Section I. On the Requisites for Valid Reception

I. In infants and those perpetually without use of reason, no intention is required; this follows from the fact that they are incapable of eliciting an intention and yet, if they are ordained, they receive ordination validly (n. 604).

II. In adults intention or consent is required; habitual intention suffices. But it is disputed to some extent whether consent to the very Order to be received is required, or whether it suffices that the ordinand consent to the application of the external rite, although he does not wish to receive the Order (n. 40).

One who consents through grave fear, for example compelled by threats or terror, is indeed validly ordained; but as canon 214 has it: "A cleric who, compelled by grave fear, receives a sacred Order and afterward, once the fear has been removed, has not ratified the same ordination at least tacitly by the exercise of the Order, while nevertheless intending by such an act to subject himself to clerical obligations, is to be reduced to the lay state by sentence of a judge, after the coercion and the lack of ratification have been legitimately proved, without any obligations of celibacy and of the canonical hours. But coercion and lack of ratification must be proved according to the norm of canons 1993-1998."¹ These things, as is clear, do not pertain to him whom fear impressed from within, for example fear that, if the lay state is chosen, he will lead a miserable life, has led to Orders.

¹ Cf. A.A.S. 1931, p. 120 and p. 457 sq., where there are: 1° the remedy for preventing ordinations from fear; 2° the rules to be observed in processes concerning the nullity of sacred ordination or of the burdens inhering in sacred Orders.