News Digest

Single mother among 20 couples wed by Pope at Vatican

Forty “I dos” were pronounced in St. Peter’s Basilica as Pope Francis married 20 couples on Sunday, with one bride already a mother. Francis in his homily Sunday likened families to the “bricks that build society.” Among the couples, all from the Rome area, was one in which the groom’s first marriage was annulled by the church and the bride has a daughter from an earlier relationship. The Vatican views sex outside marriage as a sin, but Francis stresses the church should be a forgiving one. Francis said marriage was “real life, not some TV show”.

[Marriage] is not an easy road, it’s sometimes a contentious trip, but that’s life.

Pope Francis

Many rank-and-file Catholics have pressed the Vatican to allow divorced faithful who remarry to receive Communion. The Vatican has stood firm, contending only if remarried Catholics forsake sex can they receive Communion. Catholics can only remarry in the Church if their first marriage is annulled, essentially a declaration the initial union never existed. Some hope a major Vatican meeting next month on family concerns might lead to permission for divorced Catholics who remarry to receive Communion. Francis has reportedly told a woman in his Argentine homeland whose husband’s first marriage wasn’t annulled she was free of sin and should take Communion anyway. The Vatican quickly clarified that the pope’s private conversations don’t reflect church policy.