Article V. Sacred Order

I. Major or sacred Orders, that is, the Episcopate, Presbyterate, Diaconate, and Subdiaconate, diriment marriage (canon 1072, compared with canons 949 and 950).¹ There is dispute concerning those who received sacred Order without sufficient knowledge of the obligation of celibacy, or compelled by grave fear. For the rest, canon 214, § 1 states: "A cleric who, compelled by grave fear, received a sacred Order and afterwards, once the fear was removed, did not ratify the same ordination at least tacitly through exercise of the Order, while nevertheless wishing by such an act to subject himself to clerical obligations, is to be reduced to the lay state by sentence of a judge, once the coercion and defect of ratification have been legitimately proved, without any obligations of celibacy and of the canonical hours."

Minor clerics can indeed enter nuptials, but, unless the marriage was null by reason of force or fear inflicted upon them, they fall by the law itself from the clerical state (canon 132, § 2).

II. Sacred Order as such does not diriment marriage by divine law, whether natural² or positive, but merely by ecclesiastical law. Not by divine natural law, that is, by force of the nature of sacred Order. For this is not absolutely incompatible with obligations essential to sacred Order, as is evident from approved practice in the Eastern Church and from dispensations granted by the Church; and those dispensations furnish a new argument, because the Church cannot dispense in divine natural law. Nor by divine positive law, that is, law founded in a special disposition of Christ. This is likewise deduced from approved practice and dispensations, of which there has just been discussion. It remains therefore, as we shall say, that sacred Order as such diriments marriage by ecclesiastical law alone. I said as such; for there is dispute whether the solemn vow of chastity, which according to many is attached to sacred Order, diriments marriage by divine law. Concerning this, see below (n. 784), where we adhere to the opinion which derives the invalidating force of a solemn vow from ecclesiastical law alone.

III. The Church established the diriment impediment by reason of the Order itself; in other words, she annexed the impediment to the Order itself. Whether she also annexed it to the vow is disputed. By reason of the Order itself, as is evident from the fact that canon 1072 constitutes those placed in sacred Order absolutely incapable, so that even those who excluded the vow would be held by the impediment. It is disputed whether the Church also annexed the impediment to the vow, if it is emitted. Now it seems that this must be affirmed, if one considers both the things which Boniface VIII established in the single chapter de voto et voti redemptione, III, 15, in the Sext; and the authority of other Pontiffs in the single chapter, title 6, de voto, in the Extravagants of John XXII; and the Constitution Inter praeteritos of Benedict XIV, § 41, December 5, 1749, with proposition 72³ proscribed in the Syllabus of Pius IX also being compared. I said "if it is emitted" (St. Alphonsus VI, 808, 809). For:

It is disputed, first, whether there has existed a law of emitting a vow in the reception of sacred Order. Now Wernz-Vidal, in order to prove its existence, speaks thus: "Certainly from the ancient tradition of the Western Church, from Gregory the Great onward, men were not admitted to major Orders unless they previously professed chastity. This profession according to the obvious meaning contains a true vow of perfect chastity. But by no solid argument can that fact, already in itself rather unbelievable, be demonstrated: that the Latin Church, having abandoned her ancient and more perfect practice of exacting celibacy also from a vow of perfect chastity, adopted the less perfect discipline of the Greeks, who impose upon a celibate cleric approaching major Orders the obligation of chastity by ecclesiastical law alone. Nor can adversaries assign by some probable reason the time when at last that wondrous change of ancient discipline was made. Therefore the singular prerogative and dignity of the secular clergy of the Latin Church, by which it follows the evangelical counsel of chastity in the more perfect form and mode of a vow, is to be retained with all force and constancy."⁴

It is disputed, secondly, whether the law of emitting a vow in the reception of sacred Order continued to be in force after the new Code. This may seem doubtful to someone, because the stated law is with difficulty drawn out of the Code, and therefore, with canon 6, 6° considered, seems to have been abolished.

Nevertheless the law seems to persist: both because canon 6, 6° does not seem applicable to the stated law, as introduced by custom;⁵ and because the word sacrilege occurring in canon 132, § 1 can regard also the vow annexed and to be annexed to the Order; and once this is admitted, the law is contained at least implicitly in the Code; and because at least because of doubt one must not depart from the old law (canon 6, 4°).

IV. The penalties established against major clerics attempting marriage are:

1. Excommunication latae sententiae, simply reserved to the Apostolic See; clerics moreover, if after having been warned during the time determined beforehand by the Ordinary according to the diversity of circumstances, they have not repented, are to be degraded (canon 2388, § 1).

2. Irregularity (canon 985, 3°).

3. Loss of office (canon 188, 5°).

Note. The penalties set forth have been established also against those who contract merely civilly, although an act of this sort lacks even the appearance of marriage (cited canon).

V. The Church never dispenses in the impediment of Order with Bishops, scarcely ever with presbyters, and not easily with deacons and subdeacons.

But whenever a dispensation is granted, it is enjoined upon the cleric that, reduced to the lay state, he in no way exercise the Orders received. By this injunction the fundamental principle of the Latin Church is preserved, namely, that clerics "cannot attend at the same time to pleasures and carnal desires and to ecclesiastical services." So chapter 3, de conversione coniugatorum (III, 32). But the obligation of reciting the Divine Office is commuted into other works of piety.⁶

¹ Council of Trent, session 24, canon 9.

² That is, by reason of the character of the Order itself.

³ "Boniface VIII was the first to assert that a vow of chastity emitted in ordination renders nuptials null."

⁴ Op. cit., n. 284.

⁵ Cf. Sacred Congregation of the Council, January 10, 1920.

⁶ Vlaming, I, n. 301.