It's been alleged in the past that Mr Johnson was originally baptised in an RC church. If that's so, then assuming none of his previous marriages have been RC ones, there would be an argument for claiming that they were no more than licensed concubinage, that in the sight of the RC church he has been a bachelor all the time.
It's pilpul. It might persuade Jacob Rees-Mogg. It doesn't persuade me. But then, I'm not RC.
I've no ideas whether Miss Cummings had ever been either an RC or been baptised at all. Does anyone know?
Apparently Johnson's first two marriages don't count as the Roman Catholic church perceives they lack "canonical form" according to this interview early in the Radio 4 Sunday programme 1:15-about 5:00 (link). They qualify to marry in a RC church as one is a catholic, Johnson was baptised RC, and Carrie Symonds is a catholic, the RC church sees that they are entitled to receive the sacrament of marriage, they have been receiving instruction from the priest who baptised their baby. The priest is marrying parishioners as Downing Street is covered by Westminster Cathedral.
In other news, apparently ABdePJ has secretly married his bidie-in at Westminster Cathedral.
I expect the intention is further distraction from his lies, corruption and incompetence, but if it was a Roman Catholic ceremony, how will he wriggle out of it when he finds someone else? Don't they rather frown on divorce?
The wealthy and powerful can generally find grounds for an annulment, unless their wife's family is holding the Pope hostage, of course.
The old adage is so often true: When a man marries his mistress, he creates a vacancy. It certainly has been in Johnson's life so far.
I do not give a fig about Johnson's person life as such but two things here matter
1) His inability to have any real interaction with the truth runs through his whole personal and public life uninterrupted. Thus him marrying for the 3rd time is but another example of him making meaningless promises.
2) It is offensive that he stood his Westminster Cathedral, before God and made such meaningless promises* - and it is disappointing that the authorities at the Cathedral allowed it.
AFZ
*I could be wrong, of course: maybe he really, really means it this time....
In other news, apparently ABdePJ has secretly married his bidie-in at Westminster Cathedral.
I expect the intention is further distraction from his lies, corruption and incompetence, but if it was a Roman Catholic ceremony, how will he wriggle out of it when he finds someone else? Don't they rather frown on divorce?
The wealthy and powerful can generally find grounds for an annulment, unless their wife's family is holding the Pope hostage, of course.
Hehe! That occurred to me, too! Poor old Henry. What he wouldn't have done for a 'canonical form get out of former marriages for free' card!
So, more seriously. Does this mean that if this is the only 'real' marriage, so far as his former children to his former wives go, Daddy wasn't really married to Mummy after all?
In other news, apparently ABdePJ has secretly married his bidie-in at Westminster Cathedral.
I expect the intention is further distraction from his lies, corruption and incompetence, but if it was a Roman Catholic ceremony, how will he wriggle out of it when he finds someone else? Don't they rather frown on divorce?
The wealthy and powerful can generally find grounds for an annulment, unless their wife's family is holding the Pope hostage, of course.
Hehe! That occurred to me, too! Poor old Henry. What he wouldn't have done for a 'canonical form get out of former marriages for free' card!
So, more seriously. Does this mean that if this is the only 'real' marriage, so far as his former children to his former wives go, Daddy wasn't really married to Mummy after all?
Henry did not get his annulment from Katherine of Aragon precisely because the then pope had been holed up in the Castel Sant' Angelo after Rome was sacked by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his German mercenaries. It just happened that Charles was the nephew of Katherine and Clement VII did not dare offend him.
Of course Henry's Dad had had to ask for a papal dispensation for young Henry to marry Katherine in the first place since she was the widow of the older son Arthur and old Hneroy wanted to keep her considerable dowry in. the family.
As for whether the previous Johnson kids are (ecclesiastical) bastards, who cares? Bet they don't. As an old friend of mine once said, better to be born a bastard than to become one.
God knows why he had to go to church in the first place....
I am reading elsewhere that marriage 1 was annulled, and marriage 2 was not valid because not Catholic.
That first statement, which I've also seen, is odd. It's very unlikely that what ended the first marriage legally was an annulment rather than a divorce. Legally annulments are very rare. The usual reason is non-consummation which is difficult to believe in this case.
Alternatively, the RC church has a procedure for annulling in its eyes some marriages that have already been dissolved legally. As far as the law is concerned, that's meaningless. That might just apply if his first marriage was an RC one, but I've no idea if it was. His first wife's mother is Italian. Even if it was, it's difficult to imagine Johnson's bothering to get involved with the RC marriage process, unless, perhaps his first wife's family set the process in motion.
I rather think her second husband, met long after the departure from her life of Mr Johnson, is a Muslim.
The RCs will annul if one of the parties lacked the intention or temperamental capacity to enter into a permanent faithful marriage. I'd have thought that should give all previous, the latest and any future Mrs Johnsons the ability to get one.
apparently Johnson was free legally in the eyes of the English law so there cannot be any argument there - or can there be ?
Johnson had not entered into a Catholic marriage before (or had he ? I don't know)
If he (as a baptised Catholic) had not entered into a Catholic marriage before and if he was free in the law of the land to marry - then he was free to marry with a Catholic ceremony.
Somebody mentioned up-thread that BoJo has apparently been receiving instruction from the priest who baptised his youngest child. Do Roman Catholics have to make (the sacrament of) confession as part of their preparation for entering (the sacrament of) marriage? (My thought being that the mind boggles at how long BoJo and a priest would need in order for BoJo to engage in a full confession ...)
Somebody mentioned up-thread that BoJo has apparently been receiving instruction from the priest who baptised his youngest child. Do Roman Catholics have to make (the sacrament of) confession as part of their preparation for entering (the sacrament of) marriage? (My thought being that the mind boggles at how long BoJo and a priest would need in order for BoJo to engage in a full confession ...)
Perhaps it's fortunate that the Catholic Church does not have an age limit for priests to retire.
*I could be wrong, of course: maybe he really, really means it this time....
He may have really really meant it every time, but then changed his mind later on.
In which case, one hopes that he's now reflected on why he changed his mind the last two times and what he's going to do differently in order to ensure that that doesn't happen again this time round (in order to avoid him continuing the pattern of behaviour of his promises seeming worthless in both his private and his public life).
His collection of 'little bastards' may or may not be so,but they are not 'little bastards' in the eyes of the Catholic Church. Children born of a legal union are considered as 'legally born' if such an idea still remains in law. This is irrespective of whether any legally recognised union (marriage) was or was not solemnised with Catholic rites.
The Catholic Church only concerns itself with sacraments for those who recognise its authority.
I understand that Boris' fiancee is Catholic and unmarried. I don't know the details of Boris' earlier marriages but if they were not celebrated with Catholic rites then Boris is feee to marry in the Church.
I'm not sure,if we are allowed to say whether he should be allowed to marry or not,if he is free to do so by the law of the land in which the marriage took place.
Somebody mentioned up-thread that BoJo has apparently been receiving instruction from the priest who baptised his youngest child. Do Roman Catholics have to make (the sacrament of) confession as part of their preparation for entering (the sacrament of) marriage? (My thought being that the mind boggles at how long BoJo and a priest would need in order for BoJo to engage in a full confession ...)
Been there, done that, Zoe.
I assure you that confessions are kept brief; no cleric has the time or the inclunation for a full gut-spill.
I chose to make my confession pre-marriage 43 years ago as I intended to communicate on the day after several years of being excommunicate ( my decision). We did not have a nuptial mass ( spouse was and is a born-again pagan) so I went to Saturday morning Mass at 10, walked home,got dressed ( not as a bride which would have made the angels laugh) & walked back to be married at 11.
anselmina wonders if Boris' children by other marriages will worry as to whether 'Daddy was really married to Mummy'
whether these children do or do not worry about the previous marriages all they can say is that Daddy was not married to Mummy with Catholic rites.
Interesting Sojourner, thank you. So is confession prior to an RC marriage service a requirement or does that depend on whether or not the Eucharist is being taken during the marriage service? Another qu showing my ignorance - does the Eucharist have to be taken during an RC wedding service? (It has been during the RC weddings I've been to, but the RC couples whose weddings I've been to would have wanted it regardless of whether it was strictly required or not.) Actually - re-reading your post, it sounds like you got married in an RC church but didn't have the Eucharist as part of the wedding service, so that is possible?
anselmina wonders if Boris' children by other marriages will worry as to whether 'Daddy was really married to Mummy'
whether these children do or do not worry about the previous marriages all they can say is that Daddy was not married to Mummy with Catholic rites.
I suspect you're being somewhat more forgiving to Boris Johnson than most people: Acknowledged child number 1 was born a month after his marriage to Marina Wheeler, so was both conceived out of wedlock and, from the proximity of the date of his divorce from his first wife, Allegra Mostyn-Owen, his affair with Marina Wheeler was at least part of the reason the first marriage broke down.
Then there's Stephanie MacIntyre (#5) who's the result of an affair with Helen MacIntyre, and the other child born of an affair mentioned during that court case (#6), and Wilfrid (#7) born in April 2020 while Boris Johnson was still married to Marina Wheeler, which marriage was only ended by divorce in November 2020.
By my count four out the seven children the press are aware of were conceived out of wedlock and three of those were born out of wedlock, so they may have genuine concerns.
Interesting Sojourner, thank you. So is confession prior to an RC marriage service a requirement or does that depend on whether or not the Eucharist is being taken during the marriage service? Another qu showing my ignorance - does the Eucharist have to be taken during an RC wedding service? (It has been during the RC weddings I've been to, but the RC couples whose weddings I've been to would have wanted it regardless of whether it was strictly required or not.) Actually - re-reading your post, it sounds like you got married in an RC church but didn't have the Eucharist as part of the wedding service, so that is possible?
Too bloody right it is. In theory if both parties are Catholic a nuptial mass is the order if the day and absolutely not if it is a “mixed marriage” ( or so it was in my Triddie youth). Post-V2 things lightened up a bit. Spouse was baptised RC and is a declared unbeliever. The priest who married us actually checked with the Cardinal Archbishop of Sinny as to whether the marriage could be regarded as “ mixed” before he married us.
So yes, there was no nuptial Mass. I was shriven a week before the wedding and communicated on the Sunday before and on the day. We had 7 month old baby , I was 4 months off qualifying and starting work as an intern and it shut everyone up.
I always recall my ( almost) daily communicant father telling my sister and me that if either of us wanted to marry someone unsuitable then to go ahead and do it in the registry office so when we came to our senses we could divorce the bastards & do it “properly” with the full ritesof Mother Church.
In all fairness he did say that he thought that one should not get married just to have legit sex...
Zoe, although pre marital confession may be both desirable and recommended in RC practice I suspect that these days it would be honoured in the breach....
I suppose we all can be thankful that it's secrecy means that so far we've been spared the Hello treatment. And as far a I know, it hasn't been televised either, or if it was filmed, that hasn't been broadcast.
Sacramental Confession (which might be with a priest or indeed sometimes with a goup of people with no outward confession) is a prerequisite for Catholics if they wish to receive the eucharist.
While it was common practice for Catholics to have a Nuptial Mass celebrated at a wedding it is not an integral part of the marriage rite.
(I have been to Nuptial Masses where neither the bride nor the groom received Communion)
With a general decline of religious practice many Catholic marriages are nowadays celebrated without a Nuptial Mass,just as funerals are often celebrated without a Requiem Mass.
On the other hand a Nuptial Mass can now be celebrated even when one of the parties is not Catholic.
Curiosity killed - I have absolutely no idea whether boris Johnson's children would be worried at all as to 'whether mummy and daddy were really married' as Anselmina,not I, suggested that they might.
I did think that any children born of a legally recognised union (marriage wuold be counted as 'legitimate' although I think that that terminology is no longer used. This would be whether the children were born more or even less than nine months after the date of the marriage.
I have no window into the soul of Boris Johnson and no wish to have one.
I repeat,however that the law of the land allows him to marry legally according to the law of the land. AND he has the right to marry in the Catholic Church,according to the well established norms of that Church.
Curiosity killed - surely those children you mention who were born 'out of wedlock' will not have to ask themselves the question as to whether'mummy and daddy were really married'
If the parents weren't married then they weren't married.. Unless the parents told the children that they were married when they weren't,there is no problem.
Similarly if they were married then they were married.
@Forthview - my point, and that of those pointing out that marrying his mistress was leaving a vacancy, was that Boris Johnson has been serially unfaithful for over 30 years, leaving a number of children with different claims to legitimacy in his wake, and refusing to publicly claim how many children he has. The legitimacy of his children is under question before the RC Church makes definite proclamations in this case.
*I could be wrong, of course: maybe he really, really means it this time....
He may have really really meant it every time, but then changed his mind later on.
True.
Given that he's (allegedly) already had one affair with Jennifer Arcuri while with the now-current Mrs Johnson, I'm not holding my breath. Or rather, I could hold my breath, in full knowledge that I wouldn't have to hold it for very long.
Curiosity killed I was earlier referring to the 'little bastards,at least in the eyes of the Catholic Church' mentioned earlier by GeeD. Perhaps I misunderstood but by his words 'at least in the eyes of the Catholic Church' I assumed that he was referring to all of the children of BorisJohnson,of whether they were born or even conceived within or outwith wedlock.
I understood also that children are no longer classified as illegitimate and that therefore the term 'bastard' is no longer applicable for a child born out of wedlock.
I don't believe that GeeD was indicating that Johnson's children are 'little bastards' in any other meaning of the word.
So as I understand it, has Mr. Johnson not been baptized Catholic, then he would have needed a declaration of nullity for his first marriages in order to have his third according to the rites of the Catholic church. But because he was baptized Catholic, and did not acquire a dispensation to marry outside the church, those marriages just don't count.
So as I understand it, has Mr. Johnson not been baptized Catholic, then he would have needed a declaration of nullity for his first marriages in order to have his third according to the rites of the Catholic church. But because he was baptized Catholic, and did not acquire a dispensation to marry outside the church, those marriages just don't count.
That seems like rather an odd state of affairs.
@Leorning Cniht I entirely agree. As I understand it, your summary of Catholic teaching on this is correct. If you were not a Catholic when you got married elsewhere, your marriage is valid and indissoluble. If you were a Catholic but got married other than in the Catholic Church, your marriage is void. You are entitled to walk out on your spouse and marry another one without more ado. With all due respect to our Catholic brothers and sisters, this reflects extremely badly on the Catholic doctrine and practice of marriage.
Meanwhile, another curious thing I've discovered by digging around in the course of the day is that Father Daniel Humphreys who is reported as the celebrant appears to be an ex-CofE clergyman who crossed the Tiber in 2012. He seems to have been a priest at some point in a parish in Kenton in the diocese of London but under the alternative oversight of the Bishop of Fulham.
I don't believe that GeeD was indicating that Johnson's children are 'little bastards' in any other meaning of the word.
"Little bastards" is a not uncommon way here of referring to children, particularly those who are often misbehaved. Is it not used like that in the various places others are? I was picking up that as well as the technical meaning of the word.
I don't recall anyone coming on tv and telling us to go out and create herd immunity.
No-one is claiming that. However, I do recall, and this article confirms, that there was at one point an intention to allow herd immunity to build up through infection of people at the time considered non-vulnerable. Since then the government has denied that was ever policy, which reminds me that Oceania is and always has been at war with Eastasia.
Enoch - thank you for your summary of Catholic teaching on marriage and your understanding of it.
I would disagree with you on the use of the word 'void'
From the Catholic point of view any legally recognised marriage ia a legally recognised marriage and brings with it certain obligations.
From the Catholic point of view 'marriage' for someone who claims to be a Catholic is also a sacrament,conducted along the lines approved by the Catholic Church.
Anyone who claims to be a Catholic who does not marry within the norms decided by the Church has simply not had a Catholic marriage. If they are otherwise free to do so in the land in which they live they are free to have a Catholic marriage.
I understand that the CofE allows divorce and remarriage. does that mean that any Anglican is entitled to walk out on his or her spouse and simply form another legally binding attachment without any further ado ? With all due respect to our Anglican brothers and sisters would this not reflect badly on Anglican doctrine and practice ?
I am also fairly sure that the legality of Boris Johnson's present marriage depends upon its having been conducted within the context of English marriage law not that it was conducted according to the rites of the Catholic Church.
Johnson may have been “baptised Roman Catholic” but he was actually confirmed into the Anglican Church - God alone knows what, if anything, he actually believes about theology.
Comments
It's not as if ex-PM's would be queueing up to remarry
It's pilpul. It might persuade Jacob Rees-Mogg. It doesn't persuade me. But then, I'm not RC.
I've no ideas whether Miss Cummings had ever been either an RC or been baptised at all. Does anyone know?
I wonder if Starmer will start with that at PMQs?
The wealthy and powerful can generally find grounds for an annulment, unless their wife's family is holding the Pope hostage, of course.
I do not give a fig about Johnson's person life as such but two things here matter
1) His inability to have any real interaction with the truth runs through his whole personal and public life uninterrupted. Thus him marrying for the 3rd time is but another example of him making meaningless promises.
2) It is offensive that he stood his Westminster Cathedral, before God and made such meaningless promises* - and it is disappointing that the authorities at the Cathedral allowed it.
AFZ
*I could be wrong, of course: maybe he really, really means it this time....
Snap.
Hehe! That occurred to me, too! Poor old Henry. What he wouldn't have done for a 'canonical form get out of former marriages for free' card!
So, more seriously. Does this mean that if this is the only 'real' marriage, so far as his former children to his former wives go, Daddy wasn't really married to Mummy after all?
Henry did not get his annulment from Katherine of Aragon precisely because the then pope had been holed up in the Castel Sant' Angelo after Rome was sacked by the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V and his German mercenaries. It just happened that Charles was the nephew of Katherine and Clement VII did not dare offend him.
Of course Henry's Dad had had to ask for a papal dispensation for young Henry to marry Katherine in the first place since she was the widow of the older son Arthur and old Hneroy wanted to keep her considerable dowry in. the family.
As for whether the previous Johnson kids are (ecclesiastical) bastards, who cares? Bet they don't. As an old friend of mine once said, better to be born a bastard than to become one.
God knows why he had to go to church in the first place....
Alternatively, the RC church has a procedure for annulling in its eyes some marriages that have already been dissolved legally. As far as the law is concerned, that's meaningless. That might just apply if his first marriage was an RC one, but I've no idea if it was. His first wife's mother is Italian. Even if it was, it's difficult to imagine Johnson's bothering to get involved with the RC marriage process, unless, perhaps his first wife's family set the process in motion.
I rather think her second husband, met long after the departure from her life of Mr Johnson, is a Muslim.
The RCs will annul if one of the parties lacked the intention or temperamental capacity to enter into a permanent faithful marriage. I'd have thought that should give all previous, the latest and any future Mrs Johnsons the ability to get one.
Johnson had not entered into a Catholic marriage before (or had he ? I don't know)
If he (as a baptised Catholic) had not entered into a Catholic marriage before and if he was free in the law of the land to marry - then he was free to marry with a Catholic ceremony.
He may have really really meant it every time, but then changed his mind later on.
True.
Pretty building for the occasion.
Same result.
Perhaps it's fortunate that the Catholic Church does not have an age limit for priests to retire.
In which case, one hopes that he's now reflected on why he changed his mind the last two times and what he's going to do differently in order to ensure that that doesn't happen again this time round (in order to avoid him continuing the pattern of behaviour of his promises seeming worthless in both his private and his public life).
The Catholic Church only concerns itself with sacraments for those who recognise its authority.
I understand that Boris' fiancee is Catholic and unmarried. I don't know the details of Boris' earlier marriages but if they were not celebrated with Catholic rites then Boris is feee to marry in the Church.
I'm not sure,if we are allowed to say whether he should be allowed to marry or not,if he is free to do so by the law of the land in which the marriage took place.
Been there, done that, Zoe.
I assure you that confessions are kept brief; no cleric has the time or the inclunation for a full gut-spill.
I chose to make my confession pre-marriage 43 years ago as I intended to communicate on the day after several years of being excommunicate ( my decision). We did not have a nuptial mass ( spouse was and is a born-again pagan) so I went to Saturday morning Mass at 10, walked home,got dressed ( not as a bride which would have made the angels laugh) & walked back to be married at 11.
whether these children do or do not worry about the previous marriages all they can say is that Daddy was not married to Mummy with Catholic rites.
I suspect you're being somewhat more forgiving to Boris Johnson than most people: Acknowledged child number 1 was born a month after his marriage to Marina Wheeler, so was both conceived out of wedlock and, from the proximity of the date of his divorce from his first wife, Allegra Mostyn-Owen, his affair with Marina Wheeler was at least part of the reason the first marriage broke down.
Then there's Stephanie MacIntyre (#5) who's the result of an affair with Helen MacIntyre, and the other child born of an affair mentioned during that court case (#6), and Wilfrid (#7) born in April 2020 while Boris Johnson was still married to Marina Wheeler, which marriage was only ended by divorce in November 2020.
By my count four out the seven children the press are aware of were conceived out of wedlock and three of those were born out of wedlock, so they may have genuine concerns.
Too bloody right it is. In theory if both parties are Catholic a nuptial mass is the order if the day and absolutely not if it is a “mixed marriage” ( or so it was in my Triddie youth). Post-V2 things lightened up a bit. Spouse was baptised RC and is a declared unbeliever. The priest who married us actually checked with the Cardinal Archbishop of Sinny as to whether the marriage could be regarded as “ mixed” before he married us.
So yes, there was no nuptial Mass. I was shriven a week before the wedding and communicated on the Sunday before and on the day. We had 7 month old baby , I was 4 months off qualifying and starting work as an intern and it shut everyone up.
I always recall my ( almost) daily communicant father telling my sister and me that if either of us wanted to marry someone unsuitable then to go ahead and do it in the registry office so when we came to our senses we could divorce the bastards & do it “properly” with the full ritesof Mother Church.
In all fairness he did say that he thought that one should not get married just to have legit sex...
Perhaps it's fortunate that the Catholic Church does not have an age limit for priests to retire.
[/quote].
There is an age limit: 75
A bishop is obliged to put in his resignation from active pastoral duty to Rome at 75; it is up to the pope to accept it
Your bog standard priest can expect to retire from full time pastoral duties at 75; most do after being reduced to burnout after 50 years
Zoe, although pre marital confession may be both desirable and recommended in RC practice I suspect that these days it would be honoured in the breach....
https://photos.app.goo.gl/7dRqjGTGkSZvgWiW6
Long may that mercy remain.
While it was common practice for Catholics to have a Nuptial Mass celebrated at a wedding it is not an integral part of the marriage rite.
(I have been to Nuptial Masses where neither the bride nor the groom received Communion)
With a general decline of religious practice many Catholic marriages are nowadays celebrated without a Nuptial Mass,just as funerals are often celebrated without a Requiem Mass.
On the other hand a Nuptial Mass can now be celebrated even when one of the parties is not Catholic.
Curiosity killed - I have absolutely no idea whether boris Johnson's children would be worried at all as to 'whether mummy and daddy were really married' as Anselmina,not I, suggested that they might.
I did think that any children born of a legally recognised union (marriage wuold be counted as 'legitimate' although I think that that terminology is no longer used. This would be whether the children were born more or even less than nine months after the date of the marriage.
I have no window into the soul of Boris Johnson and no wish to have one.
I repeat,however that the law of the land allows him to marry legally according to the law of the land. AND he has the right to marry in the Catholic Church,according to the well established norms of that Church.
If the parents weren't married then they weren't married.. Unless the parents told the children that they were married when they weren't,there is no problem.
Similarly if they were married then they were married.
Given that he's (allegedly) already had one affair with Jennifer Arcuri while with the now-current Mrs Johnson, I'm not holding my breath. Or rather, I could hold my breath, in full knowledge that I wouldn't have to hold it for very long.
I understood also that children are no longer classified as illegitimate and that therefore the term 'bastard' is no longer applicable for a child born out of wedlock.
I don't believe that GeeD was indicating that Johnson's children are 'little bastards' in any other meaning of the word.
Could anyone make an honest man of Pifflejohnson?
That seems like rather an odd state of affairs.
Meanwhile, another curious thing I've discovered by digging around in the course of the day is that Father Daniel Humphreys who is reported as the celebrant appears to be an ex-CofE clergyman who crossed the Tiber in 2012. He seems to have been a priest at some point in a parish in Kenton in the diocese of London but under the alternative oversight of the Bishop of Fulham.
A suitably ambitious brain surgeon?
I don't recall anyone coming on tv and telling us to go out and create herd immunity.
"Little bastards" is a not uncommon way here of referring to children, particularly those who are often misbehaved. Is it not used like that in the various places others are? I was picking up that as well as the technical meaning of the word.
No-one is claiming that. However, I do recall, and this article confirms, that there was at one point an intention to allow herd immunity to build up through infection of people at the time considered non-vulnerable. Since then the government has denied that was ever policy, which reminds me that Oceania is and always has been at war with Eastasia.
That's the alternative here.
I would disagree with you on the use of the word 'void'
From the Catholic point of view any legally recognised marriage ia a legally recognised marriage and brings with it certain obligations.
From the Catholic point of view 'marriage' for someone who claims to be a Catholic is also a sacrament,conducted along the lines approved by the Catholic Church.
Anyone who claims to be a Catholic who does not marry within the norms decided by the Church has simply not had a Catholic marriage. If they are otherwise free to do so in the land in which they live they are free to have a Catholic marriage.
I understand that the CofE allows divorce and remarriage. does that mean that any Anglican is entitled to walk out on his or her spouse and simply form another legally binding attachment without any further ado ? With all due respect to our Anglican brothers and sisters would this not reflect badly on Anglican doctrine and practice ?
I am also fairly sure that the legality of Boris Johnson's present marriage depends upon its having been conducted within the context of English marriage law not that it was conducted according to the rites of the Catholic Church.