We
received
a comment on our post Can
a Divorced Man Become an Orthodox Monk? from
N. F.
Perry. Ordinarily we anonymize the identity of inquirers but Mr
Perry has used his own personal identity in the comment posing his
question and we cannot anonymize it.
Moreover Mr Perry is something of a public figure. Mr Perry’s
comment is this:
Seems
good and clear advice. My own question is: if my marriage (recognized
under civil law of UK) in church has not been registered with any
diocese, can I become a monk without obtaining a civil divorce but
with the consent of my wife? Would appreciate very much your
observation on this situation from the point of view of Orthodox
canon law.
This
is a somewhat perplexing question. Mr Perry is originally from the
UK. That suggests to us that his marriage was originally in the
Anglican Church. However, he seems to be saying, his marriage,
although recognized under the civil laws of the UK—so that under UK
law Mr Perry and his wife are married—has not been registered with
any (Anglican?) diocese despite the fact of having taken place in a
church (presumably Anglican). Under these circumstances, Mr Perry
wishes to know, can he become a monk without getting a divorce,
merely with the consent of his wife?
First
of all we, Orthodox Monk, are not Orthodox canon lawyers or in any
way experts in Orthodox canon law. Moreover we are not a secular
lawyer anywhere. We can only speculate.
Next,
we assume that Mr Perry wishes to become a monk in the Orthodox
Church. His biography says that he lived for a time in a monastery
in Crete; such a monastery would ordinarily be Orthodox, Crete being
an island that is part of Greece, where Orthodoxy is the state
religion. Mr Perry has also published a novel about Mt Athos but we
have no idea how much time Mr Perry spent on Mt Athos and the state
of his relations with the monks of Mt Athos.
Mr
Perry lives, or has been living, on a property in Chile. We have no
idea if the Orthodox Church is represented in Chile. Chile is a
country where the dominant religion would be Roman Catholicism,
although we imagine that there is a certain amount of religious
pluralism and even outright atheism. Moreover we have absolutely no
idea of Chilean law. So the issue arises of the disposal of the
property in Chile—and any other property in any other country—in
the context of Mr Perry’s entry into a monastery.
We
assume that Mr Perry is still a citizen of the UK. We have no idea
of Mr Perry’s status in Chile. Has he become a citizen? Is he a
legal resident of Chile? How does the Chilean state view his status
under Chilean law and especially the status of the property he is
living on in Chile? How will Chilean law view a legal separation
between Mr Perry and his wife executed in the UK (see below)? We
don’t know.
Let’s
make some basic observations. You can’t become a monk in the
Orthodox Church unless you are Orthodox. Somewhere along the line Mr
Perry has converted to the Orthodox Church or will convert to the
Orthodox Church. If Mr Perry has not converted and does not intend
to convert to the Orthodox Church we can say nothing since only a
member of the Orthodox Church can become an Orthodox monk. If as a
non-member of the Orthodox Church he wished to take up his abode in
an Orthodox monastery that would depend on the discretion of the
Abbot and the local bishop; however the situation would be unusual
because a non-member of the Orthodox Church could not receive the
sacraments of the Orthodox Church, including monastic tonsure.
Next,
the question arises of the status of Mr Perry’s marriage in the
Anglican Church. Is it recognized as a marriage by the Anglican
Church? Mr Perry says that he was married in church but the marriage
was not registered with any diocese. Mr Perry would have to ask an
Anglican canon lawyer or bishop whether he is married in the eyes of
the Anglican Church. We have no idea. This is outside the realm of
our expertise.
Next,
let’s suppose that Mr Perry has converted or is going to convert to
the Orthodox Church. The place where he converts would have an
approach to his Anglican marriage, whether the Orthodox Church
recognized that marriage or not. On this question Mr Perry would
have to ask the people who were receiving him formally into the
Orthodox Church, or if he has been Orthodox for some time, the
monastery where he wished to become a monk. This is a matter that
has to be analyzed concretely in the context of specific places and
specific people where Mr Perry is going to become a member of the
Orthodox Church and/or an Orthodox monk.
In
the Orthodox Church you have to become a monk somewhere. There must
be a specific monastery that you become a monk in. That means that
there are specific people—the Abbot, the Council of Elders, the
local Orthodox Bishop—who must be persuaded that they want to make
you a monk in their monastery. Now it is possible that Mr Perry
could become a monk in a monastery in Crete and be sent back to his
property in Chile to live while still depending ecclesiastically on
the monastery where he became a monk, but that is something the
monastic authorities enumerated above would have to agree to.
While
we understand that Orthodox canon law views monastic tonsure as
dissolving the marriage and while we think that in Greece in the
Church of Greece or even in a monastery on Mt Athos a signed consent
of the wife to the husband becoming a monk would be sufficient for
the ecclesiastical authorities if the parties to the marriage were
both Greek and Orthodox, we think that the ecclesiastical
authorities would still want some formal disposition of the property
involved in the marriage. However, the situation is far more
complicated in the case of Mr Perry as we have discussed above.
With
the above caveats, therefore, we think that the approach would or
should be this. Mr Perry has to go with his wife to a lawyer in the
UK to arrange a legally binding agreement with his wife that they
will be permanently separated until death. This agreement will
stipulate that Mr Perry intends to become a monk in an Orthodox
monastery and that Mr Perry’s wife agrees with that decision. We
are taking the view that a mere written consent of the wife to Mr
Perry becoming an Orthodox monk would be too weak given all the
complications enumerated above. The concrete Orthodox ecclesiastical
authorities with whom Mr Perry was working might disagree and accept
a simple written consent of the wife. We would stand corrected. The
UK legal agreement would stipulate the terms of the permanent
separation with regard to any legal issue that might exist especially
concerning the disposition of any property belonging to one or the
other party to the marriage and any property held in common.
The
UK lawyer would have to establish that the agreement would be
recognized to the extent necessary under Chilean law. If for some
reason the Chilean state did not recognize the UK separation
agreement, then something would have to be worked out under Chilean
law for the disposition of property in Chile—and we suppose for the
separation itself. Conceivably the property in Chile would have to
be sold and Mr Perry might have to leave Chile because of legal
issues, we don’t know.
At
the same time that Mr Perry and his wife are working on a legal
separation in the UK, Mr Perry would be discussing with the concrete
Orthodox authorities in the place where he intends to become a member
of the Orthodox Church and/or an Orthodox monk how those Orthodox
ecclesiastical authorities will view his UK separation agreement with
his wife. We would think that if the Orthodox ecclesiastical
authorities were confident that the UK separation agreement was valid
in law both in the UK and in their own legal jurisdiction then they
would be satisfied that Mr Perry could become a monk in the Orthodox
Church, assuming that all other issues had been taken care of.
