Case 23. Error Does Not Confer Jurisdiction

Caius, a priest, is sent to a certain mission to supply temporarily for a sick quasi-parish priest. While he is hearing confessions, Martha comes and accuses herself of a shameful sin committed several times with a priest. Suspecting a habit of sinning, Caius asks whether she committed the same sin before her last confession, and finds that Martha has a habit of sinning with the priest and afterwards confessing to the same one; for she does not know that anything stands in the way, which Caius thinks is very probably true of all the faithful belonging to that mission, inasmuch as they are uneducated. Hence Caius doubts what he must do. Hence it is asked:

1. What is established by Benedict XIV in the Constitution The Sacrament of Penance?

2. Can common error supply jurisdiction to a confessor, and when?

3. What is to be done by Caius?

The first question is answered above, p. 200.

2. Can common error supply jurisdiction to a confessor, and when?

The Church certainly supplies jurisdiction if a colorable title is present together with common error. Probably she also supplies with common error alone, even if no colorable title is joined to it. That probable opinion, however, cannot be applied to the case in which an accomplice in a shameful sin thinks that he can be absolved by the priest who is his accomplice. For such an error is private, and the people are ignorant of the ecclesiastical law which deprives an accomplice of jurisdiction rather than err concerning it. Then, whatever may be true of the general principle, it is certain that the Church does not wish to supply jurisdiction to an accomplice-priest so that he may absolve his accomplice, for the Constitution of Benedict, The Sacrament of Penance, expressly says: “Jurisdiction having been removed for absolving any person from fault of this kind.”

3. To the case. Martha’s confessions, since they were made in good faith, were valid, and the absolution of the other sins was direct, since the accomplice-priest is deprived of jurisdiction only “for absolving fault of this kind.” The absolution of the sins of complicity was indirect, and therefore Martha is bound to submit them again to the keys so that they may be absolved directly. Caius must therefore ascertain how often, or from what time, she confessed the sins of complicity to her accomplice, and admonish her to avoid him in the future both within and outside confession.