08-15-2026, 08:34 AM
PART SECOND.
XXIII. Mixed Marriages.
— When one party is Catholic and the other is not, the marriage is called mixed.
The Church grieves at such marriages. They exhibit great indifference in matter of religion, and often entail the non-Catholic training of the offspring. For my part, I cannot understand how a Christian, a Catholic, can be so forgetful of objects divine, as to choose for a companion in life a heretical woman, to be the mother of his children, the directress of his domestic life.
The Church leaves no means untried to make us feel how repugnant these marriages are to her. She refuses them the enhancing majesty of her wedding ritual, and positively forbids her ministers to take any other part in them but that of a witness. Hence such marriages are contracted outside the Church, in the vestry, — no blessing, no prayer, no holy water, no surplice, no stole. Moreover, the betrothed, on both sides, must bind themselves, beforehand, and under a solemn oath, to raise in the Catholic Church all the children that may issue from their marriage, both boys and girls. Unless this oath is taken, the Church will not permit a mixed marriage to be contracted.
When you then meet the child of a mixed marriage raised in Protestantism, know that the parents have perjured themselves.
And were even all conditions requisite for such deplorable unions fulfilled, and the matrimonial bond signed before a priest, let it be known that the Catholic party is forbidden to go before a Protestant parson. It would be a participation with heretics in sacred things, and a culpable allowance in favor of heresy.* Once married in the Catholic Church, what do you need at the meeting-house? Not the matrimonial bond, for you are already joined in it. If you only go for the purpose of hearing some fine passages of the Bible relating to matrimony, it is not worth the scandal you give, and you can as well read them at home.
Protestants, you know, do not consider matrimony a sacrament, and if the reverend gentlemen still insist upon "couples" coming before them, it is for the sake of a fee.
Mixed marriages are a token of weakened faith. No Christian will ever stoop to such a religious incongruity, unless he be lost to all sentiments of Catholic dignity.
Matrimony is a great sacrament; on it generally depends the happiness and salvation of husband and wife. Woe to them who do not contract it according to God's laws, and let family arrangements, wealth, and sentimentality trample on their faith!
XXIII. Mixed Marriages.
— When one party is Catholic and the other is not, the marriage is called mixed.
The Church grieves at such marriages. They exhibit great indifference in matter of religion, and often entail the non-Catholic training of the offspring. For my part, I cannot understand how a Christian, a Catholic, can be so forgetful of objects divine, as to choose for a companion in life a heretical woman, to be the mother of his children, the directress of his domestic life.
The Church leaves no means untried to make us feel how repugnant these marriages are to her. She refuses them the enhancing majesty of her wedding ritual, and positively forbids her ministers to take any other part in them but that of a witness. Hence such marriages are contracted outside the Church, in the vestry, — no blessing, no prayer, no holy water, no surplice, no stole. Moreover, the betrothed, on both sides, must bind themselves, beforehand, and under a solemn oath, to raise in the Catholic Church all the children that may issue from their marriage, both boys and girls. Unless this oath is taken, the Church will not permit a mixed marriage to be contracted.
When you then meet the child of a mixed marriage raised in Protestantism, know that the parents have perjured themselves.
And were even all conditions requisite for such deplorable unions fulfilled, and the matrimonial bond signed before a priest, let it be known that the Catholic party is forbidden to go before a Protestant parson. It would be a participation with heretics in sacred things, and a culpable allowance in favor of heresy.* Once married in the Catholic Church, what do you need at the meeting-house? Not the matrimonial bond, for you are already joined in it. If you only go for the purpose of hearing some fine passages of the Bible relating to matrimony, it is not worth the scandal you give, and you can as well read them at home.
Protestants, you know, do not consider matrimony a sacrament, and if the reverend gentlemen still insist upon "couples" coming before them, it is for the sake of a fee.
Mixed marriages are a token of weakened faith. No Christian will ever stoop to such a religious incongruity, unless he be lost to all sentiments of Catholic dignity.
Matrimony is a great sacrament; on it generally depends the happiness and salvation of husband and wife. Woe to them who do not contract it according to God's laws, and let family arrangements, wealth, and sentimentality trample on their faith!
"So let us be confident, let us not be unprepared, let us not be outflanked, let us be wise, vigilant, fighting against those who are trying to tear the faith out of our souls and morality out of our hearts, so that we may remain Catholics, remain united to the Blessed Virgin Mary, remain united to the Roman Catholic Church, remain faithful children of the Church."- Abp. Lefebvre