Papal Authority: the Case of Marriage Validity in the USA.

This article examines there role and influence of the modern papacy on everyday life. The arena of everyday life examined here is that of the Catholic Church's definition of marriage, and the particular issue involved in this study is the breakdown of marriage, or divorce, among Catholics in the U.S. During the period 1982 to 1985 information pertaining to the processing of marriage annulments for divorced Catholics was gathered from a variety of sources. From a claims-making perspective, this research allowed for the inclusion of pertinent conditions in the definition of the marriage accepted by Vatican II versus the reality of millions divorced Catholics in the U.S. and around the world. The processing of marriage annulments and dissolutions is almost as old as the Church itself, yet prior to 1917 all cases were subject to various collection of the Church's laws. As most 1990, most, if not all Catholics seeking annulments grew up in a church that believed and taught procreation and nurture as the primary goals of marriage. The marriage annulment process becomes a turning point for rejecting or creating anew a catholic identity. Divorced Catholics deal first with internal, experimental, personal religion in divorce.