There is no conflict between the bishops' opposition to the Government's suggestion of reducing the age of consent for consensual sex to 16 and the church's canon law, under which it is permissible for a girl to marry at 14 and a boy at 16, according to a spokesman for the Catholic bishops.
He said the relevant canon law dealt with marriage and it was normal for it to comply with the legal age for marriage in a particular jurisdiction.
Canon 1083 states that "a man before he has completed his sixteenth year of age and a woman before she has completed her fourteenth year of age cannot enter into a valid marriage". It continues: "The [ local] conference of bishops is free to establish a higher age for the licit celebration of marriage."
Canon 1071 states: "Except in a case of necessity, a person is not to assist without the permission of the local ordinary (bishops/superior) at . . . a marriage which cannot be recognised or celebrated according to the norm of civil law."
Responding to a query on the matter, the professor of canon law at St Patrick's College, Maynooth, Dr Michael Mullaney, said Canon 1083 "concerns the legal age for marriage, not sexual intercourse outside marriage".
He said: "The canon states that the minimum legal age for marriage is 16 for a male and 14 for a female, as in some countries, due to cultural and ethnic reasons, the legal age for marriage is lower than that found in Anglo-Saxon countries.
"However, the same canon allows the episcopal conference of each country to establish a higher age for the lawful celebration of marriage so as, for example, to be in accordance with the legal or the civil law of that country," he said. "Indeed, Canon 1072 recommends that pastors dissuade young people from entering marriage before the age customarily accepted in their country," he added.
Prof Mullaney did say that the bishops had considered the situation where Travellers were concerned, among whom there was a lower average age for marriage than was the case with the general population.
However, the bishops had decided that only where an exception was allowed for Travellers by the courts to marry at a younger age would this be recognised by the church.