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Dear Father Angelo,

I’m L. and I’m almost 64 years old, I deeply believe in God and in our Lord Jesus Christ and I feel well when I go to church, any church, since I don’t belong to a parish in a stable way because I moved many times; I need, when I attend Mass, to partake of Communion, but there is this matter which I’ll keep short: I got pregnant at 17 and had my son, but my parents got me forcibly married in the church despite my denial to the father of my son, who was an atheist and I didn’t go to church either at the time; in short, a farce to keep people quiet and so it came to pass. After 5 years of arguments, we separated because it was a free relationship and I found a young man with many issues who I had already known since I was 14 and he was 13, we were friends; at 22 I started living with him and therefore when I was already separated, then my ex-husband started a new life with another wife and had two children, while I had a beautiful daughter with this young man when we were 27 years old; I was separated since 1981 and then divorced in 1992.

In 1998, my daughter’s father and I got married civilly, even though in the meantime I had met Jesus and faith and I could no longer get married in the church without an annulment of the first marriage, which I couldn’t get because of: first, economic reasons and secondly, because I couldn’t find any witnesses after all those years.

However, I went to confession several times finding priests who understood my situation and gave me absolution, while at other times they didn’t.

They absolutely wanted the annulment of a marriage that was invalid in itself, without the consent of someone who was a minor at the time, a typical shotgun marriage.

The last time I went to confessed was two years ago and the prerequisite was not to have any sexual intercourse with my husband with whom I have been for 40 years; given that there is no great activity in that regard given my age and also perhaps the sense of guilt that some priests caused me, since that time I could no longer find the courage to go to confession, so as not to receive another rejection; now my children are grown up and have already lived on their own for several years, I don’t even have a good relationship with the first one because he behaved badly towards me by squandering the inheritance that I gave him when he was 30 (a house) and only contacting me when he needs money; his father never gave him anything, not even food, he only thought about his new family and is still an atheist.

Sometimes during Mass I partook of Communion without going to confession because I felt such a need and I ask God for forgiveness; I know I made a mistake but it wasn’t my fault, at the time I didn’t want to get married, much less so in the church, and now I can’t go to confession anymore since they just tell me that I cannot receive Communion and I attend Mass much less often because I only go for the little Host, the body and blood of our Jesus in the Holy Sacrament. For me it is a great pain and I remember when at 37 years old, after 20 years, I went to the church of Our Lady Help of Christians and I did not partake of Communion because I had not gone to confession; after Mass there was a friar who confessed me, I told him my sins including my situation and he took me in front of the altar under the painting of Mother Mary, made me kneel down, opened the tabernacle and took the consecrated host and gave me the long-awaited Communion after having absolved me; that was the most beautiful day of my life, then he was transferred, and a priest came and started again with the same talk about the annulment; too many years have passed now, I used to be a nurse and now I’ve been retired since September.

It is true that Jesus told Peter what you loosen in heaven will be loosened on earth and what you bind will also be bound on earth, but perhaps I have not been released from that marriage bond of 46 years ago? I have been praying for years now, since I was 37, even hours and hours every day, perhaps not enough to put myself in the grace of God.

Please tell me Father Angelo what I can do.

With love

L.

Answer from the priest

Dear L.,

1. the first thing to do is to get to work at obtaining a declaration of nullity of the marriage, which is clearly invalid.

It should be easy to obtain such a declaration.

So, now that you are retired, you may have more time to solve this problem.

I will say right away that financially it is not particularly hefty.

2. Then there is the other problem, that of the civil marriage which, as you know, before the Church is a null marriage.

If you obtain the sentence of nullity of your religious marriage, you can apply for a sentence of sanatio in radice, which instantly makes your civil marriage a Sacrament, without you having to do any formalities to get married in the Church.

How wonderful it would be if you could do all this!

3. In the meantime, you can access the sacraments if you resolve not to have sexual relations, which are typical of spouses.

It is not a long wait, because the sentence of nullity of the marriage should be given to you within a year.

In this case, however, you could only receive Holy Communion where you are not known as a person who is only civilly married, to avoid people thinking that one can receive Communion even though one is only civilly married.

Or you can receive it separately as that friar did at that time, although not in a completely regular manner.

4. Meanwhile, I am pleased with your intense Christian life, especially for the hours of prayer which are the most precious of your life and, I am sure, also the most consoling.

Keep up the good work.

If you are sorry for your sins and you have the intention of confessing them as soon as you are again in compliance with the Church, you can already be forgiven from now and live in the grace of God.

The Church teaches that perfect contrition, which consists in repenting of one’s sins because they have desecrated the plan of God and were the cause of the crucifixion of our Lord, brings us back in the grace ofGod even before confession, although not without the intention of going to it as soon as possible.

It will be possible for you only when you have obtained the sanatio in radice.

It will take time, but in the meantime, and this is the most important thing, you can trust that you are already in the grace of God.

Although for now you cannot receive Holy Communion, you can nevertheless experience your spiritual Communion with the Lord Jesus and have the moral certainty that all your works bring you merits for eternity because you live in grace.

I gladly assure you of my prayers so that there is no obstacle in getting you in compliance with the rules of the Church.

I bless you and wish you well.

Father Angelo