Spouse being 'tied to the apron strings' is grounds for divorce in a Catholic marriage, says Church
Thursday, February 20, 2014 @ 9:24 AM
'EXCESSIVE dependence on one's mother' is sufficient grounds for the annulment of a marriage in a Catholic church – but this fact is not widely known about in Spain.
According to the Church, when one half of a married couple 'leans too much' on his or her mother, he or she is 'incapable of fulfilling marital duties'.
This situation, for the other spouse, has been likened to 'effectively being married to the mother-in-law'.
Whilst no cases have yet hit the headlines in Spain – where 80 per cent of the population identify as Catholic - about divorce caused by a husband or wife being tied to the apron strings, it is very much in practice in Italy, where head of legal affairs at the Diocese of Liguria in the north-west, Paolo Rigon led a discussion on the matter during the ceremony for the start of the new Ecclesiastical Year in the region.
A 'condition' known in Italian as Mammismo, it means that 'for every decision, every movement that a married couple wishes to take', one spouse needs to seek the approval of his or her mother – or father, in fact – first.
Rigon explained that 'psychologically', this means 'the true spouse' of the mother-dependent party is 'merely a substitute'.
He says he has come across 'cases in point' where husbands and wives of all ages, 'due to psychological immaturity' and 'not having learned enough about life', get married 'without really knowing what is in store for them' and 'continue their lives as they did before, when they were children or teenagers'.
Read more at thinkSPAIN.com