CBCP Airs Concerns Regarding Wedding Expenses, Marriage Stats
Philippine Wedding News
8 June 2010

The Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) aired numerous concerns about the process of planning a wedding and other issues concerning married life this June, known to most as the wedding month.

In separate interviews, CBCP Marriage Tribunal chairman emeritus and Lingayen-Dagupan Archbishop Oscar Cruz expressed his concern regarding certain issues faced by soon-to-wed couples and married couples. The archbishop admitted that church weddings have become too expensive for Filipinos. To aid couples in their wedding expenses, he urged church official to encourage soon-to-wed couple to opt for simpler wedding ceremonies or offer the ceremony for free.

Even the long process of acquiring a marriage license and other documents has discouraged couples to tie the knot. Archbishop Cruz said that it has become too difficult to secure a marriage license that some couples have resorted to bribery in order to get one. Church weddings have even more document requirements such as baptismal certificate, confirmation certificate, among others.

Couples should not use money as a reason for not getting married since the church does offer mass wedding rites which has lesser expenses. He stressed that the Catholic Church has a rule that they cannot deny a person from receiving the sacrament of Holy Matrimony because of financial concerns. However, only a few couples have availed of this since most still prefer to have their own wedding.

Based on the latest data from the National Statistics Office, there were 490,054 marriages that were registered in 2007. The number represented a decrease of 2,612 marriages or 0.5 percent from the 2006 figure of 492,666.

Six regions, namely: National Capital Region (NCR), Region X, Region XII, Region VII, Region III and Region IV-A reported declines in the number of marriages. The biggest downward slope was recorded in NCR at 9.4 percent.

Another issue faced by couples is the increasing rate of number of failed marriages. Archbishop Cruz attributes this to the excessive exposure to comics, telenovelas, and movies have eroded the values of couples and the sacredness of matrimony. He explains that these do not promote the sanctity of marriage because they depict stories of couples who love each other but their relationship end in separation, divorce or annulment.

In his interview over Radyo Veritas, the CBCP marriage tribunal office has received 130 annulment cases every year but only 10 cases pass the first phase of their evaluation and the number would be further trimmed down as the cases progress.

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Kasal.com thanks the following sources for this article:

Aquino, Leslie Ann, Manila Bulletin. Bishop blames telenovelas for dwindling marriages (Posted June 3, 2010) Retrieved June 7, 2010
http://www.mb.com.ph/articles/260439/bishop-blames-telenovelas-dwindling-marriages

Macairan, Evelyn, The Philippine Star. Church weddings becoming too costly. (Posted June 4, 2010) Retrieved June 7, 2010
http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=581149

Radyo Veritas. Simbahang Katolika, naalarma sa tumaas na bilang ng mga mag-asawang naghihiwalay (Posted June 4, 2010) Retrieved June 7, 2010
http://www.veritas846.ph/church_news.html

National Statistics Office Special Release No. 511 - Marriages: Philippines, 2007. (Posted May 21, 2010) Retrieved June 7, 2010 from
http://www.census.gov.ph/data/sectordata/sr10511tx.html