Chapter V — On the worthier who are to be elected to ecclesiastical benefices

I. QUESTION I. Whether the worthier, the worthy being passed over, ought to be elected to ecclesiastical benefices? ANSWER. He is called worthier who is more useful for the ministry. This worthiness is to be gathered not from knowledge alone, nor from probity alone, but from all the endowments seriously weighed; and judgment is to be formed which of those to be elected is more useful for governing the evangelical flock. The Council of Trent, session 24, chapter 1 On Reformation, teaches that electors, communicating in others' sins, sin mortally, unless they diligently take care that those be set over churches whom they themselves have judged worthier and more useful to the Church, and not indeed by prayers, or human affection, or the suggestions of the ambitious, but by their merits requiring it.

II. Fr. Thomas Tamburini, Book 8, chapter 4, § 4, no. 5, writes these things: “I assert secondly that all benefices — whether greater, as a cardinalate and bishopric, or lesser, as a canonry and chaplaincy; whether having the care of souls, as an abbacy and parish, or not having it, as the aforesaid canonry and chaplaincy, and the other benefices which are named simple — abstracting from those which are given in competition (of which presently at no. 14) — I assert, I say, that it is enough for avoiding mortal sin if they be conferred upon the worthy and fit, although the worthier or the most worthy be passed over.”

III. Fr. Filliucci, tract 41, in the Appendix, chapter 4, no. 181: “I say fifthly that the opinion which reckons it enough to elect the worthy to benefices which are not given in competition is probable, from Trent, session 7, chapter 5 On Reformation, saying: Let them be conferred upon the worthy; and from the universal estimation in the creation of beneficiaries, cardinals, bishops, abbots, and so forth, who, if they be held among the worthy, the elector and the election are praised. But it would not commonly be praised, if it were evil and a mortal sin.”

IV. These things I have transcribed, that it may be more explored and more discovered by all whither the genius of certain casuists tends, and that they do not fear to elude the most clear words of Trent. What they are about to do when the canons and laws are not so perspicuous, let the wise judge. Fr. Tamburini in the same place, no. 8, adds these things: “Since immediately before, the Council seems to be content with the worthy, either first it seems by this to wish to signify by worthier nothing else than the worthiness of those to be elected, the comparative being taken for the positive; or secondly by a less proper locution it sets down worthier, that it may exclude the unworthy … or lastly, thirdly, it speaks when there is a competition.”

V. The Venerable Innocent XI condemned this opinion of Tamburini, proposition 47, which is of this kind: When the Council of Trent said that those communicating in others' sins sin mortally, who promote to churches any others than those whom they have themselves judged worthier and more useful to the Church, the Council either first seems by this to wish to signify by "worthier" nothing else than the worthiness of those to be elected, the comparative being taken for the positive; or secondly, by a less proper locution it sets down "worthier," that it may exclude the unworthy; or lastly it speaks thirdly, when there is a competition.

VI. Fr. Tamburini is to be excused, because he wrote before the condemnation of the theses. But Fr. Viva upon this thesis, no. 1, adverts that Tamburini calls the opposite opinion more probable. What thence? This alone was lacking, that he should not recognize the doctrine evidently handed down in Trent even as more probable. But what does it matter to call the doctrine of Trent more probable, when the opposite is by Probabilism probable? Nay, it is enough that it be probable; and by these words of proscription all testimonies, even the most evident, are eluded.

VII. It is plain therefore that electors to benefices, whether simple or with the care of souls, ought to elect the worthier. Assuredly electors sin more gravely and more wickedly who elect the worthy, the worthier being passed over, to benefices with the care of souls, than if they elected them to simple benefices. But this does not take away that they sin gravely, if in the distribution of simple benefices they violate the order prescribed by Trent. Since in this also a grave detriment is brought upon the Church, and distributive justice is violated.

VIII. Authors dispute here whether, when the excess of worthiness is slight, electors sin gravely if they prefer a worthy man to another who is slightly worthier. Some deny it, others affirm it. But speculations being dismissed, pastors in a most grave business, in which the public good of the Church is always treated, are bound to prefer him whom, all things being regarded, they acknowledge to be worthier. To an unworthy man in no case is a vote to be given; nay, that electors may avoid the election of an unworthy man, when they cannot elect a worthier, they can give their vote to a worthy one. He who resigns a benefice in favour of someone is bound to seek the worthier. Examiners ought to propose to the bishop him whom they acknowledge to be worthier. Unjust electors to benefices are bound to compensate the losses at least of the Church or community. As regards him who is unjustly passed over, read St. Thomas, II-II, q. 63, art. 2, reply 4.

IX. QUESTION II. Is the translation of bishops forbidden? ANSWER. Fr. Suárez, Vol. III, On Religion, Book 1, chapter 18, with others defends that it is forbidden by ecclesiastical right alone. But Soto, Carthusianus, Bannez, and the Salmanticenses maintain that this translation is forbidden by natural and divine right. And they evince it by the authority of Innocent III, chapter Inter corporalia, where he decrees these things: Since therefore a spiritual bond is stronger than a carnal, it ought not to be doubted that Almighty God has reserved to his own judgment alone the dissolving of the spiritual marriage which is between a bishop and his Church.

X. That spiritual marriage is not founded in all things upon matrimony, since the latter is a sacrament not subject to human power. Innocent III nevertheless subjoins that by a divine rather than a human power that spiritual bond is dissolved when by the authority of the Roman Pontiff a bishop is removed from his Church and transferred to another. Hence gather that this translation can in no way be made, unless a most urgent and most evident cause occur, which yields to the convenience and utility not of the bishop but of the Church. Wherefore what is to be said of those bishops who receive one Church as a spouse with this intention, that she may be a step to another, and the other to another to be espoused, until at last they find one most beautiful — that is, which they judge richest and most opulent? Whether these are adulterers and not spouses, wolves and not pastors, let the judgment be others'. Nor should you object that things which are of natural and divine right are not obnoxious to dispensation, even pontifical: since some things are of natural and divine right absolutely; others presuppose free human acts, which being posited, a natural and divine right arises. This latter, not the former, may lie subject to a dispensation, or rather to an interpretation of the Supreme Pontiff, who, as bearing the place of God, interprets laws of this kind. See Vol. III, on the dispensation of vows.

XI. Confirmation is an act which affords full right to the elected or presented man to the dignity to which he has been elected. The confirmer ought to explore the endowments of those elected, and to confirm the worthier.

XII. The Supreme Pontiff has power of conferring all benefices of whatsoever kind in the universal Church. Archbishops and bishops in their own dioceses. Cardinals can confer the benefices of their own churches, whatsoever they be; and Cardinals in the province of their legation can confer benefices. The Chapter of a cathedral Church together with the bishop has power of dispensing canonries and prebends. In diverse Churches diverse customs obtain. The Chapter, the See being vacant, cannot confer benefices, by rule 3 of the Chancery.

XIII. QUESTION III. What is the resignation of a benefice? ANSWER. A benefice can fall vacant either by the death of the beneficiary, or by renunciation, which is a voluntary dismissal of the benefice made before the lawful Ordinary. It is twofold: the one express in words; the other tacit through acts contrary to the retention of a benefice, as through matrimony, through the military art, through religious profession, and so forth. Bishops can admit simple resignations only; the Pontiff all conditioned ones. In the Bull of St. Pius V given in the year 1568 several causes of resignation are assigned: 1. If the beneficiary be an old man of seventy years; 2. If he be sickly; 3. If he be paralytic, apoplectic, lunatic, leprous, and so forth; 4. If he be lame, dumb, deaf; 5. If he be a homicide, sodomite, concubinary, blasphemer; 6. If he be bound by ecclesiastical censures; 7. If he have obtained several benefices which he cannot administer together; 8. When on account of capital enmities he cannot administer. Some of these causes induce a necessary resignation.

XIV. After a triennium all benefices can be resigned. If the benefices be of a right of patronage, the patron's consent is necessary. A beneficiary in the article of death cannot renounce with hope of return, as Trent declares, session 25, chapter 7 On Reformation. Resignations in favour of another are simoniacal. The use of these crept in little by little about the end of the fifteenth century, against all the ancient canons. What absurdities follow hence cannot be expressed. The dispensations by which successions of this kind are wont to be made honourable are frequently obreptitious and subreptitious, and therefore before God null.

XV. Exchange is akin to a resignation in favour of another, and differs only in this, that in an exchange the resignation is mutual. If anyone having only a right to the thing should exchange with another having the same right, or a right in the thing, the exchange is simoniacal. For a lawful exchange there is always required a greater utility of the Church. A beneficiary through a contracted marriage loses his benefice, even if afterwards the marriage be detected to be null. For if he truly intended to contract, by that very deed he spurns the benefice. If he contract feignedly, he deserves to be deprived. This is to me the more probable, the argumentations of very many being dismissed.