37. On Scandal

1. Fulvia knows well that her husband, given to hidden thefts, feeds the family from them. Fulvia indeed shows her displeasure to her husband, but in vain. But since she does not have anything from which she and her numerous offspring may sustain themselves, she uses stolen money and other things for the necessary support of the family. But, since she is of a timorous conscience, although she sees that she cannot act otherwise, nevertheless she always fears lest she sin, either by thus inducing and confirming her husband in those thefts, or at least by cooperating. Wherefore she sets forth the whole matter to the confessor.

Q. 1. What is scandal, and what kind of sin is it? - 2. What as to the case?

R. To the first, cf. I. M. 419 seqq. To the second: Since Fulvia does not have from elsewhere the means by which she can sustain herself and her children, she seems able with a safe conscience to use those stolen things for sustaining the family. A husband owes food to wife and children, which consequently Fulvia can claim from her husband. But that he is unwilling to give anything except what was obtained by theft is per accidens with respect to Fulvia, who, as pressed by inevitable necessity, by accepting must be judged merely to behave permissively in order to the sins or thefts already committed by the husband. And certainly no one will say, in the circumstances of a case of this sort, that Fulvia induces the husband to commit thefts, or confirms the husband in them, or cooperates with the husband in the same. Lig. l. 4, n. 110.

"This is confirmed by parity. For according to the common opinion of the doctors, to which Diana, Sporer, and Babenstuber also subscribe, on account of a reasonable cause which service itself or subjection furnishes, cooks, male and female, licitly prepare meats for their masters who are going to violate the fast and serve them, because this action by its nature is not ordered to sin, but only to the substance of the act of eating, to which the sin of the masters is joined per accidens, which the male servants and maidservants, morally speaking, cannot impede, and by this very fact are not held to impede. Therefore similarly, if the husband is unwilling to furnish food unless it has been stolen here and there, the wife, pressed by grave necessity, licitly accepts it, otherwise behaving permissively with respect to the sins of the husband, since, morally speaking, she cannot impede them." Elbel 369; D'Annib., Summ., ed. 3, p. 2, n. 94.

But Fulvia, as appears from the case, having nothing else for the support of herself and of the family, is not only in grave, but in extreme or quasi-extreme necessity. For to verify this, one must not first wait until someone perishes by hunger. Hence from this head there can be no difficulty, that Fulvia, using the things of others, destroys and consumes them. Cf. I. M. 676, 1006; Lig. l. 2, n. 78; l. 3, n. 695; l. 4, n. 110; Pavone, Spicilegium, dissert. 2; G. 725, 726.

2. Ugolinus, on a certain day, at night, in his own house attacked by two armed robbers, and foreseeing unavoidable death, spontaneously offers to the unwelcome guests not only a numerous amount of money, but also a most abundant draught of very excellent wine, with other choice and very strong liquors. The rogues drink eagerly, and soon lie utterly drunk. Then Ugolinus, first having recovered the money and called for help, hands the robbers, bound hands and feet, over to the guards.

Q. What as to the case?

R. Ugolinus is not to be condemned of grave sin from the fact that he placed the cause of drunkenness. For he placed an indifferent cause, namely by placing wine and liquors before the robbers. Hence he certainly placed an occasion of drunkenness, but not truly a cause necessarily producing the effect, since the robbers can drink freely without becoming drunk; nor indeed does he compel them to drink, but they drink freely. And if, by placing wine and liquors before them, he thus induces them to drinking, nevertheless he by no means thus also induces them to drunkenness. Moreover, Ugolinus by no means intends the evil effect, or drunkenness, but merely permits it, intending only the good effect: to preserve his life unharmed and recover his money; and this good effect well compensates for the evil; this is, in the case, a sufficient reason for permitting the drunkenness of the robbers. G. 183.