§ 1. From the Constitution *Apostolicae sedis*

Therefore the Pian constitution declares subject to excommunication of a sentence already passed, reserved in a special mode to the Roman pontiff:

First excommunication. All apostates from the Christian faith and all and singular heretics, by whatever name they are reckoned and of whatever sect they exist, and those believing them, and their receivers, favorers, and generally any defenders of them.

50. A twofold genus of persons is struck by this censure: a. those who defect from the faith previously received: apostates, heretics, those believing heretics; b. those who in some way become participants in this crime, yet do not properly commit it: receivers, favorers, defenders.

Those defecting from the faith. 1. Apostates are called those who defect totally from the Christian faith received through baptism, so that they no longer wish to be numbered among Catholics.¹ For incurring excommunication it is required that the internal defection from the faith manifest itself externally; but it makes no difference whether the apostate passes over to another religious sect, to Judaism, paganism, Mohammedanism, or indeed professes no religious worship, as atheists, deists, indifferentists, materialists, naturalists, pantheists, freethinkers.

Those who deny either the existence or the possibility of Christian revelation are apostates from the Christian faith and incur this excommunication. Those are not apostates who, following practical indifferentism, utterly neglect the duties of the Christian religion, because externally they do not defect from the Christian religion, but still wish to be counted among Catholics.

2. Heretics are called Christian men who voluntarily and pertinaciously deny (or call into doubt) a truth of faith proposed by the Church. For incurring excommunication it is required that the heresy conceived internally be manifested externally by some sign, whether by word or by deed or by writing, even with no one present or hearing. But it is not required that the heretic join himself to some sect of heretics, such as Protestants, schismatics erring in faith, Jansenists, anti-infallibilists or Old Catholics.

a. He also incurs this excommunication who exercises heretical superstition, as one who attempts to divine, through turning tables, spiritism, and magical arts of this kind, secrets of hearts or future free actions of men known to God alone, provided he adverts to the heresy implicit in this deed.²

b. Not all concede that he incurs excommunication who positively doubts concerning the truth of faith, "because," as Struggl says, "such a one does not have heresy plainly consummated and perfect."³

c. Because only those incur this censure who have committed formal heresy, it is clear that it can happen that several who have been educated in heresy are, because of their good faith, immune from excommunication. But if they return to the Catholic faith, in the external forum they are absolved from excommunication because they are subject to a censure notorious by law; but in the internal forum those do not need absolution who are established to have been in good faith.

3. Those believing apostates or heretics are understood to be those who implicitly assent to their errors by some external sign, even if they neither join themselves to their sect nor have their doctrine viewed in particular; as if someone says of another, whom he knows to be a heretic, that he believes whatever that person believes, although he does not know his errors; or if someone, with the intention of assenting to his errors, hears the reading or sermon of some heretic.⁴

Not all interpret this clause so that even those are subject to censure who profess heresy only implicitly; but some understand by this term Catholics who commit the crime of heresy, yet do not adhere to a non-Catholic sect. Practically it makes no difference which sense is admitted, because each group incurs excommunication either under the name of heretics or under the name of believers.

¹ Cf. De praeceptis^3 n. 28.

² D'Annibale, Commentar. in const. Ap. sedis n. 31.

³ Theol. mor., tr. 4, q. 2, n. 12.

⁴ Cf. Acta sanctae sedis XI, p. 168 ff.

51. Those cooperating with them. In order that those who cooperate with heretics or apostates incur excommunication, there is required participation or formal cooperation which tends to this, that it assist heretics in their crime; material cooperation, which only gives help to the heretical person, does not suffice.

1. Receivers of heretics are called those who receive them into their house so that they may escape the penalty of heresy. Therefore they do not incur excommunication who receive them not for the sake of heresy, but as friends, blood-relatives, or suchlike.

2. Favorers of heretics are called those who furnish them help, whether negatively or positively, so that they may more easily spread their errors.

a. They favor heretics negatively who omit those things which must be done not from mere charity but from office for impeding their progress; they favor them positively who help them in spreading errors by words (praising, commending them as heretics) or by deeds (furnishing money). Here also belong Catholics who permit offspring to be educated in a non-Catholic religion.

b. The Holy Office has several times declared that those incur excommunication who enter marriage before a non-Catholic minister.¹ They dispute what the cause of this censure is; some say that they are excommunicated as favorers of heretics, but others more rightly say that in the external forum they are excommunicated as those believing heretics: for those who receive sacraments among heretics according to their rite are judged implicitly to believe heretics.

Note 1. From the declaration of the same holy see it is further established that those who contract marriage before a non-Catholic minister incur excommunication, even if they were ignorant of the censure. Therefore those who know the censure incur it for each forum, but those who are ignorant of it incur the censure for the external forum alone. For celebration of marriage is by its nature a public act, which pertains to the external forum, and therefore its forbidden celebration is punished directly by censure for the external forum. Therefore in order that one who contracted before a non-Catholic minister can be admitted to the sacraments, he must be absolved from the censure at least for the external forum.

Note 2. Reconciliation, supposing the validity of the marriage, is done in this way:

a. The one to be reconciled is admonished: a. concerning the gravity of the sins which he committed by contracting before a heretical minister, and concerning the obligation of being sorry for them and accusing himself of them in confession; b. concerning the obligation of educating children Catholicly, or, if it is a woman, of seeing to it that the husband permit the Catholic education of the children; but if he should not permit it, of seeing to it that the children, as much as depends upon her, be educated Catholicly.

b. A suppliant petition is sent to the bishop, in which, with the name of the one to be reconciled expressed, the fact about which it concerns is set forth with all its circumstances (especially that the one to be reconciled wishes to satisfy his obligations), and the faculty of absolving from excommunication for the external forum is sought. Once this has been obtained, the one to be reconciled is absolved from excommunication according to the Roman Ritual (tit. 3, c. 3). Once absolution has been granted, the acts are drawn up according to the disposition of the ordinary; once reconciliation has been made, the penitent can be absolved by any confessor from the sin of heresy.

c. If the delict is not known in the place where the one to be reconciled is staying, it is not required that the cause be conducted in the external forum. Therefore it suffices that the confessor seek the faculty of absolving the one to be reconciled from heresy in the act of sacramental confession, which absolution avails also for the external forum.

3. Defenders of heretics are those who defend their persons or doctrines insofar as they are heretical.

Therefore they do not incur excommunication who praise the learning and eloquence of a heretic, or the style and elegance of a heretical book, unless the praise redounds to approval of the heretical doctrine.

Second excommunication. All and singular persons knowingly reading, without the authority of the apostolic see, books of the same apostates and heretics defending heresy, and also books of any author by apostolic letters prohibited by name; and those retaining, printing, and in any way defending books of the same.

¹ Holy Office, August 28, 1888; May 11, 1892.

52. This censure passed verbally into the constitution Officiorum ac munerum (n. 47), and from it draws its force. From this we learn: a. books today prohibited under excommunication; b. actions prohibited under excommunication.

Books prohibited under censure are of a twofold kind:

1. Books of heretics and apostates defending heresy. Therefore a threefold condition by reason of the object is required for incurring the censure: a. that it be a book, not only a manuscript or a booklet of smaller volume; b. that it be written by a heretical or apostate author; c. that it defend heresy.

a. Therefore they do not incur excommunication: a. who read newspapers or booklets defending heresy; b. who read a book defending heresy written by a Catholic, heathen, Jew, or by another who properly is neither a heretic nor an apostate; c. who read a book containing heresy or defending it only incidentally and in a few words.

b. From the declaration of the Holy Office, those incur excommunication "who knowingly read periodical publications bound into fascicles, having a heretical author and defending heresy."¹

c. For incurring this censure it is required that it be certain to the reader (not only probable: for it says knowingly reading) that the author of the book is a heretic and that he defends heresy. That the author is a heretic can be established either from the name of the author, if he is a known heretic, or from the character of the book: for if manifest heresy is pertinaciously defended in the book, it is sufficiently established that the author is a heretic or apostate; therefore either from the sect to which he adheres, or from the manifest doctrine which he defends.

d. It is not required that the book treat expressly of religion; therefore one who reads a profane book, e.g. historical, physical, philosophical, in which a heretical author defends heresy, incurs excommunication.

2. Books of any author prohibited by name through apostolic letters. Three conditions also are required in this kind on the part of the book: a. that it be prohibited through apostolic letters, of whatever form they are: bull, brief, encyclical; b. that it be prohibited by name, i.e. by its proper title expressly given; c. that it be prohibited under excommunication reserved to the Roman pontiff, which is gathered from the mind of the constitution itself, namely of moderating censures. But it makes no difference whose author it is and what it contains.

Therefore here do not belong: a. books prohibited through decrees of the Index or of another congregation, because decrees of this kind are not issued by apostolic authority; b. books of some author condemned in a body, because they are not prohibited by name; c. books indeed condemned through apostolic letters, but not under reserved excommunication.

Note. Since it is impossible for the confessor to know all works defending heresy, when a case occurs let him ask the penitent about the argument of the depraved book which he read, and from this judge whether the book defends heresy and therefore is prohibited under excommunication or not.

¹ Holy Office, April 21, 1880.

53. The prohibited actions are these four: to read, to retain, to print, to defend; all these indeed must be exercised knowingly in order that censure be incurred through them: for since this term is placed in the head of the article, it must be understood of all. Wherefore even affected ignorance excuses from incurring censure.

What is prohibited by the terms to read and to retain is said elsewhere;¹ it remains that the terms those printing and those defending be explained.

a. Those printing, taken more broadly, are understood to be all who concur proximately in printing the book: a. the printer, publisher, and author; b. those who furnish work for the printing itself, such as those setting the types and turning the press. In this place more strictly only the printer and publisher seem to be understood.²

b. Those defending are called those who physically or morally impede that the book be destroyed or denounced; those who try to persuade others that the book is good; those who so praise the doctrine contained in it, or its learning and knowledge, that approval of the depraved doctrine appears.

a. For incurring the censure there is required a threefold knowledge: a. that the book is of a heretic or apostate, or that it is prohibited through apostolic letters; b. that its reading, retention, printing, or defense is prohibited under excommunication; c. if it has not been prohibited through apostolic letters, that it defends heresy. But it suffices that these things be known either by public report or from a man worthy of faith.

b. Since grave sin is required for incurring censure, they do not incur it except those who cooperate formally, or indeed materially but without a just cause, and notably.

c. If literary societies (Leihbibliotheken) keep books prohibited under censure, besides the president and librarian all who have joint ownership of the books incur excommunication. But this censure does not seem to affect public libraries.

Third excommunication. Schismatics and those who pertinaciously withdraw or recede from obedience to the Roman pontiff existing for the time.

¹ Cf. De praeceptis^3 n. 702.

² Cf. Vermeersch n. 125. Hollweck p. 48.

54. They incur this censure: a. schismatics, who, whether from malice or from error, deny subjection to the Roman pontiff and, separating themselves from the unity of the Church, establish a new church or adhere to one already established.

b. Those who deny obedience to the Roman pontiff in spiritual matters, rejecting his spiritual authority, although they adhere to no other head or church.

Note. From the declaration of the holy see, this excommunication is also incurred by "whoever according to decrees of civil laws, or with the people voting and the civil power confirming, having been elected to the office of parish priest or vicar, dare to undertake the duties of ecclesiastical ministry," because by this very fact they deny obedience to the Roman pontiff.¹

Fourth excommunication. All and singular persons, of whatever state, grade, or condition they may be, appealing from ordinances or mandates of the Roman pontiffs existing for the time to a future universal council, and also those by whose help, counsel, and favor the appeal has been made.

¹ S. C. C., May 23, 1874.

55. a. This censure is a particular case of the preceding one: for those appealing by the fact withdraw themselves from subjection to the Roman pontiff. But lest they think that under the pretext of appeal they can escape excommunication, this special censure has been added.

b. Any physical persons: for concerning communities appealing there is an interdict; appealing from ordinances of the reigning pontiff to a future universal council. Therefore appeal to a future pontiff or to a present council does not suffice, nor to a provincial council.

Fifth excommunication. All killing, mutilating, striking, capturing, imprisoning, detaining, or hostilely pursuing cardinals of the holy Roman Church, patriarchs, archbishops, bishops, and legates or nuncios of the apostolic see, or expelling them from their dioceses, territories, lands, or dominions, and also those mandating these things or ratifying them or furnishing help, counsel, or favor in them.

56. By this censure are punished real injuries inflicted upon the princes of the Church (Kirchenfursten), of whom the first is the supreme pontiff himself, bishop of the Roman Church, although he is not explicitly named. Therefore they incur it:

a. Those who unjustly injure their life: those killing, mutilating, striking; their liberty: those capturing, imprisoning, detaining; their dignity: those hostilely (with the intention of harming body or dignity) pursuing, expelling them from places subject to their jurisdiction.

b. Those who cooperate in these injuries by mandate, ratification, help, etc., provided the cooperation was efficacious and gravely influenced.

Sixth excommunication. Those directly or indirectly impeding the exercise of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, whether of the internal or external forum, and for this recurring to the secular forum and procuring or issuing its mandates, or furnishing help, counsel, or favor.

57. a. This censure has been established for protecting the liberty of ecclesiastical jurisdiction; they contract it who impede the exercise of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, but not those impeding the exercise of jurisdiction of regular superiors. Therefore they do not incur excommunication who impede the exercise of the power of order, such as to offer sacrifice, administer sacraments, bless, etc., nor those impeding the exercise of an ecclesiastical office, such as to preach, to teach; but they incur it who impede him who commits those things which are of order to be performed, or him who deputes someone to ecclesiastical offices.

b. Therefore they contract this censure: a. those who by some fact impede the exercise of jurisdiction directly or indirectly (e.g. the publication, execution of a pontifical constitution); b. those who for this end recur to the secular forum, to civil judges and magistrates; c. those who for this end procure or issue mandates of the secular forum; d. those who cooperate with these by help, counsel, favor.

Seventh excommunication. Those compelling lay judges either directly or indirectly to draw ecclesiastical persons to their tribunal beyond canonical dispositions; likewise those issuing laws or decrees against the liberty or rights of the Church.

58. Persons of a twofold kind are struck by this excommunication: a. those compelling lay judges to draw ecclesiastical persons to their tribunal against the privilege of the forum; b. those issuing laws or decrees against the liberty and rights of the Church.

Those compelling lay judges either directly or indirectly to draw ecclesiastical persons to their tribunal beyond canonical dispositions.¹

1. Those compelling are understood to be those who compel judges, although they themselves are compelled neither by any man nor by law; therefore legislators carrying a law by which judges are compelled to draw ecclesiastical persons to their tribunal, magistrates who, compelled by no law, of their own accord compel judges to draw ecclesiastics to their tribunal, whether it concerns a criminal cause or a civil cause.

2. They compel directly who compel the judges themselves by threats, force, or fear unjustly struck into them; indirectly, those who employ force or threats against other persons joined with the judges, so that they compel the judges to draw clerics as guilty persons to their tribunal.

3. Ecclesiastical persons are understood to be all who enjoy the privilege of the forum; therefore all clerics, even those marked by first tonsure alone, all religious, even nuns living under a rule, whether in some order or in a simple congregation.

4. Beyond canonical dispositions, i.e. unless somewhere it is permitted by the holy see (through concordats) that ecclesiastics be drawn to a lay tribunal.

a. "Nevertheless in those places in which there has not been derogation from the privilege of the forum by the supreme pontiffs, if in them it is not granted to pursue one's rights except before lay judges, individuals are bound first to seek permission from their own ordinary, that they may be able to sue clerics in the form of lay persons. But it is not licit to sue bishops in that forum without permission of the apostolic see."²

b. Therefore they do not incur excommunication: a. the judges themselves who draw ecclesiastics to their tribunal, but those who compel the judges to this; b. plaintiffs who accuse a cleric before a lay judge; c. those compelling a cleric to be drawn not as a guilty person, but as a tutor, witness, or under another title.

¹ Concerning this decree an instruction of the Holy Office was issued on June 15, 1870, and February 1, 1871, and a declaration of the same Holy Office on January 23, 1886, all of which must be attended to in the interpretation of this decree. Cf. Acta sanctae sedis VI, n. 433; XVIII, p. 416; XXV, p. 456.

² Holy Office, l. c.

59. Those issuing laws or decrees against the liberty or rights of the Church.

1. Those issuing are the authors of laws and decrees who possess authority of establishing laws and decrees, and who must concur in establishing them.

Therefore the prince who approves and promulgates laws, ministers, rulers of provinces and cities, deputies both to the assemblies of the empire and to the assemblies of the province, and local councilors who concur by their vote; the people, wherever laws are established by vote of the people.

2. Laws are universal and perpetual ordinances which emanate from supreme power; decrees likewise are general ordinances which emanate from competent power, e.g. from municipalities. But here do not belong mandates which are carried for particular persons or cases, nor sentences passed by judges.

3. Against the liberty or rights of the Church: these words are to be taken in the widest sense, so that they are subject to excommunication who establish laws or decrees by which any right whatever of the Church is taken away, restricted, or disturbed, such as the right of teaching, promoting to benefices, instituting public supplications outside the church building, erecting churches, benefices, pious sodalities; rights which belong to the Church as a society, such as the right of acquiring, alienating, leasing, and the immunity of the clergy from military service.

Eighth excommunication. Those recurring to the lay power for impeding letters or any acts whatever proceeding from the apostolic see or from any of its legates or delegates, and directly or indirectly prohibiting their promulgation or execution, or on account of them injuring or terrifying either the parties themselves or others.

60. a. Acts of the apostolic see are understood to be both those which immediately proceed from it itself and those which mediately come from the Roman congregations.¹

b. They incur excommunication: a. those recurring to the lay power, i.e. to those who exercise jurisdiction over citizens, such as judges and magistrates; b. those prohibiting promulgation or execution, meaning persons furnished with authority; c. those injuring, i.e. affecting with grave harm, according to some in body, according to others also in honor and goods of fortune; d. those terrifying, i.e. affecting with very grave fear the parties themselves to whom the acts of the holy see are directed, or others to whom namely the promulgation or execution of the acts has been committed.

Ninth excommunication. All falsifiers of apostolic letters, even in the form of a brief, and of supplications concerning grace or justice signed by the Roman pontiff, the vice-chancellors of the holy Roman Church, or those acting in their place, or by mandate of the same Roman pontiff; and also those falsely publishing apostolic letters, even in the form of a brief, and also those falsely signing supplications of this kind under the name of the Roman pontiff or of the vice-chancellor or of one acting in place of the aforesaid.

¹ Holy Office, January 13, 1892.

61. a. The crime of forgery committed through writings, which in past centuries with reference to pontifical letters (bulls, encyclicals, briefs) was very frequently in use, is punished by this censure.

b. They contract it: a. falsifiers, who in apostolic letters, after they have been signed, add, remove, or change something, so that the sense is changed; b. those falsely publishing either true but corrupted letters, or letters fabricated entirely; c. those falsely signing supplications, who therefore subscribe rescripts of grace or justice both with the concession (Fiat, Concessum, Placet) and with the name, as if these were from the supreme pontiff himself or from one acting in his place.

Tenth excommunication. Those absolving an accomplice in a shameful sin, even in the article of death, if another priest, although not approved for confessions, without grave infamy or scandal about to arise, can hear the confession of the dying person.¹

a. The removal of jurisdiction over one's own accomplice and the penalty of excommunication carried against one absolving his own accomplice must carefully be distinguished; for it can happen that the absolution is invalid without excommunication being incurred, and that excommunication is incurred where the absolution is valid.²

b. This censure is called reserved in a most special manner, because in the faculty of absolving from all cases and censures reserved in a special mode to the Roman pontiff, the faculty of absolving from this censure is not contained.³

c. To explain this censure, three things must be set forth: a. the notion of an accomplice; b. the notion of a shameful sin from which an accomplice priest cannot absolve with impunity; c. the action of absolving because of which excommunication is incurred.

¹ Benedict XIV, const. Sacramentum poenitentiae.

² Cf. De sacramentis^3 n. 384 ff.

³ Holy Office, June 27, 1866; therefore even to bishops the faculty of absolving "an accomplice priest" is usually conceded for only a few cases.

62. Accomplice in a shameful sin. 1. An accomplice is called one who commits the same (shameful) sin with another, whoever that person may be.

a. Hence complicity is not properly had if a priest sins with one sleeping, drunk, insane, unwilling: for the law speaks of formal complicity, for which the consent of each party into the same sin is required.

b. For incurring the case of complicity there is required complicity immediately in the shameful action itself; cooperation, however proximate, to the shameful sin of another does not suffice.

c. Therefore under the name accomplice is understood not only a woman, but also a man or boy, even if not yet pubescent, indeed also a person with whom the priest sinned before receiving priesthood;¹ for the bull says: whatever person may be the accomplice.

2. Shameful sin is understood to be any sin against the sixth precept, although it is not consummated by intercourse, provided that on the part of each it is certain, grave, and external.

a. Therefore even a shameful touch alone, or look, or dishonorable conversation constitutes a sin of complicity, provided that on the part of each it is mortal sin.²

b. It is not required that each act, as in mutual touches and conversations, but it suffices that one alone act, e.g. that one shamefully touch another and the latter consent and manifest consent externally. But he who does not resist externally is already judged to manifest consent externally.

c. Therefore a sin of complicity is not had in the following cases:

a. If only venial sins were committed, whether from smallness of matter or from imperfection of the act. But let the confessor never absolve his own accomplice even from venial sins committed in shameful matter, although he does not lack jurisdiction for this.

b. If the sins committed with respect to the external act are only venial, e.g. handling of the hand, even if in internal affection they are grave.

c. If the sins are merely internal, not manifested externally.

d. If the sins are doubtful, whether by doubt of fact or doubt of law, as if he doubts whether he sinned gravely, or whether shameful speech is comprehended by the pontifical constitution.

e. If it is not established whether the penitent himself also sinned gravely.

¹ Sacred Penitentiary, January 22, 1879.

² Holy Office, May 28, 1873.

63. Those absolving an accomplice incur excommunication:

1. If they absolve or at least simulate or feign absolving.

a. After so many declarations of the holy see it is certain that even those incur excommunication who only feign that they absolve.¹ Wherefore the contrary opinion of St. Alphonsus (n. 556) can no longer be safely taught. Since for simulation, or rather dissimulation, it is required that the penitent who judges himself to be absolved be led into error, a priest does not incur excommunication who dismisses with only a blessing a penitent who has been admonished about this matter.

b. Therefore one who only hears an accomplice in confession, but does not absolve nor feign absolving, indeed commits grave sin, because even the very hearing of confession is prohibited to an accomplice priest, but he does not incur the censure.

2. If they directly absolve, and further if the confessors themselves, either directly or indirectly, induced the penitent not to declare the sin of complicity and thus indirectly absolved.²

a. Therefore one who absolves an accomplice who does not declare the sin of complicity, even if the penitent culpably conceals it and the confessor knows this, does not incur the censure,³ provided he did not induce the accomplice to do this.

b. A confessor directly induces the penitent when he positively and explicitly warns him not to disclose the sin of complicity; he indirectly induces him when he tries to persuade the penitent that the action committed with him is not a sin or is not a grave sin, so that the penitent persuades himself that the sin is not to be declared and in fact does not declare it.⁴

c. Therefore he probably does not incur excommunication who, when the precept of confession is pressing, absolves only indirectly from the sin of complicity an accomplice unwilling to confess to another without danger of grave infamy or scandal, and at the same time admonishes him concerning the obligation of afterward confessing it to another confessor.⁵

3. If by absolving they sin gravely.

a. Since grave sin must be certain, a priest who in some perplexity of mind, likewise a priest who without advertence to the complicity absolves an accomplice, cannot be declared entangled by censure.

b. Although ignorance of censure simply vincible excuses from incurring censure, nevertheless crass ignorance does not excuse from censure. The older authors indeed excuse from censure even him who absolves an accomplice with crass ignorance, because the Benedictine constitution carries the censure against him who shall have dared to absolve; nevertheless, since the Pian constitution Apostolicae sedis strikes simply with excommunication him who absolves, the more recent authors rightly do not excuse one absolving with crass ignorance.⁶

c. One who absolves a penitent concerning whom he doubts whether he is his own accomplice does not incur censure, because he is not bound to inquire into the matter with danger to his own reputation and that of the whole priestly state.

d. Likewise one does not incur censure who absolves an accomplice by whom neither in the act of sin nor afterward he had been known as a priest, because he is not bound to manifest his own delict with defamation of himself and of the priestly state. Nevertheless, if after the sin has been perpetrated he is known as an accomplice and a priest, he contracts censure by absolving the accomplice.

e. Likewise one incurs censure by absolving an accomplice who here and now, when he absolves, does not know the priest absolving as an accomplice.

4. If they absolve outside the article of death and outside a case of most urgent necessity. Concerning the article of death it will be said below; with respect to the most urgent case, the opinion of those who teach that a priest does not incur censure who, having used epikeia in a truly most urgent case, absolves an accomplice, does not seem improbable: for it can reasonably be presumed that the legislator did not wish to comprehend even these cases in his law.

Cases of this kind are:

a. If the accomplice person cannot omit annual confession and communion, or cannot abstain long from the sacraments, without danger of grave infamy and scandal, and at the same time no other priest is present to whom he can confess.

b. If the accomplice person is in a place where the accomplice confessor is alone, but the person cannot turn aside elsewhere to seek a confessor, nor is there hope that another priest will come there, so that even in Easter time he would have to abstain from the sacraments.

5. One absolving an accomplice in the article (danger) of death incurs excommunication if another priest, although not approved, can hear the confession without some grave infamy and scandal about to arise.

Although an accomplice confessor of himself cannot absolve his own accomplice with impunity even in the article of death, nevertheless he licitly absolves him:

a. If no other priest is present or can be called, not even a simple priest.⁷

b. If another priest cannot be called without grave scandal or infamy of the accomplice priest. Nevertheless in this case the accomplice priest is bound to forestall the danger of scandal or infamy if he can, e.g. by withdrawing under some pretext. But if he omits to do this when he can, or if he invents danger where there is none, he incurs the censure by absolving.

c. If the dying person refuses to confess to another, so that sacrilegious confession is to be feared.

d. If another is unwilling to hear the confession of the dying person.

Eleventh excommunication. Those usurping or sequestrating jurisdiction, goods, revenues pertaining to ecclesiastical persons by reason of their churches or benefices.

¹ Sacred Penitentiary, March 1, 1878. Holy Office, December 10, 1883.

² Sacred Penitentiary, February 19, 1896.

³ Sacred Penitentiary, May 16, 1877.

⁴ Sacred Penitentiary, February 19, 1896.

⁵ Marc n. 1782 thinks the absolution in this case is more probably invalid; cf. however De sacramentis^3 n. 386.

⁶ Holy Office, January 13, 1892.

⁷ There are some who say that even a suspended or excommunicated priest is to be preferred to an accomplice priest, because in the bull it is said: "when then any other priest, who can perform the office of confessor, is lacking." Others, however, more rightly gather from the same bull that only one not approved must be preferred to the accomplice in absolving the dying person, since it says: when any priest, who can perform the office of confessor, is lacking.

64. There are four excommunications carried against those who dispose of ecclesiastical goods unjustly or illicitly: a. against those usurping or sequestrating goods of ecclesiastical persons (I. 11); b. against those invading, etc., the temporal dominion of the Roman Church (I. 12); c. against those usurping goods of any benefice or pious place (II. 19); d. against those alienating ecclesiastical goods without license of the apostolic see (IV. 3).

a. Jurisdiction is understood to be both spiritual and temporal; goods are both movable and immovable, such as beneficial lands; revenues are natural and civil fruits which come from ecclesiastical goods. These constitute the matter of this excommunication insofar as they pertain to ecclesiastical persons, and indeed either by reason of the church over which they preside, or by reason of the benefice which they possess. Therefore here do not belong: a. goods of pious places, because they do not pertain to ecclesiastical persons; b. goods of monasteries, because they do not pertain to regulars by reason of a church; c. goods which by another title, e.g. of stipend, pension, pertain to ecclesiastical persons.

b. Usurpers are called those who occupy by authority, as if by right owed to themselves, a thing still existing in the power of its owner. Therefore they do not incur this censure: a. thieves and robbers;¹ b. those who buy a thing from a usurper or receive it by another title.² Sequestrators are both judges and magistrates who command sequestration, and their ministers who execute the mandate.

Twelfth excommunication. Those invading, destroying, detaining, either by themselves or through others, cities, lands, places, or rights pertaining to the Roman Church, or usurping, disturbing, retaining supreme jurisdiction in them, and also those furnishing help, counsel, favor for each of the aforesaid things.

¹ Holy Office, March 9, 1870.

² Holy Office, July 8, 1874.

65. a. This censure intends to protect the temporal dominion of the apostolic see; wherefore temporal jurisdiction, and indeed supreme temporal jurisdiction, is to be understood.

b. They incur the censure: a. those who occupy or retain some temporal right of the holy see or some place of the temporal dominion; b. those who exercise supreme jurisdiction in occupied lands, of which kind are the kings of Italy, ministers of the kingdom, prefects of provinces, etc.; c. cooperators, who spontaneously, not by compulsion, concur in the aforesaid things.