Section IV. The Duty of Refusing the Sacraments to the Unworthy

“ Let a man so account of us,” says St Paul, ‘‘ as of the ministers of Christ, and the dispensers of the mysteries of God. Here now it is required among the dispensers, that a man be found faithful.”¹ As, then, the administration of the sacra ments is entrusted to the ministers of the Church, they must be faithful to their charge and administer them according to the intention of Christ and the rules of the Church. These rules are chiefly contained in the Ritual and in other liturgical books. The prescribed rites are of grave obligation in serious matters, for the Council of Trent anathematized those who should assert, “That the received and approved rites of the Catholic Church, wont to be used in the solemn administration of the sacraments, may be contemned, or without sin be omitted at pleasure by the ministers, or be changed by every pastor of the churches into other new ones.”² Ministers are specially required to refuse the sacraments to such as are unworthy: ‘‘ Give not that which is holy to dogs,” said our blessed Lord.³ The minister should have positive reasons for judging that those who ask for the sacraments of Penance and Orders are worthy to receive them. For the dispositions of the subject enter into the substance and validity of Penance, and the duty of seeing that everything is present which is required for the validity of the sacraments belongs to the minister of them. Public officials of the Church are constituted by Orders, and the public good requires that only those who are worthy should be chosen. All lawful subjects who ask for the other sacraments are presumed to be worthy unless it is certain that they are unworthy.

With special reference to the holy Eucharist the Ritual lays down that, “‘ All the faithful are to be admitted to Holy Communion except those who are forbidden for just cause. Those who are notoriously unworthy are to be refused, such as the excommunicated, interdicted, and openly infamous, as are strumpets, those living in concubinage, usurers, wizards, sorcerers, blasphemers, and other public sinners of that kind, unless it is certain that they have repented and amended, and have made satisfaction for the public scandal which they have given ” (Can. 855). However, in the judgement of theologians, it will be sufficient if such public sinners openly go to confession; in this way, according to modern discipline, they will show their amendment and make satisfaction for the scandal which they have caused, unless more is required in special cases by the bishop or by other competent authority.

The Ritual proceeds: “ Let the minister also repel secret sinners when they ask in secret unless he knows that they have amended; but not when they ask publicly, and cannot passed by without scandal.” be In the latter case public injury oe 4 t would be done to the secret sinner, scandal would be given to others, and other inconveniences would follow, if the sacraments were refused; and these reasons justify the minister in co-operating materially with the sin of unworthily receiving the sacraments. Of course, if the minister only knows of the bad dispositions of the subject from sacramental confession, he can make no use of his knowledge out of confession.

¹ 1 Cor. iv 1, 2.

² Sess. vii, c. 13.

³ Matt. vii 6.

It is specially laid down in the new Code of Canon Law and in the synods¹ that the priest should strive to induce all who are going to marry to approach beforehand the sacraments of Penance and the holy Eucharist. If he does not succeed in this, he may nevertheless assist at the marriage even though he knows that one or both parties are not properly disposed to receive the sacrament, for he is not the minister of Matrimony, but only the witness authorized by the Church to assist at it and to bless the parties; to refuse to assist would commonly do more harm than good. Even if one of the contracting parties knows that the other is not in a fit state to receive a sacrament of the living like Matrimony, still he will as a rule be excused from sin in ministering the sacrament to him, because he is not a consecrated minister of the sacrament, and the advantages connected with marriage are a sufficient justification for co-operating materially with the sin committed by the other party by receiving the sacrament in a state of sin.

¹ 1 West., d. 22; can. 1033.

If one who is unworthy were to demand the administration of a sacrament out of contempt for the Faith or to show his hatred for religion, the minister would be bound to refuse it even at the risk of his life. He must protect the sacraments which have been committed to his care from so great an indignity—which indeed would redound on God himself—even at the risk of life. Whether a minister at the risk of his life would be bound to refuse a sacrament to one who was unworthy and who demanded its administration with threats of death in case of refusal, not indeed out of contempt or hatred of the Faith, but for some other reason, is a disputed point among theologians. It is at any rate a probable opinion that the minister would not be bound to expose his life to danger, but that he might administer the sacrament to save himself, as we saw above that he might administer it to a secret sinner to avoid scandal.

Innocent XI condemned the proposition that instant and grave fear is a just cause for simulating the administration of the sacraments.¹ From this it follows that not only formal simulation with the intention of deceiving others is wrong, as being a lie in action, but even material simulation of administering a sacrament, whereby the matter or the form of a sacrament is used without the making of the sacrament, is not justified by grave fear. The minister may not give an unconsecrated host to a sinner as Communion, nor fictitiously absolve a penitent even to avoid death. The reason is because by so doing he would abuse a holy rite, instituted by Christ, and thus be guilty of gross irreverence toward God. It is a less sin for a priest to celebrate unworthily than to pretend to say Mass and not consecrate. However, a priest who instead of absolving a penitent who is not worthy of absolution dismisses him with a blessing so as not to betray him to people who are looking on, does not simulate the administration of the sacrament in the technical sense, and he does nothing reprehensible. He does not make an irreverent use of the sacramental sign or of part of it without completing the sacrament, in which the essence of the simulation of the administration of a sacrament consists in so far as it is wrong and has been condemned by the Church.

According to Canon 731, it is forbidden to administer the sacraments of the Church to heretics and schismatics, even though they be in good faith and ask for them, unless they have first been reconciled with the Church after abjuring their errors.

¹ Prop. 29.