A Roman Catholic diocese has banned public weddings for conspicuously pregnant brides, calling such bulging tummies contrary to the meaning of Christian marriage, the diocese's head said Tuesday.
"Brides who are conspicuously pregnant are to be discouraged and disallowed from having public weddings," said a pastoral letter issued Feb. 10 by Bishop Jose Sorra of the Diocese of Legazpi, a city 340 kilometers (210 miles) southeast of Manila.
"They may be married in a private ceremony within the parish church or chapel (not in a house unless very sick or bedridden), or may postpone such church marriage until after having given birth to the child," it added.
Sorra told The Associated Press by telephone that the policy aims to prevent the sacrament of marriage from being desecrated or ridiculed.
The bishop related the experience of a priest in the diocese who was officiating a marriage ceremony when the very pregnant bride went into labor and had to be rushed to the hospital.
He said the policy was being implemented in the dioceses of Legazpi and Davao, a southern city, but that the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines and the Vatican are silent about the issue. He explained that every bishop is the sole legislator in his diocese and is answerable only to the pope. The Philippines is overwhelmingly Catholic.
In his pastoral letter to all priests and pastors of Legazpi, Sorra explained that marriage of two baptized Christians is a symbol of the marriage of Christ to the Church, with the bride symbolizing the Church and the bridegroom, Christ.
He said pregnancy outside marriage is a result of the violation of the Sixth Commandment and is therefore "a counter-symbol to the purity, chastity, and beauty of the bride of Christ, the Church, his mystical body."
The purity, chastity and beauty of the mystical body is symbolized by the white bridal gown, and "a white bridal gown over a conspicuous pregnancy is a contradiction of symbol or a ludicrous confusion of symbols."