Iraq’s Child Brides

Iraq (*) just passed a ‘law’ permitting nine-year old girls to marry, following other jurisdictions, and the advice of imams and Islamic interpreters too numerous to count. Read the whole article, for it is enlightening, at least in one sense, even if in another, rather sickening.

We should clarify that the law permits such girls ‘to be married’, or, more to the point, a simulacrum of such a sacred bond. For a nine-year old cannot actually marry, as she is below the age of consent to the obligations of matrimony, to say nothing of the actions proper thereto. The girl takes no active part in this. The law, rather, obliges them ‘to be married’ to men far older than they, who take, shall we say, the initiative.

Perhaps the law simply implies ‘betrothal’, as in the mediaeval practice of promising a young girl to a future husband – as they did for young and future kings and queens, waiting until maturity for the rata et consummata.

But, really. After all, we have the example of their alleged Prophet, who, according to one traditional account, married his last ‘wife’ Aisha when she was six (and he, by the same account, 54), but waited until she was nine before, well…you know. Some are trying to scrub this inconvenient episode from the whatever historical records exists.

Paedophilia is an evil thing, for it preys upon vulnerable innocence. I strive to be clear in my terms, for what we are really talking about here is paedo-erotica, for ‘philia’ is the Greek term for friendship, not sexual attraction. That is eros.

But eros itself is only proper when there is some sort of philia along with it. That is, friendship, which is only really possible between equals.  Sexual activity requires not only full and informed consent to the act, but to everything the act signifies and implies – a full union of bodies and souls for life, to commit to the bearing and raising of children. The current Code of Canon Law puts the minimum age for such full consent at 14 for women, and 16 for men.

This is, of course impossible for a nine-year old. Physically, psychologically, spiritually, they simply cannot. They are children. Having to spell this out is disconcerting. What are we to say to those who cannot see this, and of a religion and culture which condones such barbarism?

Whatever is said of the religion – and we may presume not every Muslim is on board with child ‘marriage’ – we can at least say of this law what Voltaire did at end his letters, écrasez l’infâme.

Saint Maria Goretti, intercede pro nobis +

(*) A previous version of this article mistakenly attributed this law to Iran, not Iraq, and my apologies for the misattribution. 

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