Marriage and Prenups

 This is why prenups are important.

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Every marriage has a prenup, even if it doesn't have a prenup. The default prenup is whatever the laws of the state and nation are. That might be straight 50-50 split, it might be split only 50% of property acquired during marriage, whatever. 

But, whatever it is, EVERY marriage sanctioned by a state or national government has a prenup. And the Catholic Church won't allow the sacramental marriage to take place unless you have first licensed the marriage through the government. So, the Catholic Church's insistence that a prenup is somehow damaging to a marriage is pure bullshit. 

The Catholic argument is, "Well, if you insist on a prenup, that's a sign that you don't expect the marriage to succeed, so that means it is not a sacramental marriage." And if I take out medical insurance, am I saying I don't trust that God will keep me healthy? This is not a minor argument. For centuries, buying insurance was seen as a sinful act, because you were not trusting in God's providence. When you bought insurance, you were betting on whether or not something bad would happen. Yet, if the Church recognizes the possibility of state-sanctioned divorce and subsequent Catholic annulment - and it most assuredly does recognize this possibility - then it recognizes that sacramental marriage vows do not always "take." 

Furthermore, it is commonly acknowledged that there is no way for the spouses to know if the vows actually worked. The Catholic process of annulment requires that the spouses show that some deficit of knowledge or moral agency was involved, at the moment the vows were exchanged, so that consent could not be given. That is, the Church requires that the putative spouses show they knew the vows wouldn't work even as they were making the vows. 

The process even takes into account the Dunning-Krueger effect, the possibility that the spouses were so deficient in knowledge that neither spouse was capable of recognizing the lack at the time both attempted to exchange vows. In fact, it could be that one of the two spouses is so deficient in understanding that they NEVER figure out the lack was there from the beginning. That is, one spouse figures it out and seeks the divorce/annulment, but the other one is never good with it and refuses to accept the Church declaration of nullity. And, in fact, since Church declarations of nullity are not infallible (that is, the Church could, indeed, be in error by granting annulment), even the Church recognizes that it may suffer from Dunning-Krueger when it tries to judge the matter.

But, if there is a Dunning-Krueger possibility, shouldn't the spouses have the possibility of protecting against that? A prenup is just marriage insurance, like health insurance, car insurance or any other kind of insurance you can morally take out. If I can take out insurance on the principle that God might not protect me from my own stupidity and ignorance when I operate an automobile, then why not take out insurance when I try to operate myself as a spouse?