Chapter I — The notion and partition of a censure, and who can pass censures

I. QUESTION I. What is a censure, and of how many kinds is it? ANSWER. It is an ecclesiastical medicinal penalty of the exterior forum, by which a baptized believer is deprived of the use of certain spiritual goods, that he may depart from contumacy. It is called a penalty, because it supposes a fault. Medicinal, because it wills amendment. Of the exterior forum, because he who inflicts it must be endowed with jurisdiction. It deprives of the use of certain spiritual goods, which are proper to Christians. The very conversation with the faithful of which excommunication deprives one is a certain spiritual good.

II. A censure is distributed into three species: excommunication, suspension, and interdict. Irregularity from a delict, deposition, and degradation are not medicinal penalties. Cessation from divine offices is not a censure, but a precept.

III. One censure is from man, another from law. All indeed are from man; but when superiors by force of a law or statute inflict a censure, it is called a censure from law. Wherefore the Pontiffs alone and oecumenical Councils can pass censures from law in the universal Church, and a bishop in his own diocese. Censures from man all superiors who have jurisdiction in the exterior forum can inflict. This censure, if it be not contracted, vanishes when the superior dies; if it be contracted, it lasts even when the superior is dead, until absolution be obtained. A censure passed from law lasts as the law lasts. Another censure is called general, passed against all who, for example, steal in such a place; another particular, passed against this or that person. Another is of sentence passed, which by the very deed binds the guilty before the judge's sentence. Another of sentence to be passed, which is incurred only after the judge's sentence. It is reputed of sentence passed when it is said by that very deed, straightway, forthwith, immediately. It is judged of sentence to be passed when the superior says We command under penalty of excommunication or interdict, or he shall be excommunicated, he shall be suspended. In doubt it is to be judged that the censure is of sentence to be passed, not of sentence passed. When it is said let him be anathema, or let him be excommunicated, the censure is of sentence passed.

IV. QUESTION II. Who by ordinary right can pass censures? ANSWER. It is a truth of faith that the Church can pass censures. In the first place, the Supreme Pontiff by ordinary right has power in the universal Church of passing censures. Similarly general Councils in the universal Church, provincial ones in the province, diocesan ones in the diocese, enjoy the same power; and likewise Patriarchs, Archbishops, and Bishops; Cardinals in their own Churches can pass censures; likewise Generals, Provincials, Rectors, Provosts, Priors, and Guardians of Regulars in respect of their own subjects; and the Chapter of a cathedral Church, the See being vacant.

V. This power can be delegated by ordinary right even to a cleric, and not only to a priest, provided the cleric be not married. This power delegated by the Supreme Pontiff can be subdelegated by force of a privilege granted by the Apostolic See to papal delegates. No one can excommunicate himself, just as neither can he pass sentence in his own cause. He who inflicts censures is required to be baptized, a cleric not married, marked at least with the first tonsure.

VI. The mode of passing censures has no determinate formula or precise words; but it is enough to employ those which suffice for expressing the judge's will. But tribunals have their own prescribed formulas. An admonition ought to precede a censure, because a censure is not passed save against the contumacious. But he is not called contumacious who was not first admonished. And this admonition must needs be canonical, even if the delict be notorious. This admonition ought to be threefold, or one which is equivalent to three. Then a threefold admonition precedes when the guilty party is thrice admonished at a congruous time, the space of two or more days flowing between. One is equivalent to three when the judge assigns a congruous time for three, for instance of six or ten days. If there be danger in delay, within the same day, nay within a few hours, three intervals being always assigned for the threefold admonition, he can pass the censure. This admonition must needs be made in writing or before witnesses. If a censure is to be passed against several, it is enough that it be made in the church before the people. If an interdict is to be passed against a community, not individuals but only those are to be admonished whose fault is the cause of the interdict. If the delinquent study to decline the admonition, it suffices that the admonition be made either in the church or at his house. Authors assert no censure valid unless a threefold admonition, or one equivalent to three, precede.

VII. On festal days censures ought not to be passed; they are nevertheless valid, though unlawful, even when passed on these days. Those who have a limited territory cannot pass censures outside it. When nevertheless the cognizance of the cause has been made in their own territory, or when the contumacy is so notorious that it needs no discussion, and a canonical admonition has preceded, a censure can validly be passed by a bishop even dwelling in another's territory. When a bishop has been unjustly expelled from his own diocese, he can in places nearer to it exercise contentious jurisdiction over his own subjects, licence having been sought from the Ordinary, although not obtained, as is had in the Clementine Quamvis on the competent forum. A bishop can also inflict censures upon a subject delinquent in his own territory, even if he has passed to another territory: otherwise delicts would remain unpunished, and ecclesiastical discipline would be frustrated, since a subject could not be punished by another bishop. But a bishop cannot punish with censures a subject sinning in another's territory. If nevertheless he return to his own diocese, and there be convicted by the injured party of a delict committed in another's territory, he can be compelled by censures by the bishop to repair the injured party. Another's subject delinquent in his own diocese a bishop can punish, unless he depart before the cause be known.