It is the hope of those working in Marriage Tribunal ministry that this process is an extension of the healing and reconciling mission of Jesus Christ, as well as an opportunity for both parties to a former marriage to look at themselves, their marriage and their future, and evaluate these realities in light of the Gospel. Toward that end, the Marriage Tribunal of the Diocese of Sioux City stands ready to assist and support those who seek to take advantage of this judicial and pastoral process.
"We [bishops] understand the pain of those for whom divorce seemed the only recourse...We urge them to make frequent use of the sacraments, especially the Sacraments of Holy Eucharist and Reconciliation…We encourage divorced persons who wish to marry in the Catholic Church to seek counsel about the options that exist to remedy their situation, including the suitability of a declaration of nullity when there is no longer any hope of reconciliation of the spouses."
- USCCB, Marriage: Love and Life in the Divine Plan, 2009
Jesus intended marriage to be a permanent commitment between a man and a woman, a relationship that would last throughout their entire lives.
But some marriages break down, oftentimes because there is something missing from the very beginning—some element that keeps the relationship from being the kind of permanent commitment Jesus intended.
An annulment is an official decree of the Church that says: Upon careful examination, after a thorough investigation, a particular failed marriage appears not to have been the kind of (sacramental) relationship that Jesus intended. A church annulment doesn't mean the marriage didn't exist; it simply says that from all appearances the failed marriage in question was not a sacrament in the full sense intended by Jesus.
Children born in such marriages are not thereby declared illegitimate, since an annulment does not "dissolve" a marriage or declare that it never existed.