Folia Theologica et Canonica, Supplementum (2016)
Hanns Engelhardt, Marriage and Divorce In Anglican Canon Law
MARRIAGE AND DIVORCE IN ANGLICAN CANON LAW 55 dons concerning marriage; such regulations - at first concerning the marriage of persons who had been married earlier to a spouse still living - were inserted only later. The question whether and how far the English canons were binding still was disputed in the course of the 19lh century. It appears to have no importance today any longer. 3. Nigeria The structure of the canon law of the Church of Nigeria (Anglican Communion) - this is its official name according to eh. 1 citation 1 of its Constitution of 2002 - follows the model we know from the Episcopal Church. There is a constitution and a body of canons. The canon law of marriage is regulated in the extensive canon XVII which comprises 6 sections (Marriage, Of the Rite of the Church. Of Marriage under non-Christian Law, Of Polygamists. Miscellaneous Rules, Impediments), 39 paragraphs, and 1.788 words. IV. Initiation of Marriage 7. England With regard to the conclusion of a marriage the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum would have determined: Nuptiarum solemnes ritus in oculis omnis Ecclesiae summa cum gravitate et fide collocari statuimus, quibus si quicquam absit eorum, quae nos in illis sancivimus, pro nullis statini haberi placet.1" It is interesting that this determination is to be found in that part which deals with the Sacraments in general. It would have attached the consequence of nullity to the neglect of the prescribed solemn rite, very much like the decree Tametsi of the Council of Trent. But as already said, the Reformatio never became actual law. So the settlement that was to develop into the Anglican Church21 inherited the medieval maxim “Consensus facit nuptias”.22 The long held opinion that this meant that every expression of marital consent per verba de praesenti in whatever form and however privately made constituted a valid marriage has 2,1 De Sacramentis, cap. 7; Cardwell, E., The Reformation of the Ecclesiastical Laws, 32. 21 Cf. e.g., Avis, P., Anglicanism and the Christian Church, Edinburgh 1989, passim. 22 Cf. X 4.4.3; Helmholz, R. H., The Spirit of Classical Canon Law, Athens GA. 1996. 238 seqq.
