Annulments are not divorces. They invalidate a marriage by stating it was never valid. If you were never actually married, how can you get a divorce? Although that sounds like circular reasoning, it makes more sense when you get into it. Remember, marriage is one of the 7 sacraments. Marriage is of God, from God, and for God. It is meant to be holy and full of grace. If it is not, the Church can then argue that the marriage was invalid because it did not meet God's guidelines for matrimony. The Church believes God's guidelines for marriage are consent (to leave your family and start a new one), permanence (commitment to a lifelong union), and fidelity (the action of starting a family.) We take this belief from Genesis: "Therefore a man leaves his father and his mother and cleaves to his wife, and they become one flesh."
This idea of invalidating such a marriage is not new. Even in the Bible there are stories of times when God set aside invalid marriages. In Genesis 21:14, for example, God calls Abraham to cast out Hagar, the slave woman through whom he (Abraham) had a son. Another example is found in Ezra Chapter 10, when the men who had taken foreign wives send them and their children away in order to do God's will. In Deuteronomy, God had told them not to do this deed- thus, the marriages were unholy.
There can be a fee for the annulment proccess ($200-$1000) and civil divorce is sometimes a preresequeite-but not always. There are many reasons that would invalidate a marriage including: insuffeicient age(too young, age difference...) forced weddings, blood relations closer than 2nd cousin, unwillingnes to bear children, murder of one spouse in order to marry another, a previous "valid" marriage, and drug use- among other things.
I hope someone is reading my blog..... HELLLLOOOOO??? IS ANYBODY OUT THERE?
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