§ 6. Defect of Reputation.

From defect of reputation those contract irregularity who are infamous in any manner whatsoever, whether by law or by fact.

The ministers of the Church ought to be irreprehensible and without crime. Therefore in antiquity any delict whatever kept a guilty man from the sacred ministry and constituted him irregular. But today only graver delicts, and indeed those which are expressed in law, make one irregular; nor properly the delicts themselves, but the infamy which is contracted on account of the delicts.

154. Declarations. 1. Infamy is the privation or diminution of good reputation or good estimation.

2. One infamy is of law (legal), which is inflicted by the authority of law on account of a delict; the other is of fact (popular), which is contracted from public knowledge of a crime committed.

a. Infamy of law is contracted either by the fact itself, namely by the very commission of the crime before every sentence of the judge;¹ or by sentence of the judge which decrees infamy. The former infamy is called by some immediate, or of latae sententiae; the latter mediate, or of ferendae sententiae.

b. Infamy of fact is contracted by its nature from public notice of a crime committed. This notice can become public in a twofold mode: either by sentence of a judge condemning the guilty man concerning the crime, or by actual divulgation.

No infamy is contracted from an office which someone discharges or has discharged, although in the estimation of men that office is low and abject, such as the office of butcher, executioner, actor, etc. He who discharges an office of this kind is kept from orders by natural law, unless he has renounced it.

3. Infamy of law induces irregularity, even if the delict is hidden;² but infamy of fact by its nature requires that the delict be publicly known, either by sentence of a judge or by actual divulgation.

Infamy of fact actually existing induces irregularity, even if the sentence of the judge is unjust or the judgment of men concerning the crime committed is false; for an unjust sentence and a false estimation generate infamy equally with a just and true one.

4. Irregularity arising from infamy of law, whether it is of latae sententiae or ferendae sententiae, is an irregularity properly so called, perpetual of itself, which cannot be removed except by dispensation. But irregularity arising from infamy of fact is not an irregularity properly so called: for it does not need dispensation, but is removed by amendment of life, which has been proved and has become notorious by perseverance for three years. For when infamy is removed by amendment of life, the irregularity also, which arises from it, is removed.

¹ By law indeed a declaratory sentence of the crime committed, or rather of the infamy contracted, is required; but since declaratory sentences of this kind today are rarely issued, authors commonly teach that immediate infamy of law is contracted without sentence of a judge.

² Gasparri I. n. 288, following Suarez.

155. Irregularity from infamy of law. 1. In antiquity, by canon law, those were held infamous whom Roman civil law marked with infamy (immediate) on account of delict. But, Roman law having been abrogated, the ancient canon: All are said to be infamous whom the laws of the age call infamous¹ does not seem to have to be extended to recent civil laws, so that today according to the mind of the Church those are not marked with infamy of law except those who are declared infamous by canon law.²

2. By the law itself chiefly the following are declared infamous:

a. Duelists and their seconds.³

b. Ravishers of women and their cooperators.⁴

c. He who has two wives at the same time, as one who attempts civil marriage while his legitimate wife is living.⁵

d. Heretics, apostates, and those favoring heretics. More will soon be said concerning irregularity from heresy.⁶

¹ C. Omnes 2. c. 6. q. 1.

² Moreover, modern civil codes establish the penalty of infamy rarely, if ever.

³ Council of Trent, sess. 25. c. 19. De reform. From the declaration of S. C. C., Aug. 9, 1890, academic duels also are to be numbered among the duels to which infamy of law is annexed.

⁴ Council of Trent, sess. 24. c. 6. De reform.

⁵ C. Nuper 4 De bigamis non ordinandis (I. 21).

⁶ Cf. Aichner p. 216 s.

156. Irregularity from infamy of fact. 1. Infamy of fact is contracted by any enormous delict which is publicly known, whether by sentence of a judge condemning the delinquent or by actual divulgation.

2. Delicts of this kind are: homicide, perjury in court, adultery, sodomy, simony, robbery, preparation of arms against parents, public exercise of usury, etc.¹

Therefore one who is accused on account of a crime of this kind and is condemned by an ecclesiastical judge contracts infamy, even if no mention of infamy is made in the condemnatory sentence. But if a cleric is condemned by a civil judge on account of a crime of this kind, by this condemnatory sentence itself he is not yet of himself infamous; but the ordinary, after the cause has been examined in the ecclesiastical forum, must either absolve or condemn the cleric, and when this has been done the condemned man will be infamous.² Ordinarily, however, already by the sentence of a civil judge, at least on account of the actual divulgation of the crime, he is held infamous.

¹ Cf. St. Alphonsus n. 363.

² Cf. instruction of S. C. Ep. et Reg., Jan. 11, 1880.

157. Concerning irregularity from heresy. 1. Heretics who publicly adhere to a condemned sect are irregular from infamy of law.¹

a. All affirm that heretics are irregular; but they dispute whether they are irregular from the crime itself of heresy, or from the infamy of law which is annexed to heresy. But because in law there is no canon which declares heretics irregular on account of heresy itself, it seems it must be said that they become irregular on account of infamy, which is annexed by law to the crime of heresy.

b. Heretics who have not defected to a condemned sect, even public ones, are not irregular: for there is no text of law from which this irregularity can be proved. Therefore Catholics who have denied one or more articles of faith, even publicly, are not judged to be irregular, neither they themselves nor their sons.

2. Also the sons and grandsons of heretics are irregular if they descend from a heretical father; the sons alone, but not also the grandsons, if they descend from a heretical mother;² and this indeed if the sons were born after the parents had lapsed into heresy, and if the parents die in heresy.

It was the common opinion of authors that this irregularity is not contracted in Germany and England and places of this kind, where heresy spreads unpunished and heretics themselves are not marked with infamy. But the following response of the Holy Office given to the bishops of Germany is opposed to this opinion: "heretics converted to the Catholic faith, and the sons of heretics who persist in heresy or have died in it, to the first and second degree through the paternal line ... are irregular even in Germany and in the other places concerning which inquiry is made, and therefore need dispensation in order to be promoted to tonsure and to orders."³

¹ C. Excommunicamus 13 De haereticis (V. 7).

² C. Quicunque 2 and C. Statutum 15 De haereticis in 6° (V. 2).

³ S. Officium, Dec. 4, 1890.