Question V

GRATIAN. PART I. They are not permitted to make testaments except concerning their own goods. Hence Gregory writes to Bishop Lucidus, [book X, letter 42]:

It is doubtful to no one that, just as priests have no permission to alienate goods acquired in the episcopate, so they are not prohibited from judging whatever they wish concerning those which they possessed before. And so we recall that your fraternity, at the time when it was with us, complained that your predecessor Constantius had left to Luminosa, a handmaid of God, and to his brothers, by the sequence of a testament under the title of a legacy, certain movable goods which he had acquired while already a bishop; and we decreed that, if this is established, your church should suffer no prejudice from them. You too ought to recall this, not cause any vexation to the aforesaid handmaid of God, nor take anything from her without an inquiry concerning the things which she possesses.

The same, [book IV, letter 22, to Cyprian the Deacon]. We believe that your affection has already learned of the death of Bishop Theodore. But because he is said to have made a testament, you ought to inquire carefully whether he consumed anything from the goods of his church. And if indeed you learn that he diminished anything from them improperly, act in such a way that the goods are by every means repaired by the person whose interest it is.

Likewise Gregory to Marinianus, Bishop of Ravenna, [book V, letter 1]. Because John, your former predecessor, very often requested of us that we ought by our authority to confirm those things which he had conferred upon that monastery which he himself had constructed beside the church of Saint Apollinaris, and we promised that we would do this, we foresaw that it was necessary to exhort your fraternity that it permit nothing from the things which he conferred and established there to be diminished in any manner, but endeavor that all things be preserved with firm stability. Because he is known to have made mention of this monastery and the goods collected there in the testament which he made, you ought to know that we confirmed these things not because we follow his last will, but because we promised this to him while he was living, as we have said. Therefore let your fraternity hasten solicitously to fulfill all these things in such a way that both the things which he established in the aforesaid monastery and which were confirmed by us are preserved, and those things which he decreed by his testament to be given or done to the detriment of his church obtain no validity, since the law prohibits it.

Likewise from the Council of Seville. We have decreed that it be fixed henceforth and remain perpetually that a bishop may confer upon whom he wishes the goods under his own right which he acquired either before the episcopate or indeed during the episcopate by hereditary succession, according to canonical authority, and do with them whatever he wishes. But after he has been made bishop, whatever goods he has purchased from the resources of the church either in his own or another’s name, we have decreed that they come under the rights not of his relatives but of the church over which he presides. GRATIAN. But a bishop is permitted to make a testament concerning ecclesiastical goods if he restores as much from his own. Hence it was established in the Council of Agde, [c. 51]:

If a bishop, having made a testament, bequeaths anything from property belonging to ecclesiastical right, it shall not be valid otherwise, unless he supplies as much from resources belonging to his own right. PART II. GRATIAN. But if a bishop or anyone from an ecclesiastical rank dies intestate, and no persons are found who succeed him by right of kinship, let the church succeed him in the whole, nor shall it be lawful for anyone to presume anything from his goods.

Hence it was established in the Council of Tarragona [c. 12]:

Wherever a bishop has died intestate, after this determination let a written inventory of his goods be made by his priests and deacons, from the least to the greatest—that is, of utensils and all household furnishings—yet in such a way that, if anyone is convicted either of having presumed anything from them or of having taken anything secretly, he shall restore everything according to the tenor of theft.

Likewise from the Council of Tribur. Whoever from an ecclesiastical rank dies without a testament and without kindred, let his inheritance devolve upon the church where he served. Likewise concerning nuns.