1.

Impediment of Age

In the first place, the minimum age at which the Church allows young people to contract marriage is the completed fourteenth year for girls and the completed sixteenth year for boys. Before that age the Church does not recognize any marriage. In fact, she does not desire young people to make such an important contract until they are of more mature age and judgment, wherefore she admonishes the pastors of parishes to dissuade them from marrying at an earlier age than that which the good and intelligent people of a country commonly hold to be the proper age. The customs of countries do, of course, vary in this matter.

accepts the perpetual and exclusive right to the body for the performance of actions that of their nature pertain to the procreation of children (Canon 1081). The consent must be a free act of the will, and whereas an act of the will as such is internal and invisible, it must be manifested by such external signs (either words or actions [ex. marrital vows or nodding the head in affirmation]) as are commonly considered sufficient to express one's will.

form of this most important of all human contracts. Wherefore, when people inform the pastor of their intention of getting married, the Church demands that the names of the parties intending marriage be announced in church at Holy Mass on three successive Sundays (or holy days of obligation) and Catholic people who hear the announcement are strictly obliged by the law of the Church to inform the pastor, if they know of any legal obstacle to the marriage, for instance, that one party is divorced, or that the parties are blood relations, etc. Finally, after the announcements have been duly made, or a dispensation has been obtained from the Bishop in a special case to omit the announcements, the parties must present themselves with two witnesses (after having obtained the marriage license) to the pastor of the parish where the young lady lives. If there are special reasons why the parties wish to marry in the parish of the young man, they must make the reason known to the pastor, who will decide whether those reasons are sufficient to have the marriage in his parish. The Church desires very much that the parties should get married at Holy Mass, and that they receive the special marriage blessing, which can be given only at Holy Mass. If one of the parties is a non-Catholic and the Bishop has given permission for the marriage, the banns are not announced and the marriage ceremony is not to be held in church, but in the pastor's residence. The assistance of the pastor as the official witness to the marriage contract is of such importance that the Church does not recognize a marriage of Catholics, even though one only is a Catholic, if the pastor or another priest duly authorized did not assist. If, therefore, careless Catholics spurn the law of the Church and get married before a non-Catholic minister or a civil officer, the Church does not recognize the marriage, and the Catholic cuts himself off from the Church. If he again wishes to be admitted to the Sacraments, the marriage must be made over again in the presence of the pastor.

4. Mixed Marriages, Marriages with the Unbaptized

2. Impediments of Relationship by Blood and by Marriage.

Again, the Church does not consider marriage between near blood relations proper, and science confirms the prudence of the judgment of the Church; for it is commonly admitted by men of science that marriage between near relations is often dangerous to the life and health of the offspring. The Church, therefore, rules that the blood relations within three degrees or generations cannot intermarry. When, therefore, two young people have the same grandfather or grandmother (second degree), or the same great grandfather or great grandmother (third degree), they are debarred from marrying each other. A dispensation is at times granted by the Church for second cousins (third degree), and also for first cousins (second degree), but there must be special reasons, and the nearer the relationship the more urgent the reasons must be. There is no human law which does not admit of exceptions for proportionate good reasons, but exceptions prove the rule. Relationship by marriage is considered by the Church as sacred as the tie of blood; hence she does not recognize marriage within the first two degrees with the kindred of a deceased wife's blood relations and vice versa. It is perfectly in harmony with nature that the person marrying into a family enters into a close relation to the blood relations of the family of wife or husband, and it is therefore not becoming that after the death of the married party he marry a near kin of the deceased partner. As the relationship by marriage is not as close as that by blood, the prohibition of the Church extends only to the first and second degree relations, for instance, the sister of the deceased wife (first degree), or a first cousin of the deceased wife (second degree). Also from this impediment a dispensation may be granted by the Church for serious reasons.

The Church has for several centuries past warned her children in the most solemn words, beseeching them for the sake of their immortal souls, not to marry non-Catholics, whether baptized or unbaptized. The gift of faith and the grace to belong to the true Church of Christ are such great blessings that the person who knows how to value God's gifts fully, realizes the great importance of safeguarding such a treasure, for as the Saviour says: "What does it profit man, if he gain the whole world but suffer the loss of his soul." Catholic young people who marry nonCatholics certainly do expose themselves to the danger of losing the faith, for if the nonCatholic is opposed to the practice of religion and to a married life according to God's law as explained by the Church, the Catholic party may be forced either to live against his faith, or else continually to fight for freedom of worship. The question of the Catholic education of the children is beset with even more difficulties. It suffices just to mention these facts, for experience proves that as a general rule marriages between Catholics and non-Catholics are unhappy unions. If the Church cannot dissuade Catholics from marrying non-Catholics, she will reluctantly give permission for such a marriage, but only under condition that the non-Catholic party gives in writing the solemn promise that he or she will not interfere with the free practice of the faith of the Catholic party and not induce him or her to sin against the sacred obligation of the married state, and that all the children God may give them will be baptized in the Catholic Church and raised as Catholics. This is God's law, not merely a law of the Church, for a Catholic cannot enter into a union in which he is not able to do his duties towards God. There is no dispensation possible from these conditions, and if the non-Catholic does not agree to them, the Church will not have anything to do with that marriage and no Catholic priest will marry such parties. If the unfortunate Catholic prefers human love and human comfort to God's law and gets married outside the Church, he cuts himself off from the Church by his own choice.

3. Free Consent

Marriage is contracted by the legitimately manifested consent of two parties who are qualified by law to enter into such contracts: no substitute for this consent can be supplied by any human power. The matrimonial consent is an act of the will by which each party gives and

5. Banns. Pastor as Authorized Witness of Marriage

Church and State alike consider the married state of such great importance for the well being of human society that all civilized nations forbid free love, and have their laws as to the legal