Article IV: On the Dominion of Clerics

194. Notions. - Clerics can have goods of three genera:

1st. Patrimonial or profane and quasi-patrimonial goods, which come to them from parents or others by inheritance or donation, or which they acquire by their own profane labor or industry, by exercising an art distinct from the sacred ministry, for example, by writing books, making paintings, teaching philosophy; to these can be equated those things which from frugality of life they subtract from the honorable support owed to them from ecclesiastical goods: for this is reckoned a fruit of industry.

2nd. Casual goods, which come to them by reason of personal ministry, and are handed over to them immediately by the faithful absolutely and without restriction: not as the price of a sacred thing, but as compensation of expenses or extraordinary labor or as a stipend of support, for example, stipends of Masses not connected with a benefice; offerings on the occasion of preaching or the administration of sacraments; also stole fees (c. 463, § 3), unless they partially constitute the dowry of a benefice, as the custom is not to consider them in our regions;¹ likewise choral distributions of canons, unless in the erection of the benefice they are assigned for the dowry according to can. 1410.

¹ This is also established for Belgium and France from the responses of the Sacred Penitentiary, Jan. 19, 1819 and Aug. 9, 1821; furthermore it is not demonstrated that those responses were revoked by more recent ordinances.

3rd. Ecclesiastical goods, or revenues which by reason of a benefice or ecclesiastical dignity are conceded to them from the goods of the Church itself and from the dowries of benefices; which consequently belong immediately to the church itself and only mediately to clerics by reason of the benefice.

195. Principles. - I. Clerics have full dominion over patrimonial and casual goods.

The reason is that they come to them by personal title and have been handed over directly to them.

II. Clerics have from ecclesiastical goods a right to honorable and suitable support according to that saying, I Cor. IX, 13: "Do you not know that those who work in the sanctuary eat the things which are of the sanctuary?"; but by ecclesiastical law they are obligated under grave obligation, a personal obligation, at least from religion and charity, to expend the superfluities of revenues on pious uses.

Thus can. 1473: "Even if a benefice-holder has other non-beneficial goods, he can freely use and enjoy beneficial fruits which are necessary for his honorable support; but he is held by the obligation of expending the superfluous for the poor or for pious causes, with the prescription of can. 239, § 1, n. 19 being saved," namely, the privilege of Cardinals, who enjoy the faculty "of freely disposing of beneficial revenues even by testament," but not of sacred furnishings (c. 1298). The obligation is derived from the intention of the Church, which is also affirmed by the Council of Trent, sess. 25, c. 1 de ref.; and from the intention of the donors who handed over money and other goods to the Church for pious uses, not for profane ones. But it is a personal obligation, which therefore does not pass to heirs or donees; the cleric making the fruits his own acquires true dominion of the revenues, but with the obligation of expending the superfluous, which presses at least from religion and from charity, for that it presses from justice is not proved, as we already learn from St. Thomas.² Whence no obligation of restitution is given.

² Quodl. VI, q. 7, a. 12, ad 3; II-II, q. 158, a. 7.

For grave fault there is required a quantity much greater than for theft. St. Alphonsus judges, Th. M., l. 3, n. 490, and l. 4, n. 183, that a notable quantity is the twentieth part, or 5%, of superfluous revenues, if the superfluities are great.

196. Practical conclusions. - 1. A cleric, like any citizen, can fully dispose of goods which are not strictly ecclesiastical; yet by reason of his state he must use them without scandal and with clerical modesty preserved, and he is more strictly bound to relieve the poor and sustain pious causes.

2. Unless necessity threatens of providing for the poor, a benefice-holder can reserve superfluities for pious uses in the future, provided nevertheless that he apply caution, lest, prevented by death, the revenues be plundered by blood relatives.

3. In several regions, ecclesiastical goods which formerly supplied revenues to benefice-holders have now almost totally been plundered by the government or private persons; but the pension which in Belgium, in many parts of the Netherlands, Germany, Austria, etc. (and formerly in France) is paid to bishops, pastors (even succursalists), and canons, according to the declarations of the Sacred Penitentiary (Jan. 19, 1819; Aug. 9, 1821; Jan. 9, 1823), assumes the character of a benefice, yet for the most part is so modest that by itself alone it scarcely suffices for the suitable support of a cleric. But this does not seem valid concerning supplements which are paid to pastors by municipalities or church fabrics, nor is it valid concerning pensions of old age or adverse health which come to them after the office has already been abdicated; nor concerning those things which are paid to vicar cooperators or other helpers, who do not have a benefice.

4. In other regions, as in the United States of America, contributions of the faithful imposed by way of tax for the support of benefice-holders take the place of ecclesiastical goods and revenues; just as those things which by force of statutes or custom are given to pastors by reason of title, as at the time of the Nativity or Easter is accustomed to happen in certain places.