Marriage

The banns announce your marriage, so that anyone who knows a reason you are not free to marry can say so. They are published in the parish where each of you lives: read at Mass, or put on the notice board after an announcement at Mass.

There are at least two, and they normally begin at least two weeks before the wedding. In the Archdiocese of Bombay the parish priest may excuse one of them. If you have moved and no longer belong to any parish, he may excuse them altogether, once he is sure you are free to marry.

Then your freedom to marry is shown another way. Two trustworthy people who know you well swear to it; if that is not possible, you swear to it yourself before two witnesses.

For a partner who is not Catholic: a baptised Christian brings a letter from their own pastor saying they are free to marry, and someone who is not baptised signs an affidavit.

Bring two things from your own parish priest or pastor: a letter saying that you are free to marry, and his written permission for this parish to prepare the papers and celebrate the wedding. Without them the parish cannot go ahead, so ask for them early.

Yes.

Yes, with the Church’s permission, which your parish priest asks for on your behalf. Marrying a baptised Christian of another church is called a mixed marriage. Marrying someone who is not baptised is called a marriage of disparity of cult, and needs a dispensation.

The Catholic’s parish prepares all the papers, even when the other partner lives in another diocese. The priest will also explain to your partner what the Church understands marriage to be.

The Catholic partner still makes the usual promise to keep the faith and to bring the children up Catholic. Permission can still be given if the Archbishop, or the priest he appoints, judges that your own faith is not in danger and that there is good hope of a happy marriage. Talk it through with the priest early.

Not if one of you is not a Christian. If your partner is a baptised Christian of another church, only with the Archbishop’s permission.

Ordinarily, no. The bishop may allow it only in a case of grave need, for a Christian who shares the Catholic belief in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, asks for it of their own accord, and cannot go to a minister of their own church. The parish would ask on your behalf.

Not a second religious ceremony in which you give or renew your consent, before or after the Church wedding, nor one where a Catholic priest and another minister each ask for your consent in their own rite.

A civil marriage before or after the Church wedding is allowed, for instance for a passport or a visa.

For serious reasons, the Church can excuse a Catholic marrying a baptised Christian from marrying in a Catholic church. The priest will first ask your partner why it matters to them, and your parish then applies to the Archbishop. Afterwards, bring your marriage certificate to your parish so the marriage is entered in its register.

If you are both Catholic, you are married in the eyes of the state but not yet of the Church, and you prepare for a Church wedding in the usual way. You sign only the Church register; the parish records your civil marriage separately.

If one of you is not baptised and you married under the Special Marriage Act or the Indian Christian Marriage Act, you prepare as any Catholic marrying someone who is not baptised.

If you married under the Hindu Marriage Act or another religion’s law, the law presumes the Catholic partner changed religion. You sign an affidavit that you never meant to leave the faith, or that you wish to return to it, and you are received back into the Church before the wedding.

The marriage can often still be made valid in the Church without a new ceremony. Speak to a priest, who will take it to the Archbishop.

No. If your marriage was valid and you have both become Catholic, it becomes a sacramental marriage by itself. You do not renew your vows, and a note is made beside your baptisms in the register.

Not yet. The Church recognises your earlier marriage, even though it does not recognise a civil divorce. It must first be declared null, or dissolved. There are two ways a marriage made outside the faith can be dissolved: the Pauline privilege, when two unbaptised people married, one is later baptised, and the other will not live with them in peace; and the favour of the faith, which the Pope grants so that someone may marry a particular Catholic.

The parish takes every such case to the Archbishop. Speak to a priest before you set a date.

Yes. A priest can register a marriage under the Indian Christian Marriage Act, but the law gives the Church no power to end one. Without a civil divorce you are still married in law, and a new marriage would count as bigamy.

Embassies and some offices ask for the certificate to be countersigned by the government’s Christian Marriage Registrar at Mantralaya. This is for certificates from Latin Catholic churches in the Archdiocese of Bombay, and the Registrar sees people on Tuesday and Friday afternoons; check the times before you go.

1. Ask the parish for a fresh original certificate. It must be less than three months old when you take it on.
2. Have it attested at the Chancery, at Archbishop’s House in Colaba.
3. Stick a recent joint photograph of the two of you on the back: 3 by 2 inches, white background, matt paper.
4. Have the back notarised by a registered notary.
5. Photocopy both sides.
6. Take the originals and a copy of each spouse’s Aadhaar card and PAN card, and the passport and driving licence if you have them. Check first that the names, the fathers’ names, the surnames and the dates of birth on the certificate match these exactly.
7. Go together to the Registrar to sign the register. If one of you is abroad, the other brings a letter of authority. If you are elderly or unwell and cannot travel, a close relative may go with a letter naming them, both your documents, and their own proof of identity.
8. Finally, have the notary verified by the Home Department, on the 9th floor of the New Administration Building at Mantralaya.

If one spouse has died, bring a copy of the death certificate. If both have died, the Registrar will not countersign.

A plain spelling mistake is corrected by the parish, initialled and dated. Anything more goes to the Archbishop’s office, and the register itself is never altered; a note is made beside the entry, and the new certificate carries the same note.

• A name changed in the Government Gazette: bring a copy of the Gazette. The new certificate shows the new name, with a note of the change
• A name you are commonly known by: the note reads that you are commonly known by that name
• Names in Portuguese spelling at baptism and English at marriage, or the other way round: the priest sends you to the Archbishop’s office with a letter and your documents
• Names in the wrong order: a note is made that you are commonly known by the other order