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Was this (allegedly gay) marriage in a Catholic Church valid?

4 votes
1 answer
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The Spanish newspaper El Pais wrote an [article](https://elpais.com/cultura/2019/02/13/actualidad/1550074514_072680.html) the other day (with an awful clickbait, I must say), where it told the story of two women married by the Catholic Church in 1901. The story goes that they were married by a local priest, with one of the woman disguised as a man (as one of her dead cousins, in fact). The priest did not know the situation, and hence the marriage received official approval. The article claimed then that this is "the first (and only) official gay marriage in the Catholic Church" (title of the clickbait), and which has yet not been annuled. Two things come to my mind. First, the marriage act probably stated the name of the (dead) cousin, and hence, the two women were actually never married (i.e. they couldn't prove it, since they didn't have a certificate to the name of both women). Second, as one of the spouses was dead, the marriage was invalid. Thus, there was never a valid marriage anyway, and thus there is nothing to annul. Is this the case?
Asked by luchonacho (4702 rep)
Feb 18, 2019, 09:33 AM
Last activity: Feb 20, 2019, 10:21 PM