Title XVI: Of Delicts in the Administration or Reception of Orders and of the Other Sacraments

A minister who has dared to administer Sacraments to those who by divine or ecclesiastical law are prohibited from receiving the same is to be suspended from administering Sacraments for a time to be defined by the prudent judgment of the Ordinary, and punished by other penalties according to the gravity of the fault, with peculiar penalties established by law for any delicts of this kind remaining firm.

A presbyter who, having faculty neither by law nor by concession of the Roman Pontiff, has dared to administer the sacrament of confirmation, is to be suspended; but if he has presumed to exceed the limits of the faculty made for him, let him exist deprived of that same faculty by that fact itself.

A priest who without necessary jurisdiction has presumed to hear sacramental confessions is by the fact itself suspended from divine things; but one who has presumed to absolve from reserved sins is by the fact itself suspended from hearing confessions.

§ 1. One absolving or pretending to absolve an accomplice in a base sin incurs by the fact itself excommunication reserved in a most special manner to the Apostolic See; and this even in the article of death, if another priest, although not approved for confessions, can hear the confession of the dying person without grave infamy and scandal about to arise, except in the case in which the dying person refuses to confess to another.

§ 2. He does not escape the same excommunication who absolves or pretends to absolve an accomplice who indeed does not confess the sin of complicity, from which he has not yet been absolved, but conducts himself thus because he was induced to this directly or indirectly by the accomplice confessor.

§ 1. One who has committed the crime of solicitation of which in can. 904 is to be suspended from the celebration of Mass and from hearing sacramental confessions, or even, according to the gravity of the delict, declared incapable of hearing them, deprived of all benefices, dignities, and active and passive voice, and declared incapable of all these things, and in graver cases also subjected to degradation.

§ 2. But a faithful person who has knowingly omitted to denounce within a month the one by whom he was solicited, against the prescription of can. 904, incurs latae sententiae excommunication reserved to no one, not to be absolved unless after he has satisfied the obligation or has seriously promised that he will satisfy it.

§ 1. A confessor who has presumed directly to violate the sacramental seal remains under excommunication reserved in a most special manner to the Apostolic See; but one who violates it only indirectly is liable to the penalties of which in can. 2368, Sec. 1.

§ 2. Whoever has rashly violated the prescription of can. 889, Sec. 2 is to be struck according to the gravity of the guilt with a salutary penalty, which can even be excommunication.

A Bishop consecrating someone as Bishop, the Bishops or, in place of Bishops, presbyters assisting, and the one who receives consecration without an apostolic mandate against the prescription of can. 953, are suspended by the law itself until the Apostolic See shall have dispensed them.

All, even those increased with episcopal dignity, who knowingly through simony have promoted to orders or been promoted, or have administered or received other Sacraments, are suspected of heresy; clerics moreover incur suspension reserved to the Apostolic See.

Those who presume to receive orders from an excommunicated or suspended or interdicted person after a declaratory or condemnatory sentence, or from a notorious apostate, heretic, or schismatic, contract by the fact itself suspension from divine things reserved to the Apostolic See; but one who in good faith has been ordained by any of them lacks the exercise of the order thus received until he is dispensed.

They incur by the fact itself suspension for a year from the conferral of orders, reserved to the Apostolic See:

1° Those who, against the prescription of can. 955, have ordained another's subject without the dimissorial letters of his own Ordinary.

2° Those who have ordained their own subject, who stayed elsewhere for so much time that he could have contracted a canonical impediment there, against the prescription of can. 993, n. 4, 994.

3° Those who have promoted someone to major orders without a canonical title against the prescription of can. 974, Sec. 1, n. 7.

4° Those who, without prejudice to legitimate privilege, have promoted a religious belonging to a family which is outside the territory of the one ordaining, even with dimissorial letters of his own Superior, unless it has been legitimately proved that one of the cases occurs of which in can. 966.

One who without letters or with false dimissorial letters, or before canonical age, or by leap, has maliciously approached orders, is by the fact itself suspended from the order received; but one who has approached without testimonial letters or while detained by some censure, irregularity, or other impediment is to be punished with grave penalties according to the circumstances of things.

Catholics who have dared to enter a mixed marriage, even if valid, without dispensation of the Church, remain by the fact itself excluded from legitimate ecclesiastical acts and Sacramentals until they have obtained dispensation from the Ordinary.