Question VI: Whether dispensation can be granted in religious chastity, and who can dispense in enclosure

The first part of this question is easily resolved from what we said in the preceding disputation, question 30, where we abundantly elucidated the mind of the Seraphic Doctor on this matter; who, although he was most devoted to religious Chastity, does not nevertheless defend its indispensability with such tenacity as to deny that it can be released by the supreme power of the Pontiff, when a cause of greater benefit intervenes; see also what we said in the same disputation about the nature of a dispensation; whether it is a relaxation of the law, or rather a declaration; for from these one may easily conjecture whether some grave cause ought to precede a dispensation, so that it may be done licitly and validly.

This difficulty Suarez also solves in the same way, by referring to what he had said about the solemnity of vows, so that a valid consequence might allow arguing from genus to species; for if the Pontiff can dispense in solemn profession, which contains the three vows under itself, no one will doubt that he can also dispense in those vows.

But there turns upon the pivot of greater difficulty the question there treated by Suarez, cap. 26., namely whether, the other vows remaining, religious chastity can be dispensed in one or another act; a knot indeed hard to untie, and which therefore perhaps almost no Doctor has touched, as num. 7. intimates Suarez. But he, having premised the foundations of the negative opinion, which we lightly touched upon for the dispensation of solemn vows in the places already cited, concludes for the affirmative, persuaded by the example of the military religion, whose solemn virginal chastity was changed into conjugal.

But that example, as Suarez himself admits in the same place, militates for those who made profession after that institution, not however for the dispensation of those who had previously vowed religious and integral chastity solemnly, as is clear from the Bulls of Paul III and Gregory XIII.

Whatever indeed may be said of this opinion, which I remit to be discussed by a better judgment, those reasons can hardly be persuaded which Suarez heaps up at length, who admits two things which strongly impugn him, namely that the three solemn vows are of the essence of the religious state, among which Chastity will yield the last place to none, and no one will count conjugal chastity among those vows; then he confesses that this partial solution of a solemn vow suffers no small diminution of the religious state; whence someone may thus argue: By any addition, or subtraction of those things which pertain to the essence of any thing, the whole essence itself is lost, as is Aristotle's constant rule, who therefore says that essence is after the manner of a number, which with any unit added or subtracted passes wholly into another species, as is evident of itself; but not slightly is something subtracted from the essence of the Religious state, while its chiefest and purest vow, in one or another act, is not only mutilated, but changed wholly into another species: for as he who licitly consummates matrimony, although he excel in every chastity, no longer possesses virginal chastity; because they are two species, of which one is lost by the approach of the other. So, etc.

QUOD if the Pontiff should decree something similar, which we do not yet note as decreed, it would rather be a dispensation of the whole state for a brief time, and its subsequent reintegration; whence no inconvenience would follow.

QUOAD the other part of the question, it is resolved from those words of Boniface VIII, indicating that enclosure be kept, unless a grave cause intervene, and the special license of him to whom it pertains. For there are certain monasteries of nuns immediately subject to the Pontiff himself, who alone can dispense both in these and in the others absolutely and in perpetuity; Bishops, however, for the time being and for a reasonable cause, can dispense in enclosures subject to them, as the Council of Trent enjoins, sess. 25. de regularibus, cap. 5. in those words, without the license of the Bishop or superior, obtained in writing: and a little after: but the Bishop or superior alone ought to grant license in necessary cases, nor can anyone else in any way, etc. He says, however, the Bishop or superior, because certain monasteries are subject to Bishops as well as to regular prelates; and under the name of Bishop is comprehended his Vicar general, provided however that he have a special mandate for this, as the Congregation of Cardinals declares and modifies, cited by Suarez cap. 10. num. 11. tom. 4. de relig. lib. 1. de obligationibus religios. whence it is clear that this power is delegable, and therefore ordinary in the Bishop, under whose name comes also the Chapter during a vacant see, just as secular Abbots, holding a quasi-episcopal power in the monasteries subject to them.

DE Regular prelates, to whose direction certain exempt nuns are committed, this same thing is certain, since they are truly their superiors, and since the Council says the Bishop, as superior; for the verification of either part suffices for the truth of a disjunctive proposition; whence if license be necessary for entering, the approval alone of the regular prelate suffices; but if it be required for going out, the cause must be approved by the Bishop; since going out demands a graver cause, and sometimes redounds to public scandal, which the Bishop is bound to avert; see Suarez num. 11.

FURTHERMORE, although the Council uses the disjunctive particle vel, it does not however follow from this that the Bishop can dispense, or grant license for entering or leaving, monasteries whose care the Regulars have; otherwise these also could in turn render the like to them; whence not a few, nor small, inconveniences would follow; as Suarez well observed num. 15. Therefore the particle vel is to be understood according to an accommodation of division, that each may share and divide his own power; yet if it be otherwise established by custom, that be observed; since in a certain declaration of the Cardinals, cited by Suarez, it was so provided.

BY the name of regular prelate, more properly comes the Provincial, since he has power as it were episcopal; yet if others by force of rule, constitution, or custom have the care and jurisdiction over the Nuns, they will be superiors accordingly, and according to the mind of the Council will be able to dispense.

OTHER several things remain to be said about enclosure, concerning which Bonacina wrote an entire treatise, and Suarez also treats diffusely of the same matter: But since these are of no such weight, and are easily deduced from what has already been said, I remit the reader to the aforesaid Authors, and to others cited by them: What remains to be discussed concerning Chastity, below; where I shall examine it more fitly under Temperance.