A reader writes:
I don’t know if you saw Dr. Phil tonight, but he was doing a show about liars. The first guy was incredible– he had absolutely no clue. He impersonated all kinds of things — including a Roman Catholic priest! He posed as a "visiting priest from Mexico," heard an engaged couple’s confessions, performed their wedding, and faked the mass. I can’t tell you how flabbergasted I was. It is obvious that this guy is completely unrepentant.
But, here is my question– Where does that leave the couple? Obviously, they were not legally married by this fraud, the mass cannot possibly be valid, and he violated the sanctity of the confessional as well.
But what about the couple who believed in good faith that they were married? The marriage can be convalidated, I guess. But am I correct in assuming that there was no sin of fornication in this instance? They did not know about this bogus "Fr. Fred" until they returned from their honeymoon.
I am so bowled over by the audacity and callousness of what he did to this couple and to other victims, my brain is fried. He actually terms himself "a benevolent con man" and doesn’t think it was wrong, because he "worked and earned a living" by impersonating everything from a psychiatrist to a orchestral conductor.
Like I keep saying, I don’t get it. I would appreciate your comments.
Reports of this type are, indeed, disturbing, and to do what this man did is clearly a grave sin against the people he deceived. If the gentleman was Catholic, he would be subject to multiple penalties under canon law.
In terms of where he left the couple that he purported to marry, you are correct that there is not a valid marriage between them and they would need to have that situation fixed in order to go on living together as husband and wife.
In terms of the moral character of their life as husband and wife prior to the point at which they learned the priest was a fake, they were acting in good conscience. This does not mean that they were not performing acts that were objectively immoral (having sexual relations with a person to whom you are not married) but the fact that they did not know that this was the case means that they are not culpable for engaging in those acts.
This illustrates why the man in question was not a "benevolent con man." He deceived a couple into engaging in objectively gravely immoral acts, and that is gravely sinful even if the couple was acting in good conscience.
Incidentally, this kind of thing–simulation of the sacraments by a fake priest–is precisely what makes me uncomfortable with the concept of movies like The Left Hand of God or TV shows like Father Murphy.
