A Catholic priest in northern Argentina has celebrated the marriage of a couple who publicly identify as transgender after determining that there was no canonical impediment to the sacrament.
The wedding was celebrated on January 28 at Our Lady of Pompeii parish in the city of Corrientes. The priest acted after consultation with the archbishop of Corrientes, José Adolfo Larregain, who concluded that, on the basis of the couple’s biological sex, the essential requirements for a valid Catholic marriage were met.
One of the parties, Solange Ayala, is a well-known national LGBT activist who is biologically male and identifies as a woman. The other party is biologically female, presents as a man and uses the name Isaías. According to an interview given by Ayala to Radio Sudamericana on February 6, the couple completed what was described as a standard Catholic marriage preparation process prior to the ceremony.
Ayala said that the priest was fully aware of their situation from the outset and treated them with respect throughout. He added that their baptismal certificates were submitted under their legal names but that the marriage register recorded the names by which they are publicly known. The ceremony itself was celebrated using those same names.
Photographs and video footage of the wedding circulated widely in Argentinian media.
In response to the public reaction, Our Lady of Pompeii parish issued a statement emphasising the Church’s doctrine on marriage and the limits of what could be disclosed about the case. “The Church teaches that Christian marriage, as a sacrament, requires the fulfilment of essential canonical conditions for its validity and licitness,” the statement said.
“It is not merely a ceremony or the fulfilment of administrative requirements, but rather it is necessary that the contracting parties be legally capable of entering into marriage, that there be no canonical impediment, and that they give true consent, that is, that they wish to enter into marriage according to what the Church understands and teaches, with rectitude of intention and good faith.”
The parish added that, “out of respect for the privacy of the people involved, no particular details will be provided nor will any comments be made that could give rise to public interpretations or speculation.” It concluded by reaffirming “its commitment to authentic pastoral care, always linked to fidelity and truth in the sacrament,” and announced that interview, preparation and verification procedures would be strengthened “in order to safeguard the sanctity of the sacraments and avoid confusion in the community.”
The archdiocese of Corrientes also confirmed that the priest had acted only after consultation at the highest local level and that the judgement reached was strictly canonical rather than ideological.
Under canon law, marriage is understood as a covenant between one man and one woman ordered towards the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of children. The Church also teaches that biological sex is immutable, regardless of subjective self-identification. The 1983 Code of Canon Law defines marriage as a partnership of the whole of life “ordered by its nature to the good of the spouses and the procreation and education of offspring,” a definition that presumes sexual complementarity as something given, not chosen. Consent, to be valid, must be consent to this reality as the Church understands it, not to a private or reimagined version of marriage shaped by contemporary ideologies.
The recent celebration of a marriage in Corrientes between two individuals who publicly identify as transgender has therefore generated controversy not because canon law was obviously ignored, but because the event appears to sit at the fault line between doctrinal clarity and pastoral practice. The local archbishop determined that there was no canonical impediment, judging the parties according to their biological sex rather than their self-identification. The wider issue is whether a sacrament celebrated under public signs that contradict biological reality can be pastorally responsible, even if it is technically defensible.
The Church’s opposition to gender theory is relevant here. Across pontificates, the magisterium has warned against ideologies that treat sexual difference as a mutable construct rather than a gift inscribed in creation. Pope Francis has repeatedly cautioned that the “removal of sexual difference creates a problem, not a solution,” describing such thinking as a form of ideological colonisation. The 2024 declaration Dignitas Infinita was more explicit, rejecting “all attempts to obscure reference to the ineliminable sexual difference between man and woman,” and insisting that biological elements of sex are “impossible to ignore.” This is not an abstract concern but a concrete claim about what it means to be human.
Thus, the Corrientes wedding raises serious questions about consent and intention. Canon law requires not only freedom from impediment but an intention to marry according to what the Church means by marriage. When both parties publicly present themselves as members of the opposite sex, adopt names that deny their biological reality and are known for activism that promotes gender ideology, it becomes legitimate to ask whether their understanding of marriage aligns with the Church’s teaching.
