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The annulment of the 12-year marriage of political scion and former U.S. congressman Joseph P. Kennedy II and his first wife Sheila Rauch was kept secret from Rauch when it was granted by the Catholic Church in the early 1990s, but now the annulment has been reversed by the Vatican.
1991 Divorce
Kennedy and Rauch had a civil, no-fault divorce in 1991. After Kennedy's 1993 civil marriage to his second wife, he unilaterally and secretly asked the Church for an annulment of his marriage to Rauch, apparently so that he and his new wife could also be married by a Catholic priest. An annulment holds that a failed marriage was never valid in the eyes of the Catholic Church.
Secret Annulment
When Sheila Rauch found out about the secret annulment in 1996, she appealed it to the Vatican. The ensuing controversy may have contributed to Joe Kennedy's decision to not seek re-election to Congress in 1998. Today the Boston Archdiocese informed Rauch of her successful appeal. She told a TIME magazine reporter, "I am very pleased...there was a real marriage. It was a marriage that failed, but as grown-ups we need to take responsibility for that. The [annulment] process was dishonest, and it was important to stand up and say that." Rauch and Kennedy had twin boys during their marriage.
It is estimated that there are about eight million Catholics in the United States who have divorced and remarried. About 75% of annulments each year are done in the U.S., and Joe Kennedy is not the only prominent politician who has sought an annulment; Democrat John Kerry and Republican Rudolph Giuliani have also had marriages annulled.
(Source: Time.com)
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