Choose a topic from Part 3 Suppl:
1. An irregularity, in the technical sense in which weuse the term here, is any physical or moral defect which, by decreeof the Church, prevents a man from receiving the sacrament of holyorders. Now, bigamy (that is, a plurality of wives, a plurality ofmarriages) makes a man irregular. For he who is to administer thesacraments, must not himself be deficient with reference to thesacrament of matrimony. For marriage as a sacramentsignifies the union of Christ with the Church, and this is a unionof One with one.
2. A man who has one wife in law, and anotherin fact, is a bigamist, and incurs the irregularitymentioned above.
3. One who marries a non-virgin is adjudged irregular.
4. Baptism does not remove the fact of bigamy, nor theirregularity consequent upon bigamy.
5. In certain cases, it is possible for a bigamist to bedispensed from irregularity. {-Most of thisdiscussion of irregularity from a cause of bigamy is whollyirrelevant or meaningless today.-}
"A person who rails at God in adversity, suffers without merit; moreover by his lack of resignation he adds to his punishment in the next life and experiences greater disquietude of mind in this life."
St Alphonsus de Liguori
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"When the devil has failed in making a man fall, he puts forward all his energies to create distrust between the penitent and the confessor, and so by little and little he gains his end at last."
St Philip Neri
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"Let persons in the world sanctify themselves in their own houses, for neither the court, professions, or labour, are any hindrance to the service of God."
St Philip Neri
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