
1076 A custom which introduces a new impediment, or is contrary to existing
impediments, is to be reprobated.
Can.
1077 §1 The local Ordinary can in a specific case forbid a marriage of his own
subjects, wherever they are residing, or of any person actually present in his
territory; he can do this only for a time, for a grave reason and while that
reason persists.
§2 Only the
supreme authority in the Church can attach an invalidating clause to a
prohibition.
Can.
1078 §1 The local Ordinary can dispense his own subjects wherever they are
residing, and all who are actually present in his territory, from all
impediments of ecclesiastical law, except for those whose dispensation is
reserved to the Apostolic See.
§2 The
impediments whose dispensation is reserved to the Apostolic See are:
1° the
impediment arising from sacred orders or from a public perpetual vow of
chastity in a religious institute of pontifical right
2° the
impediment of crime mentioned in can. 1090.
§3 A
dispensation is never given from the impediment of consanguinity in the direct
line or in the second degree of the collateral line.
Can.
1079 §1 When danger of death threatens, the local Ordinary can dispense his own
subjects, wherever they are residing, and all who are actually present in his
territory, both from the form to be observed in the celebration of marriage,
and from each and every impediment of ecclesiastical law, whether public or
occult, with the exception of the impediment arising from the sacred order of
priesthood.
§2 In the
same circumstances mentioned in §1, but only for cases in which not even the
local Ordinary can be approached, the same faculty of dispensation is possessed
by the parish priest, by a properly delegated sacred minister, and by the
priest or deacon who assists at the marriage in accordance with can. 1116 §2.
§3 In
danger of death, the confessor has the power to dispense from occult
impediments for the internal forum, whether within the act of sacramental
confession or outside it.
§4 In the
case mentioned in §2, the local Ordinary is considered unable to be approached
if he can be reached only by telegram or by telephone.
Can.
1080 §1 Whenever an impediment is discovered after everything has already been
prepared for a wedding and the marriage cannot without probable danger of grave
harm be postponed until a dispensation is obtained from the competent
authority, the power to dispense from all impediments, except those mentioned
in can. 1078 §2, n. 1, is possessed by the local Ordinary and, provided the
case is occult, by all those mentioned in can. 1079 §§2 - 3, the conditions
prescribed therein having been observed.
§2 This
power applies also to the validation of a marriage when there is the same
danger in delay and there is no time to have recourse to the Apostolic See or,
in the case of impediments from which he can dispense, to the local Ordinary.
Can.
1081 The parish priest or the priest or deacon mentioned in can. 1079 §2,
should inform the local Ordinary immediately of a dispensation granted for the
external forum, and this dispensation is to be recorded in the marriage
register.
Can.
1082 Unless a rescript of the Penitentiary provides otherwise, a dispensation
from an occult impediment granted in the internal nonsacramental forum, is to
be recorded in the book to be kept in the secret archive of the curia. No other
dispensation for the external forum is necessary if at a later stage the occult
impediment becomes public.
|