Article I. On the Consecration of the Eucharist

216. Principle. Every priest, and only a priest, can validly consecrate the Eucharist.

The Albigensians and the Innovators of the sixteenth century taught the contrary. The Fourth Lateran Council (1215) had already defined: "Certainly no one can confect this sacrament except a priest who has been rightly ordained."²⁰¹ The reason is that Christ said only to priests: "Do this in commemoration of Me." The power of consecrating so inheres in the priestly character that it can never be taken away from him. Therefore even a heretical, schismatic, and apostate priest validly consecrates, provided that he employs the right matter, form, and intention. For licitly consecrating the Eucharist, very many conditions are required, which will be explained below in the treatise on the sacrifice of the Mass. If several priests consecrate the same matter at the same time (as happens in the ordination of new priests and in more solemn Masses according to the Greek rite), all must take care to pronounce the form of consecration at the same time; for if one pronounced the form before the others, then he alone consecrated and the form of the others is rendered ineffective. For the rest, one should not proceed here with excessive anxiety, since it suffices that all the concelebrants have the intention of consecrating together.

²⁰¹ Denz., n. 430.