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TEN MYTHS ABOUT ANNULMENTS
Introduction
As often as critics assail the annulment process, purporting to let
the unenlightened "in" on what the experience is really like, the unmistakable tone of bias might
incline fairer-minded people to suspect there is more to the story. Cynics almost seem to relish a bizarre
caricature
of the process as a cloak-and-dagger operation, a kind of cover-up, more likely to be accessible to whoever
can
pull a few strings at the Vatican or grease the palm of some clerical bureaucrat. All this (hearsay has
it) to proclaim children bastards, humiliate mothers and exonerate dead-beat dads. Throw in suspicions
that, with a wink and a nod, the politically connected can put a thumb on the scales of justice to have
it their own way, one wonders why anyone would ever come near a Tribunal. But every year over 60,000 persons
in America do. Petitions come almost equally from women and men, and of every socioeconomic bracket, even
from non-Catholics who might be considering marriage to a Catholic.
Reporters are ethically bound to tell what the news is, not what they
feel about the news. Truth is there is not much fresh news about the annulment process;
it has not changed substantially in thirty years. But what some people feel about the process
or what they feel it is about has increasingly become news. Sheila Rauch Kennedy,
for example, promoting her book, "Shattered Faith", exhumed some old myths
about annulments, not without help from a complaisant chorus of commentators.
More recently, a writer with a background in the behavioral sciences,
though perhaps with as many personal reasons as Ms. Kennedy to give vent
to anger, published an extraordinarily one-sided indictment of the process ("The
Annulment Crisis in American Catholicism"
by Robert H.Vasoli). This calls for a reexamination of a process which, when viewed with less bias, bears
little resemblance to such caricatures.
The Church has taken significant steps over years to ensure fair, yet efficient, procedures,
to
those wishing to exercise their rights under canon law to seek an annulment when all hopes of restoring
common
life have been exhausted. Aided by insights from psychology and the experiences of couples themselves,
today'
s process, in my view, offers one of the best and least costly means for such persons to learn and
tell the truth about their marital experience and about themselves, while devaluing neither. It is not
enough just to defend the integrity of the process, however. We need to hear more from people who have
experienced it so we can continue to improve it. Letters to an editor or a few well-crafted sound-bites
may not be enough to fill that order.
This presentation is organized as reflections
on ten common myths or misunderstandings about the annulment process. I do not
argue that the system is perfect nor intend to contradict those who feel it has
failed them, but seek only to level the playing field by separating the chaff of
misinformation from the substance, so that constructive discussion can proceed.
I begin with one very common myth, the notion that an annulment is just divorce
by another name.
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