The Nature of an Indulgence

The most efficacious means of satisfying God for sins already remitted, besides sacramental penance, is constituted by indulgences. Since these complete sacramental satisfaction in their own way, moral theologians are accustomed to treat in this place several practical questions both concerning indulgences in general and concerning certain indulgences in species.

Canon 2237, sec. 2, provides that in occult cases the Ordinary can remit, himself or through another, penalties latae sententiae imposed by common law, except censures very specially or only specially reserved to the Apostolic See. Canon 2327 I. Quaestum facientes ex indulgentiis plectuntur ipso facto excommunicatione Sedi Apostolicae simpliciter reservata. (Those who make gain out of indulgences are punished ipso facto with an excommunication simply reserved to the Apostolic See.)

IN every sin the teaching of the Catholic Church distinguishes two elements: the guilt and the penalty which it incurs. The guilt is the injury committed against God by the sinner and the displeasure with which God views the sinful act. If the sin is mortal, it deprives the soul of sanctifying grace and of God’s friendship, so that a state of enmity exists between God and the sinner. A venial sin is an injury against God; it is the object of his displeasure, and is a stain on the soul, but it does not rob the soul of sanctifying grace or deprive it of the friendship of God. Besides this guilt a sin deserves and ordinarily receives punishment at the hands of God. It is a law of God’s justice that wrongdoing entails suffering either in this world or in the world to come. It is the sanction which in the nature of things is annexed to the great moral law. The penalty for mortal sin, as befits the unrepenting and obstinate enemies of God, is eternal separation from him and punishment in the fires of hell; the penalty for venial sin is temporary punishment in this world or in purgatory. These two elements in sin are not only distinct from each other in thought; they may be, and frequently are, separated in reality. When God pardons mortal sin, the eternal penalty which it deserves in hell is also remitted, but we know from revelation that he frequently exacts from the sinner some temporary punishment for the serious offence which has been committed against him and right order. The guilt of David’s adultery was forgiven on his repentance, but he had to endure the loss of the child and other punishments. This is only in keeping with what we might expect at the hands of a wise Providence and with what observation of the order of nature teaches us. A man may truly repent of his sin, and he may have the fullest confidence that God has pardoned it, but he knows that he will have to bear the sad effects of it till his dying day.

This distinction between the guilt of sin and the penalty due to it is necessary for the understanding of what is meant by an indulgence. An indulgence is not the forgiveness of the guilt of sin; much less is it a permission to commit sin. It is the remission of the temporal punishment which often remains due to sin after its guilt has been forgiven. An indulgence, then, cannot be gained for unrepented sin, nor for sin of which the guilt still stains the soul. If, however, the guilt has been forgiven, any temporal punishment which remains to be suffered in consequence of it may be remitted by indulgences and by other means.

As the Catholic Church claims that her divine Founder empowered her ministers to forgive sin, provided that the sinner has the requisite dispositions, so she also lays claim to the power of remitting the temporal punishment due to sin both by the ministration of the sacraments and by granting indulgences. From the first centuries of the Christian era her bishops have used the power to condone temporal punishment due to sin outside sacramental confession, and they have understood that this power was contained in the general power to bind and loose granted to the Apostles and their successors by our Lord. As the Pope has jurisdiction over the whole world, he can grant indulgences to all the faithful; a bishop can only grant indulgences to those who are within his diocese, and up to the limits imposed on him by the supreme authority of the Roman Pontiff (Can. 349, sec. 2, ii).

The doctrine of indulgences is intimately connected with other dogmas of the Catholic faith. When the Church remits temporal punishment due to sin, she does not simply condone it outright in the name of God, but she pays the debt due to sin out of the treasure of the Church. This treasure of the Church is made up of the satisfactions of our Lord and of his saints. Christ and all the members of his Church form one mystical body: “ For as in one body we have many members, but all the members have not the same office: so we being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another.”¹ “One body and one Spirit: as you are called in one hope of your calling. One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism. One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in us all.”² By virtue of this oneness in Christ, there is among the faithful what is called the communion of saints. Not only do all get the benefit of the same sacrifice and sacraments, but the good works of each benefit to some extent all the rest. The merit, indeed, which every good action possesses with God, with a view to an eternal reward, is personal and belongs exclusively to the doer of it; but besides meriting, every good action has also a power of placating God and satisfying for sin, as well as a power of impetrating his graces and blessings. The satisfactory part of the good actions of Christ and his saints was not required to satisfy for their own offences, and it is available to satisfy for the sins of those who form with them one mystical body. It needs, however, application to the individual soul, and one of the ways in which this is done is through indulgences. The dispensing of the mysteries of God belongs to the prelates of his Church, and inasmuch as they have jurisdiction over the faithful in this life, indulgences are applied to them directly by the power of the keys.

Over the faithful departed who are suffering for their sins in purgatory the Church has no jurisdiction, but as we can pray for them, and they are helped thereby, so if the Church permits it we can gain indulgences and apply them to the souls of the faithful departed by way of suffrage, asking God to accept the satisfaction offered for the holy souls (Can. 911).

¹ Rom. xii 4.

² Eph. iv 4-6.

A plenary indulgence is one by which all the debt of temporal punishment due to a person for his sins is remitted, while a partial indulgence, of say, forty days, remits the same amount of temporal punishment as would have been remitted by undergoing canonical penance for forty days according to the ancient discipline of the Church.

Indulgences are local, if they can only be gained in a particular place, as by visiting some particular church; they are personal, if they are attached to certain persons who fulfil certain conditions; they are real, if they are attached to a particular object, as to a crucifix or a rosary.

Again, they are temporary if they can only be gained within a specified time; if granted without any time limit, they are perpetual.

No one can gain an indulgence unless he is a member of the Catholic Church, and, moreover, he must have the requisite intention, he must be in the state of grace, and he must fulfil all the conditions prescribed for gaining the indulgence.

It is not necessary that the intention be actual; it is sufficient if it be virtual, so that there was the wish to gain the indulgence, and it continues to influence the actions whose performance is required for the purpose of gaining the indulgence. It will be sufficient to form an intention in the morning of gaining all the indulgences which may be annexed to any of the good works done during the following day. Some authorities hold that such a virtual intention is not necessary, but that an habitual, or even an interpretative intention, will suffice. An habitual intention is one which was formed and which has not been retracted, but which does not influence the performance of one’s actions any longer. An interpretative intention does not exist in reality, but it would be elicited if the agent thought of the matter. Inasmuch as an indulgence is a grant made by the Church to all who fulfil certain conditions, these authors maintain that all pious Catholics who value indulgences gain such as are annexed to their prayers and other good deeds without any special intention, ‘This opinion, however, though probable, is not certain, and so it is safer in practice to follow the other, which requires at least a virtual intention, especially as it is doubtful whether probabilism can be used in this matter. Canon 925, sec, 2, says that a general intention is requisite, which many interpret as signifying an habitual intention.

Almost all indulgences are now applicable to the souls in purgatory (Can. 930). In order that they may be applied to them in fact, the person who fulfils the conditions should form his intention of offering them to God for the benefit of certain souls, or for the benefit of the souls in purgatory in general. It is a controverted point among the theologians whether such application is infallible in its effect or not. The difficulty is about the divine promise to accept such offerings, some theologians holding that such a promise is implicitly contained in the words of our Lord: “ Whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed also in heaven ”’; others denying this. The negative opinion seems to be more in accordance with the mind and practice of the Church.

Similarly, it is a disputed question among theologians whether one who gains an indulgence for the souls in purgatory must himself be in the state of grace. Many hold that he must be, as he must gain the indulgence himself before he can apply it to the holy souls. Others do not see the necessity of this, for such a one only fulfils the conditions, and on the fulfilment of these the Church offers to God the corresponding satisfactions. Both opinions are probable, but the former is safer in practice.

I. Notion. An indulgence is the remission before God of temporal punishment due for sins which, as far as guilt is concerned, have already been blotted out, which ecclesiastical authority grants from the treasury of the Church outside the sacrament, for the living by way of absolution, for the departed by way of suffrage (canon 911).

It is said:

1. Remission of temporal punishment; but not of guilt, whether mortal or venial; nor of eternal punishment, but only temporal punishment.

2. Before God. This is clear both from proposition 19 of Luther condemned by Leo X: "Indulgences are of no value for those who truly gain them for the remission, before divine justice, of punishment due for actual sins;"² and from the authentic declaration of Pius VI issued against propositions 40 and 41 of the Synod of Pistoia.³

Besides this, indulgences are worth as much before God as the Church expresses in her words; so that, for example, a plenary indulgence of itself remits all temporal punishment, and an indulgence, for example, of one year of itself is worth only as much as one year of penance would be worth, passed according to the penitential canons, independently of the devotion or fervor of the subject. The reason is that "the quantity of the effect follows the quantity of its cause. But the cause of the remission of punishment in indulgences is nothing except the abundance of the merits of the Church, which is sufficient for expiating the whole punishment; but the devotion, or labor, or gift of the one receiving the indulgence, or the cause for which the indulgence is given, is not the effective cause. Hence the quantity of the remission ought not to be proportioned to any of these things, but to the merits of the Church, which always superabound" (St. Thomas, Supplement, q. 25, a. 2). "Nor in this is too great a market made of the mercy of God, as some say; nor is derogation made from divine justice, because nothing of the punishment is remitted, but the punishment of one is reckoned to another" (St. Thomas, cited place).

3. Due for sins which, as far as guilt is concerned, have already been blotted out. For while the guilt remains, the punishment corresponding to it cannot be remitted. But once guilt has been remitted, not necessarily every temporal punishment is remitted.

4. Ecclesiastical authority, since to it alone belongs disposing of the common treasury. Who are the subjects of this power is explained in n. 494.

5. From the treasury of the Church. By the treasury of the Church is understood the accumulation of satisfactions of the Saints, both those reigning in heaven and those dwelling on earth, which they did not apply to others. Namely, to every good work proceeding from grace there belongs a threefold value: meritorious, insofar as, when the other conditions have been fulfilled, it confers a right to a just reward; impetratory, insofar as it has the force of obtaining goods from God by supplication; satisfactory, insofar as by reason of the difficulty of the work itself and at least by reason of the reluctance of our nature, it can satisfy the injured justice of God. Now the satisfactions of Christ, certainly of infinite value, and likewise the satisfactions of the saints, insofar as they were neither necessary for blotting out their own punishment nor applied by them to other persons, constitute, as it is called, the treasury of the Church.

6. Outside the sacrament; by which indulgence is distinguished from the remission of punishment which is made by the power of the keys in the sacrament of Penance.

7. Grants for the living by way of absolution, for the departed by way of suffrage. Namely:

a) An indulgence granted to the living is a judicial act by which the Church definitively applies the satisfactions of Christ and the Saints to her subjects in substitution for the temporal punishment still due for guilt that has been remitted. Therefore it is made by way of absolution, or is a quasi-absolution; but it is not a pure and simple absolution, because it has payment attached, insofar as it applies to the faithful satisfactions rendered by others. Hence St. Thomas says: "One who receives indulgences is not, simply speaking, absolved from the punishment due, but it is given to him so that he may pay the debt" (Supplement, q. 25, a. 1, ad 2).

b) An indulgence for the departed - over whom the Church lacks jurisdiction - involves the Church, from her power of administering her treasury, offering - or granting the one gaining the indulgence the right of offering in her name - to God the satisfactions of Christ and the Saints, praying to Him that He will accept them in substitution for the punishment to be paid by the departed. Hence an indulgence of this kind is valid only by way of suffrage.

From what has been said it follows that an indulgence granted to the living, when the things to be observed have been observed, has an infallible effect. But as regards the effect with respect to the departed, it is disputed whether or not it is infallible. Some affirm, because God, by the very fact that He gave the Supreme Pontiff the power of granting indulgences for the departed, seems also to have bound Himself by a promise to apply indulgences to them. Others deny this, or at least think that the application of the whole value, and to the designated souls, is not infallible, because such a divine promise is not proved in any way. For the power of the Church to grant indulgences for the departed involves only the competence of offering to God for the departed the spiritual treasury entrusted to herself, that is, to the Church. But a competence of this kind does not prove a divine promise of accepting what is offered. The response of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, dated July 28, 1840, taken in its obvious sense, favors this opinion: "By an indulgence of a privileged altar, if the mind of the one granting and the use of the power of the keys are considered, there is to be understood a plenary indulgence which immediately frees the soul from all the punishments of purgatory. But if the effect of the application is considered, there is to be understood an indulgence whose measure corresponds to the good pleasure and acceptance of divine mercy" (St. Alphonsus, VI, 534, under 10).

¹ Cf. Beringer-Steinen, Die Ablässe; Fanfani, De indulgentiis: manuale theoretico-practicum; Stein, De indulgentiis lucrandis.

² Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 759.

³ Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 1540 and 1541.

II. Existence of indulgences. The existence of indulgences must be admitted if it is proved: 1. that there exists in the Church a treasury of satisfactions which in itself suffices for blotting out before God the temporal punishment due for sins; 2. that these satisfactions are applicable to the faithful; 3. that the Church enjoys the power of applying them. Now:

1. There exists in the Church a treasury of satisfactions which in itself suffices for blotting out before God the temporal punishment due for sins. This follows from the propositions of Luther condemned by Leo X. For, as we noted above, in proposition 19 he condemned Luther's doctrine which teaches that indulgences are not of value for the remission, before divine justice, of punishment due for actual sins; and in proposition 17 the same Supreme Pontiff condemns this: "The treasures of the Church, from which the Pope gives indulgences, are not the merits of Christ and of the Saints."¹ Hence there exists in the Church a treasury of satisfactions which in itself suffices for blotting out before God the temporal punishment due for sins. Besides this, the existence of such a treasury is clear from the superabundant and infinite satisfaction which belongs to the works of Christ, as being a divine Person, and which He offered to God the Father for us.

2. The said satisfactions are applicable to the faithful. This is clear from the condemned propositions cited; as regards the satisfactions of Christ, it is furthermore clear from the work of redemption, by which the Savior satisfied God for us; as regards the superabundant satisfactions of the Saints, it follows from the dogma of the communion of Saints, by virtue of which a mutual participation of goods is had in the Church.

3. The Church enjoys the power of applying them; this is proved in Section II.

¹ Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 757.

III. Division of indulgences. Indulgences are chiefly divided:

1. Into plenary and partial, according as of themselves they wholly or partially remit the punishment due for sins. Now when an indulgence is granted, for example, of one year, the sense is that so much punishment is remitted to someone as would be remitted to him if for a year he performed the penance once customarily imposed for sins according to the canons (St. Alphonsus, VI, 535). By quarantines, however, which are sometimes attached to years - for example, an indulgence of seven years and seven quarantines - there is not understood some time beyond the years themselves, but that part of the year in which a harder penance was prescribed, namely the time of Lent.

2. Into personal, local, and real, according as they are granted only to certain persons, for example religious or members of a confraternity; or are affixed to certain places, for example to a church or altar, that is, to their pious visitation, etc.; or are attached to certain things, for example rosaries, medals, etc., that is, to the pious use of them.

3. Into temporary and perpetual, according as they are granted in perpetuity or only for a definite time.

4. Into indulgences for the living only, for the departed only, and for both the living and the departed.

Corollary I. From what has been said it follows how deservedly canon 911 states that indulgences are to be held in great esteem, and that their use - which is of faith¹ - is most salutary. For indulgences, besides remitting temporal punishment, stir the faithful to contrition and other salutary works, since they are not granted except to penitents and under definite conditions.

Corollary II. Those who make gain from indulgences are guilty of simony (vol. I, n. 621); indeed, by canon 2327 they are punished ipso facto with excommunication simply reserved to the Apostolic See.

¹ Council of Trent, session 25, Decree on Indulgences.

I. Existence of the power in the Church of granting indulgences. That the power of dispensing indulgences belongs to the Church is of faith from Trent;¹ and it follows from the power which Christ conferred on the Church of remitting sins and opening the kingdom of heaven to believers;² for to the perfect remission of sin and to the opening of the kingdom of heaven there also belongs the removal of temporal punishment still remaining after the guilt of sins has been remitted. That this power can be used outside the conferral of the sacrament is clear from the general sense of the words, which also contain the power of teaching and of making laws; and this certainly has place outside the sacrament. Besides this, the whole tradition from the first centuries has recognized this power in the Church.³

¹ Council of Trent, session 25, Decree on Indulgences.

² Matthew 16:18.

³ Cf. Fanfani, cited work, p. 19-22.

II. Subject of the power. The Supreme Pontiff alone, by his own and full right, can grant indulgences (canon 912). The reason is that he, and he alone, can dispose of the common treasury of the Church to whom the government of the whole Church has been committed. Now the Supreme Pontiff commonly exercises the said power through the Sacred Penitentiary, whose office it is to judge all those things which regard the use and concession of indulgences, without prejudice to the right of the Holy Office to see to those things which regard dogmatic doctrine concerning the same indulgences or concerning new prayers and devotions (canon 258, § 2). Those inferior to the Supreme Pontiff can dispense indulgences by ordinary power only insofar as this has been expressly granted to them by law. Now the law states:

1. As regards a plenary indulgence.

a) Bishops, each in his own diocese, can impart the papal blessing with a plenary indulgence, according to the prescribed formula, twice a year, that is, on the solemn day of the Resurrection at Easter and on another solemn feast day designated by themselves, even if they have only assisted at the solemn Mass (canon 914). If some Bishop has several dioceses to be governed, he cannot, by his own right, transfer in one of them to another day the papal blessing attached to Easter of the Resurrection.¹

b) Abbots or Prelates nullius, Apostolic Vicars and Prefects, even if they lack episcopal dignity, can do the same, namely impart the papal blessing with a plenary indulgence according to the prescribed formula, in their territories on only one of the more solemn days during the year (cited canon).

c) Regulars who have the privilege of imparting the papal blessing are not only bound by the obligation of observing the prescribed formula, but also cannot use this privilege except in their own churches and in the churches of nuns or tertiaries lawfully aggregated to their Order; but not on the same day and in the same place² where the Bishop imparts it (canon 915).³

d) A pastor or another priest who assists the sick has the faculty of granting to them the apostolic blessing with a plenary indulgence at the point of death, according to the form handed down by approved liturgical books, and he should not omit to impart this blessing (canon 468, § 2).

e) Bishops, Abbots or Prelates nullius, Apostolic Vicars and Prefects, and major Superiors of exempt clerical religious institutes can designate and declare one daily perpetual privileged altar, provided another is not already had, in their cathedral, abbatial, collegiate, conventual, parochial, and quasi-parochial churches, but not in public or semi-public oratories, unless they are united to a parish church or are subsidiary to it (canon 916).

2. As regards partial indulgences.

a) Cardinals, from their promotion in Consistory, enjoy the faculty of granting indulgences of two hundred days, even to be gained as often as often, in places or institutes and for persons of their jurisdiction or protection; likewise in other places, but to be gained only by those present, on each occasion (canon 239, § 1, 24°).

b) Metropolitans or Archbishops can grant indulgences of one hundred days both in their own diocese and in suffragan dioceses (canon 274, 2°).

c) Residential Bishops, from taking possession of the diocese, enjoy the right of granting indulgences of fifty days in places of their jurisdiction (canon 349, § 2, 2°). But the words "in places of their jurisdiction" are not to be understood so that Bishops are prohibited from granting indulgences to exempt religious or in their churches.⁴

d) Apostolic Vicars and Prefects, even those who lack episcopal character, possess the same faculty as residential Bishops (canon 294, § 2).

e) The consecrating Bishop, when a church or altar is consecrated, even though he lacks jurisdiction in the territory, grants an indulgence of one year to those visiting the church or altar on the day of the consecration itself; but on the anniversary day, one of fifty days if he is a Bishop, one hundred if an Archbishop, and two hundred if a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church (canon 1166, § 3). Capitular Vicars and Vicars General lack ordinary power of granting indulgences, since the Law does not enumerate them. They therefore, like the others not enumerated above, cannot grant indulgences except by commission or delegation of the Supreme Pontiff or of another to whom the faculty of delegating has been expressly granted.

f) What Nuncios can do is to be drawn from their letters.

Note 1. Those inferior to the Roman Pontiff cannot: 1. commit to others the faculty of granting indulgences, unless this has been expressly granted to them by the Apostolic See; 2. grant indulgences applicable to the departed; 3. add other indulgences to the same thing or act of piety or sodality to which indulgences have already been granted by the Apostolic See or by another, unless new conditions to be fulfilled are prescribed (canon 913).

Note 2. Generals of Orders and Prelates of Religious, having regard to common law, enjoy no power of issuing Indulgences; but some of them have the privilege of reserving to themselves and of granting to others the faculty of imparting certain blessings - for example, the blessing of a rosary of the Most Holy Rosary - to which Indulgences are attached.⁵

¹ A.A.S. XXII, p. 195.

² Cited place: in the city, town (Brief of Leo XIII, July 2, 1882).

³ Here, however, the matter is not the papal blessing which religious missionaries are permitted to impart at the end of missions or in similar circumstances, but the privilege by which regulars, without another condition of function, are able to impart that blessing (Aertnys-Damen, Theologia Moralis, 5th ed., II, n. 1112).

⁴ Pontifical Commission, December 6, 1930 (A.A.S. 1931, p. 25).

⁵ Fanfani, cited work, p. 17.

III. Interpretation of the power of granting indulgences. Both ordinary and delegated power must be interpreted according to the proper meaning of the words and the common usage of speech; but in doubt it is to be taken broadly (canons 49, 50; St. Alphonsus, 534).

IV. Use of the power of granting indulgences.

1. In order that a concession be valid, a just cause is required. The reason is that the Supreme Pontiff is not the owner of the treasury of the Church, but has been constituted only its dispenser. But a dispenser is not judged to have been granted the faculty of disposing of goods at will, that is, without a just cause (St. Thomas, Supplement, q. 25, a. 2; St. Alphonsus, n. 532).

2. Furthermore, for liceity there is required a cause proportioned to the quantity of the indulgence, so that for a greater indulgence a greater cause is required. But the gravity of the cause is to be judged "not only from the difficulty of the work, but from the intended end and the usefulness of the work for that end" (St. Alphonsus, cited place).

It is disputed whether the proportion of the cause is required for validity. Now with St. Alphonsus (cited place) and the more common opinion, it seems one must affirm this, because a dispenser does not seem to have been granted the faculty of disposing prodigally of goods. Besides this, once an indulgence has been granted, a proportionate cause is always presumed to be present. Furthermore, even if a proportionate cause were lacking, nevertheless the privileges attached to the indulgence would certainly be valid, for example the faculty of absolving from reserved cases, since these are matters of ecclesiastical law.

Note. The Supreme Pontiff or a Bishop can sometimes grant an indulgence without the injunction of any work, because there can be a just and reasonable cause for granting an indulgence in this way, for example to a worthy man, or at the point of death.¹

¹ Aertnys-Damen, Theologia Moralis, 11th ed., II, n. 1113.

V. Publication of granted indulgences.

1. Indulgences promulgated at Rome need no further publication. Indulgences are understood to have been promulgated at Rome whether they have been granted through Briefs or through decrees contained in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis.

2. New indulgences, even those granted to churches of regulars, which have not been promulgated at Rome, are not to be published abroad without consulting the Ordinary of the place. In publishing books, booklets, etc., in which concessions of indulgences for various prayers or pious works are listed, the prescription of canon 1388 is to be observed.¹

3. Those who have obtained from the Supreme Pontiff concessions of indulgences for all the faithful are bound, under penalty of the nullity of the grace obtained, to bring authentic copies of those concessions to the Sacred Penitentiary (canon 920). It is said:

1. Concessions for all the faithful. Indulgences granted for all the faithful are understood as those which all the faithful can always and everywhere gain without the special use of a blessed thing, or participation in a pious confraternity, or visitation of a determinate church.²

2. Authentic copies, that is, a written document, either signed by the Supreme Pontiff's own hand or subscribed by a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, which testifies to an oral oracle.

¹ That canon states: all books of indulgences, summaries, booklets, sheets, etc., in which their concessions are contained, are not to be published without the license of the Ordinary of the place. But the express license of the Apostolic See is required in order that it be lawful to publish in print, in any language, both the authentic collection of prayers and pious works to which the Apostolic See has attached indulgences, and the list of apostolic indulgences, and a summary of indulgences either previously collected but never approved, or now for the first time to be gathered from diverse concessions.

² Beringer-Steinen, cited work, I, n. 199-200.

VI. Interpretation of some indulgences granted or to be granted.

1. A plenary indulgence granted for the feasts of Our Lord Jesus Christ or for the feasts of the Blessed Virgin Mary is understood to have been granted only for the feasts which are found in the universal calendar. A plenary or partial indulgence granted for the feasts of the Apostles is understood to have been granted only for their natal feast. A plenary indulgence granted as daily perpetual, or for a time, to those visiting some church or public oratory is to be understood in such a way that on any day, but only once in the year, it can be acquired by each member of the faithful, unless something else is expressly said in the decree (canon 921).

2. An indulgence affixed to some Feast is acquired by the faithful on the fixed day duly constituted in their Diocese; by Regular Orders, on the fixed day duly constituted in their Calendar; by those enrolled in a sodality of some Regular Order, on the fixed day duly constituted in the Calendar of the Diocese or in the Calendar of the Order, but not on both days. Thus the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences.¹

3. When a plenary indulgence once in a month is granted to those who have performed a certain good work through an entire month, the month is not necessarily to be computed from the first day to the last, but is understood as a continuous space of a month, that is, of thirty days.²

¹ August 29, 1864; January 12, 1878.

² Aertnys-Damen, II, n. 1120.

I. One who has received the faculty of blessing crosses, medals, scapulars, rosaries, etc., with the application of indulgences, is not bound to exhibit it to the Ordinary unless this is expressed in the concession.¹ One who has obtained the faculty of privately blessing pious things with the application of indulgences cannot use that faculty publicly, for example in a church or oratory before the faithful gathered there and holding in their hands the things to be blessed.²

II. As regards the form or rite to be observed in blessings, hold these things:

1. The ordinary or customary form - which is done by forming the cross over the thing to be blessed, without pronouncing any formula and without sprinkling holy water - suffices for crosses, medals, and rosaries, except, however, rosaries of the Most Holy Rosary and of the Seven Sorrows;³ it also suffices for crucifixes with a plenary indulgence at the point of death; likewise for the crucifix of the Way of the Cross in favor of the faithful who are impeded; and it always seems to suffice when no proper form is prescribed. In that case, the sign of the cross with the words "In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit," together with the sprinkling of holy water over the object to which indulgences are to be attached, certainly suffices.⁴

2. The proper form must be used for rosaries of the Most Holy Rosary and of the Seven Sorrows, for crosses of the stations of the Way of the Cross, for a plenary indulgence at the point of death or the Apostolic Blessing, as it is called, for enrollment in the Confraternity of the sacred Scapular, etc.⁵

Cardinals, by canon 239, § 1, 5° and 6°, from their promotion enjoy the faculty of blessing everywhere, by the sign of the cross alone, with all the indulgences customarily granted by the Holy See, rosaries and other prayer-beads, crosses, medals, statues, and scapulars approved by the Apostolic See, and of imposing them without the burden of registration; likewise, by a single blessing, of erecting in churches and oratories, even private ones, and other pious places, stations of the Way of the Cross with all the indulgences which have been imparted to those performing such a pious exercise; and also of blessing for the faithful who, because of illness or another legitimate impediment, cannot visit the sacred stations of the Way of the Cross, Crucifix images with the application of all indulgences attached by the Roman Pontiffs to the devout exercise of the same Way of the Cross.

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 5, 1841.

² Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 7, 1843.

³ Cf. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, April 14, 1840; January 7, 1843; February 29, 1864; Holy Office, May 18, 1914 (A.A.S., p. 346).

⁴ Cf. Beringer-Steinen, cited work, I, n. 836.

⁵ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 5, 1841; March 12, 1855; February 29, 1864; March 22, 1879.

In order that someone be capable of gaining indulgences for himself, he must be baptized, not excommunicated, in the state of grace at least at the end of the prescribed works, and a subject of the one granting (canon 925, § 1). It is said:

1. For himself. To what extent the enumerated things are required so that someone may apply an indulgence to the departed, we shall say later.

2. Baptized; because the Church lacks jurisdiction over the non-baptized, even over catechumens.

3. Not excommunicated, because the concession of indulgences belongs to the communion of Saints, of which the Church deprives the excommunicated.

It can be disputed whether material heretics and schismatics can acquire indulgences. It seems one must deny this; for such heretics and schismatics indeed belong by will to the body of the Church, but in the external forum they seem to be considered by the Church as formal heretics and schismatics; for she does not judge concerning internal matters. Now in this case the Church does not seem to extend her act of jurisdiction to those who are considered by her, in the external forum, as formal heretics.

4. In the state of grace at least at the end of the works. The reason is that "a dead member does not receive influence from the other living members; but one who is in mortal sin is, as it were, a dead member; therefore through indulgences he does not receive influence from the merits of the living members" (St. Thomas, Supplement, q. 27, a. 1). Added to this is the response of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences,¹ which declares that the sense of the clause "with heart at least contrite" is that contrition is required "insofar as someone placed in mortal sin and therefore incapable of gaining any indulgence is restored to the state of grace by perfect contrition with the purpose of confession, and becomes capable of obtaining indulgences." Finally, canon 925, § 1 absolutely requires the state of grace in order that someone acquire an indulgence for himself. Hence even if it were admitted that the Church can grant a partial indulgence to one constituted in mortal sin, namely the remission of punishment due because of sins already previously remitted, nevertheless that this actually occurs seems altogether to have to be denied (St. Alphonsus, n. 534, under 9).

To what extent the state of grace is required so that someone may apply an indulgence to the departed, we shall investigate immediately.

This, however, is the place for noting these words of St. Alphonsus: "No one gains a plenary indulgence of all sins unless he is free from every guilt, even venial, when he completes the last work... for it is certain that venial sin not remitted as to guilt cannot be remitted as to punishment... That venial sin, however, does not prevent the punishment due to other sins already remitted from being remitted" (n. 534, under 19). Hence nothing of itself prevents one who lacks the disposition required for gaining a plenary indulgence integrally from gaining it partially. And in fact canon 926 states: a plenary indulgence granted in such a way is understood so that, if someone cannot gain it plenarily, nevertheless he gains it partially according to the disposition which he has.

5. A subject of the one granting, because an act of jurisdiction, such as is the concession of an indulgence for the living, can be exercised only upon subjects. But since an indulgence is granted after the manner of a privilege, nothing prevents non-subjects also, after it has been granted, from being able to gain it according to the norm of canon 927: unless something else appears from the tenor of the concession, indulgences granted by a Bishop can be gained both by subjects outside the territory and by pilgrims, vagi, and all exempt persons dwelling in the territory.

¹ December 17, 1870.

But in order, thus canon 925, § 2, that a capable subject actually gain them, he must have at least a general intention of acquiring them and fulfill the enjoined works at the appointed time and in the due manner according to the tenor of the concession.

Therefore, first, intention is required, because the Church does not bestow her benefits except on one willing. But a general intention suffices, by which someone wills to gain all the indulgences which he can gain through the works to be performed; and this can be habitual, that is, once elicited and not retracted (St. Alphonsus, VI, 534, 14°). Namely, the Church, on whose benign mind this whole matter depends, is not judged to require a virtual intention, much less an actual one; indeed canon 925, § 2, which speaks only of intention without addition, sufficiently signifies that every intention, even habitual, suffices. Nevertheless, it is advised that each morning one elicit the intention of gaining all indulgences perhaps attached to the works to be performed during the day.¹ Finally, an implicit intention seems to suffice, that is, one by which someone wills that his works profit as much as they will be able to profit.²

Besides intention, fulfillment of the enjoined works is required, concerning which one must treat more fully. We shall speak first of the works to be fulfilled generally, then of some works in particular, finally of the commutation of works.

¹ Cf. Raccolta, p. XI.

² Raccolta, VIII.

I. Works to be fulfilled considered generally. The fulfillment of works is a condition without which an indulgence cannot be acquired, so that neither ignorance, nor good faith, nor impotence excuses anyone. Nor does it help to substitute a work equivalent to, or even more excellent than, the prescribed work. But the works must be fulfilled integrally, personally, morally well, at the appointed time, and in the due manner. It is said:

1. Personally; except, however, almsgiving, according to what will be said in n. 566.

2. Integrally. "But if one of the enjoined works is omitted, either wholly or in a notable part, through ignorance, negligence, or impotence... except in the case of legitimate commutation, the indulgence is not acquired."¹ Nevertheless, omission of a slight part, both in itself and with respect to the prescribed work, does not stand in the way of gaining the indulgence, as if you eat a little in a fast, or in the recitation of the Rosary omit three Hail Marys. The reason is that the work is judged to have been placed morally. It is otherwise if, for example, from the five Our Fathers and Hail Marys prescribed, one is omitted (St. Alphonsus, n. 534, under 14 and 16). What must be kept before one's eyes if a particular prayer is assigned, see n. 507.

3. Morally well, according to what was said in volume I, n. 242; hence an act not even partly good, such as an act placed from vanity alone, is unsuited for gaining an indulgence.

4. At the appointed time. Now the determination of time is for beginning and for ending the privilege, so that fulfillment carried out before or after the assigned time is invalid.

5. In the due manner, for example if a prayer is established as to be recited kneeling. It does not matter in what order the works are fulfilled.²

Note 1. By a work which someone is bound by law or precept to perform, an indulgence cannot be gained, unless something else is expressly said in the concession of the same; nevertheless, one who performs a work enjoined on him as sacramental penance and perhaps enriched with indulgences can at the same time both satisfy the penance and gain the indulgences (canon 932). Hence someone cannot gain an indulgence by reciting the canonical hours owed. Sacramental penance is excepted, as the cited canon has it; likewise Easter communion, as the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences declared,³ excepting, however, the case in which the indulgence is granted in the form of a jubilee. Those things imposed by a rule are also excepted, if the rule does not oblige under sin. Nor does anything prevent someone from gaining an indulgence by performing a work owed by vow or promise, because a vow and promise are neither law nor precept.

Note 2. By one and the same work, to which indulgences are attached by various titles, several indulgences cannot be acquired, unless the required work is confession or communion, or unless something else has been expressly provided (canon 933). Thus, for example, since it has been expressly provided, Apostolic indulgences and those of the Most Holy Rosary, perhaps attached to a rosary, can be acquired at the same time;⁴ likewise indulgences of the Most Holy Rosary and of the Cross-bearers, attached to the same rosary.⁵

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 19, 1759 (Decreta authentica, n. 214).

² Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 19, 1759 (Decreta authentica, n. 214).

³ December 13, 1841; May 10, 1844.

⁴ Sacred Penitentiary, February 17, 1922 (A.A.S. 1922, p. 143); June 14, 1922 (A.A.S. 1922, p. 394).

⁵ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 12, 1907.

1. Confession. Whenever an indulgence is granted with the clause "to the contrite and confessed" or a similar clause, sacramental confession is established as a condition, even for those who do not have mortal sin, although absolution is not required for these.¹ Nevertheless:

a) For gaining any indulgences whatever, the confession perhaps required can be made within the eight days which immediately precede the day to which the indulgence was affixed, and likewise within the whole subsequent octave (canon 931, § 1).

b) For gaining indulgences granted for pious exercises of three or more days, confession can also be made within the octave which immediately follows the completed exercise (canon 931, § 2).

c) Actual confession is necessary for gaining no indulgence for those who are accustomed, unless legitimately impeded, to approach the sacrament of penance at least twice in the month, or to receive Holy Communion daily in the state of grace and with a right and pious mind, although once or twice during the week they abstain from it (cf. canon 931, § 3). Except the indulgences of either an ordinary or extraordinary jubilee or in the likeness of a jubilee (cited canon).

¹ If the clause "with heart at least contrite" is added in the concession of an indulgence, it signifies this one thing: that the state of grace is required for the indulgence to be acquired; it does not require that one who is in the state of grace elicit an act of contrition (Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, December 17, 1870, Decreta authentica, n. 427). The same is signified if an indulgence is said to be granted "in the customary form of the Church."

2. Holy Communion. This can be received in any church, etc., even if the visitation of a determinate church is prescribed. Besides this:

a) Communion can be received on the vigil of the day to which the indulgence is affixed and within the whole subsequent octave (canon 931, § 1).

b) For gaining indulgences granted for pious exercises of three or more days, communion can also be made within the octave which immediately follows the completed exercise (canon 931, § 2).

3. Visitation of a church; concerning this, observe:

a) Visitation of a church requires entrance into it, and indeed with the intention of worshiping God.¹ If, however, because of the multitude of the faithful someone cannot enter it, it suffices to join himself to the multitude (St. Alphonsus, n. 538, q. 10). But if the visitation of the church is made processionally, it does not suffice, for carrying out the prescribed visitation, that the clergy and people pass by praying before the Church, nor that the clergy with some from the procession enter the church and recite the common prayer while the rest remain outside the church; rather, it is required that all who can be contained in it enter the church and recite the common prayer there.² Entrance into the church for the purpose of receiving Holy Communion can also be counted for the visitation.

b) If the visitation of a determinate church or public oratory is prescribed, these must be visited. If the visitation of a non-determinate church is prescribed, it suffices to visit any church or public oratory, but not a semi-public or private one. Nevertheless:

1. Whenever for gaining indulgences there is prescribed the visitation of some non-determinate church or of some indeterminate public oratory, the faithful of either sex who, for the sake of the pursuit of perfection, or of instruction or education, or even of health, live a common life in houses lacking a church or public chapel and established with the consent of the Ordinaries, and likewise all persons dwelling there to minister to them, can visit the chapel of their own house in which they can satisfy by law the obligation of hearing Mass, provided they have duly performed the other enjoined works (cf. canon 929).³

2. Cardinals from their promotion in Consistory, Archbishops, and Bishops enjoy the faculty of gaining in their own chapels indulgences for the acquiring of which the visitation of some temple or public shrine of the city or place in which the Cardinals actually reside has been prescribed, and their household members can also enjoy this privilege (canon 239, § 1, 11°; canon 349, § 1, 10°).

Finally, if the visitation of a determinate chapel or altar is prescribed, it does not suffice merely to enter the church; rather, it is necessary to betake oneself to the determinate chapel or altar, or at least to stand in a place from which the chapel or altar can be seen.⁴

c) For gaining an indulgence affixed to some day, if the visitation of a church or oratory is required, this can be done from noon of the preceding day up to the midnight which closes the appointed day (canon 923).

d) One who wishes to gain several indulgences, each of which requires visitation of a church, is bound to make as many visitations - namely, by going out after each visitation and entering again - as the indulgences he intends to gain. This also holds if some indulgence can be acquired as often as the church is visited.⁵

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 19, 1759 (Decreta authentica, n. 214); August 20, 1822 (Decreta authentica, n. 253, to II); December 15, 1841 (Decreta authentica, n. 295).

² Raccolta, p. XVI.

³ The concession cannot be applied to the Portiuncula indulgence, since for it the visitation of a determinate church is prescribed, unless nevertheless this has been specially granted to some persons (A.A.S. XVI, p. 346, to VI).

⁴ Adrian VI, April 1, 1523; Clement VIII, April 4, 1524; Fanfani, cited work, p. 47.

⁵ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 29, 1864 (Decreta authentica, n. 399, to II and III).

4. Recitation of prayers, which, if visitation of a church is prescribed, is usually imposed as to be made in the visitation itself. Besides this, observe:

a) If, for gaining indulgences, prayer in general according to the mind of the Supreme Pontiff¹ is prescribed, mental prayer alone does not suffice; but vocal prayer can be chosen at the judgment of the faithful, unless some particular prayer is assigned (canon 934, § 1). Therefore, in the case posited, mental prayer alone does not suffice; yet it is enough to add some vocal prayer - not, however, a minimal one - to mental prayer (St. Alphonsus, n. 538, q. 10).²

According to the common opinion, five Our Fathers and Hail Marys suffice, or equivalents to be chosen at will, unless a particular prayer is prescribed. But for gaining the Portiuncula Indulgence, by decree of the Sacred Penitentiary dated July 10, 1924, the recitation of six Our Fathers, Hail Marys, and Glory Bes is required, and other equivalent prayers cannot be recited.³

b) If a particular prayer has been assigned, indulgences can be acquired in whatever language the prayer is recited, provided that the fidelity of the version is established from a declaration either of the Sacred Penitentiary or of one of the Ordinaries of the place where the language into which the prayer is translated is vernacular; but indulgences entirely cease because of any addition, subtraction, or interpolation (canon 934, § 2). Hence, for example, indulgences are not acquired if, in sung litanies of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Kyrie eleison is sung only once, nor if after each title Ora pro nobis is not recited.⁴ But the custom of announcing before each decade the mystery to be meditated upon does not seem to harm, since in the case there is no interpolation in the prayers themselves. As regards the practice of recalling the mystery in the middle of the Angelic Salutation, the Sacred Penitentiary, privately asked, declared⁵ that it cannot be kept and propagated while the indulgences remain intact. Nevertheless, the same Congregation judges that by canon 934, § 3 there was in no way revoked the indult by which Pius IX in the year 1859, for places where the custom had already grown up, granted that the faithful reciting the Rosary in such a manner could gain its indulgences; and Benedict XV, at the petition of the Sacred Penitentiary, extended that indult to all who according to the aforesaid custom had been accustomed to recite the Holy Rosary in any places whatever.⁶

c) For the acquisition of indulgences, it is enough to recite the prayer alternately with a companion, or to follow it mentally while it is recited by another (canon 934, § 3).

d) Mutes can gain indulgences attached to public prayers if, together with the rest of the faithful praying in the same place, they lift up their mind and pious sentiments to God; and if the matter concerns private prayers, it is enough that they recall them mentally, or express them by signs, or merely run through them with the eyes (canon 936). Finally, by concession of Benedict XV, maimed persons can gain indulgences for the gaining of which the recitation of prayers together with some bodily act which they are unable to perform is enjoined, by pouring forth prayers alone.⁷

Finally, I note that by the faithful enrolled in some sodality, indulgences granted to the sodality can be acquired even if they do not observe the statutes of the society,⁸ provided they fulfill the works imposed for the indulgences.

Question. Whether one who performs the enjoined works more perfectly, for example with greater fervor, becomes a participant in the indulgence in a greater measure than one who acts less perfectly.

Response 1. Of itself, no; because the Church is content with common fervor, and in applying the indulgence does not take account of that which is performed beyond what is due.

Response 2. Incidentally, it will easily happen that one who performs beyond what is due participates more in the indulgence, insofar namely as contrition, and therefore remission of guilt, is more universal.

¹ The Supreme Pontiff intends the prosperity and exaltation of the Church, the extirpation of heresies, the conversion of sinners, and finally the peace of the Christian people.

² Cf. Benedict XIV, Constitution Inter praeteritos, § 83.

³ A.A.S. XVI, p. 343, to IX; Sacred Penitentiary, January 30, 1930 (A.A.S. 1930, p. 43).

⁴ Sacred Penitentiary, July 21, 1919.

⁵ July 27, 1920.

⁶ Sacred Penitentiary, January 22, 1921 (A.A.S. 1921, p. 163).

⁷ Sacred Penitentiary, October 22, 1917 (A.A.S. 1917, p. 539).

⁸ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 25, 1842 (Decreta authentica, n. 298, to II); cf. canon 692.

III. Commutation of works. Confessors can commute pious works enjoined for gaining indulgences into others for those who, detained by a legitimate impediment, cannot perform the same works (canon 935). To pious works here do not belong those which constitute the cause or occasion of the indulgence, as, for example, the use of a crucifix which ought to supply for the Way of the Cross. By confessor is understood one who enjoys sacramental jurisdiction over the faithful person to whom commutation seems to be granted, so that he can at least validly hear the confession. Commutation, however, can be made not only within confession, but also outside confession (St. Alphonsus, n. 534, 15°).

Members of some confraternity who, because of illness or imprisonment, are impeded from visiting the church, can gain the indulgences granted to the confraternity, even with the visitation perhaps prescribed being omitted.¹

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, August 20, 1887 (Collectanea, n. 1680).

Question. To what extent several indulgences can be acquired on the same day.

Response 1. A plenary indulgence, unless something else has been expressly provided, can be acquired only once in the day, even if the same prescribed work is placed several times (canon 928, § 1).

Response 2. A partial indulgence, unless the contrary is expressly noted, can be gained several times during the day, the same work being repeated (canon 928, § 2).

Response 3. As is sufficiently clear of itself, diverse indulgences can be acquired on the same day, provided the works enjoined for each are fulfilled, or if the same works are prescribed, are repeated insofar as they must be repeated. Now one and the same confession and communion suffices for gaining several indulgences (n. 502).¹ The faculty of gaining diverse indulgences on the same day regards both indulgences concurring on one day because of a festivity, and those which someone out of his devotion has affixed to such a day in the week or month.²

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 29, 1864; January 12, 1878 (Decreta authentica, n. 434, to 3).

² Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 29, 1864.

I. The power of the Supreme Pontiff to grant indulgences for the departed. That the Supreme Pontiff enjoys this faculty is proximate to faith, because of the condemnation, and that repeated several times, of the contrary opinion.¹ It is established from the practice of the Church, by which the Supreme Pontiffs have established various indulgences applicable to souls in purgatory; and it follows from the dogma of the communion of Saints, by virtue of which a mutual communication of goods has place in the Church.

The manner of granting indulgences for the departed was explained above, on p. 377.

¹ Thus, for example, proposition 42 condemned by Pius VI against the Synod of Pistoia (Denzinger-Bannwart, n. 1542).

II. Requisites so that one acquiring indulgences may apply them to the departed. It is required: 1. that the Supreme Pontiff has granted them as applicable to the departed; since, as canon 913, 2°, states, those inferior to the Roman Pontiff cannot grant indulgences applicable to the departed. Besides this, all indulgences granted by the Roman Pontiff, unless something else is established, are applicable to souls in purgatory (canon 930). 2. The intention of the one acquiring is required, by which he wills this and determines, in general or in particular, to whom the indulgence acquired by him is to be applied. The reason is that the Supreme Pontiff makes indulgences only applicable, as follows from canon 913, 2°, and 930. A virtual intention suffices, or even, because the matter concerns a quasi-donation, a habitual one.

It is disputed whether the state of grace is required in the one gaining. The Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, when asked several times concerning this matter, answered on August 20, 1822: Deferred; and on February 22, 1847: Let approved authors be consulted. Now from the approved authors, some¹ deny it, because the state of grace is required only as a disposition for obtaining the effect of the indulgence, that is, the remission of punishment. Therefore, if the effect is to be received by the departed person, it suffices that this person be in the state of grace, but the said state is not required in the living person who fulfills the conditions of the indulgence. Nevertheless, with St. Alphonsus (n. 534, under 10) and others,² it seems the contrary must be admitted. For by granting indulgences for the departed, the Supreme Pontiff constitutes them only as applicable, as follows both from concessions of the Supreme Pontiff and from canon 913, 2°, and canon 930; in other words, he grants to the faithful a certain right in the satisfactions of Christ and the Saints, or at least a right of offering those same satisfactions to God in the name of the Church. Now, if the matter concerns a sinner, the former cannot be admitted, since a sinner cannot merit any satisfaction for himself. As regards the latter, it likewise is admitted with difficulty that a right of this kind is granted to a subject who, even at the end of the works to be performed by him, persists in enmity with God; all the more because then the Church would grant to a sinner the faculty of doing for others what he cannot do for himself as regards previously remitted sins.

To what extent indulgences applied to the departed produce an infallible effect was explained above, on p. 377.

¹ St. Bellarmine, De Indulgentiis, book I, chapter 14; Billuart, De Indulgentiis, single dissertation, article 6.

² De Lugo, Disputation XXVII, n. 75; Tournely, De Poenitentia, last question, article 6; Wignandt, Tribunal Confessariorum, treatise 14, n. 96.

III. The measure according to which an indulgence comes to the departed.

1. If the indulgence is plenary and is applied to one person, it is understood, if we suppose that God assents to the Church making suffrage, to remit all the remaining punishments of the soul. If it is plenary and is applied to several or to all, which can be done,¹ the distribution is left to Divine Providence.

2. If the indulgence is partial, for example of one year, it is understood to remit so much punishment as would be remitted to someone if for a year he performed the penance once customarily imposed for sins according to the canons. If it is partial and is applied to several or to all, the distribution is left to the Providence of God.

¹ Raccolta, p. XI.

I. Transfer of indulgences consists in this, that they are transferred from one place to another or from one time to another. Some things must be noted only about transfer with respect to time. Now, having regard to canon 922:

1. If the external solemnity of a feast is transferred, the indulgences attached to the feast are transferred to the day on which the external solemnity is held; otherwise, if only the Office and Mass are transferred and the external solemnity is held on the proper day.

2. If the matter concerns feasts which are celebrated without external solemnity, then the indulgences are transferred if the feast is only occasionally transferred.

3. Indulgences attached to sacred supplications or to novendial, septenary, or triduan prayers, which are performed before or after the feast or even while its octave lasts, are transferred or not transferred according as the indulgences attached to the feast day itself are transferred or not transferred.

Note. Nevertheless, observe that the same indulgence cannot be acquired twice, even at a different time. Thus one who, for example, in one diocese has gained the indulgence attached to the feast of the Immaculate Conception cannot gain the same indulgence again in another diocese if he is there on the day on which the external solemnity of the feast is celebrated in that place.¹ But for the Portiuncula Indulgence it was declared on January 13, 1930² that Christ's faithful can obtain it on the second day of the month in one church and on the Sunday next following in another church where that day has been substituted according to the norm of the Decree of the Sacred Penitentiary dated July 10, 1924, to VII.³

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 12, 1878 (Decreta authentica, n. 435, to III).

² A.A.S. 1930, p. 23.

³ A.A.S. 1924, p. 346.

II. Suspension of indulgences consists in this, that indulgences cease for a time, but when the time has passed, they revive without a new act of the superior. Now:

1. Indulgences attached to some church are suspended if the church is overturned from its foundations; they revive, however, if within fifty years it is built in the same or almost the same place and under the same title (canon 924, § 1). It is said "almost the same place," that is, at a small distance, for example twenty or thirty paces. If a church is renewed even totally through successive repairs, the indulgences persist.

2. Likewise indulgences attached to an altar are suspended if the altar is destroyed; but they revive if it is rebuilt under the same title and in the same church, even in another place.¹ Indulgences attached to a mission cross are continued if a new cross is substituted for a fallen or destroyed cross, provided the new cross is erected in the same or almost the same place, with at least the tacit consent of the Bishop.²

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, September 16, 1623^† (Decreta authentica, n. 317); July 18, 1902 (A.S.S. 1902, p. 62).

² Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 22, 1888 (cf. Analecta ecclesiastica 1902, p. 261); July 20, 1901.

III. Cessation of indulgences has place:

1. By the lapse of the time for which they were granted.

2. By revocation by the one granting or his Superior.

3. By the death of the one granting or by the resolution of his right, they cease only if they were given with the clause "at our good pleasure," or another equivalent clause; but not if they were given absolutely, without a clause, or with the clause "at the good pleasure of the Holy See" or a similar one (cf. canons 70 and 73).

4. By the death of the one to whom the indulgences were granted, if the matter concerns a purely personal privilege; likewise by the extinction of a Confraternity, if the extinction lawfully had place; otherwise, if unlawfully, in which case the indulgences revive when the Confraternity has been restored.¹

5. By the destruction or sale of the thing enriched with indulgences; namely, canon 924, § 2 states: Indulgences attached to rosaries or other things cease only when the rosaries or other things entirely cease to be or are sold. The exchange of one thing for another, however, seems to be equivalent to sale.²

Therefore indulgences do not cease because a price is paid after the rosary or blessed thing has been blessed, provided the sale itself had place before the blessing; nor do they cease from the fact that rosaries, crosses, etc., enriched with indulgences are given or lent to another for gaining indulgences; and this holds even if the one giving or lending the said rosaries, crosses, etc., has already used them for acquiring indulgences.³ Nor is it an obstacle that something is received or even asked, provided it is not done under the title of sale.

As regards rosaries, note that the indulgences are attached to the beads; hence the chain can be changed. If the beads are bound by a thread and this is broken so that the beads are gathered into one, the indulgences seem to be suspended and, when the rosary has been restored, to revive.

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, August 26, 1840 (Decreta authentica, n. 285).

² Cf. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 4, 1721 (Decreta authentica, n. 78).

³ Cf. Sacred Penitentiary, February 18, 1921 (A.A.S. 1921, p. 164).

Sinful Indulgence.—Sinful indulgence, which is opposed to meekness by excess, is often a mortal sin on account of the grave harm it inflicts upon the common welfare and the protection it affords to crime. Thus, Heli was seriously reproved and punished because he winked at grave disorders, or at least was too easy-going in his corrections (I Kings, ii, iii).

As regards indulgences. - "All professed regulars enjoy the indulgences granted to any religious order," L. l. 4, n. 64, namely according to the Brief of Leo X, Dudum per Nos accepto, 10 Dec. 1519, and the Brief of Paul V, Romanus Pontifex, 23 May 1606, indulgences exclusively proper to each order being excluded from this communication, S. C. Indulg., 25 Apr. 1735; Theod. a Spiritu S., p. 2, p. 88 ff., p. 114. "It must be noted that the privilege of a privileged altar is not communicable by general communication of privileges, from the Decree of S. C. Indulg., dated 5 Feb. 1748, and approved by Benedict XIV on 2 Mar. of the same year." L. l. 6, n. 339. More recent nuns of simple vows, in France, of ancient religious orders, from a special indult, "can gain all indulgences which were granted to the religion or Institute of other nuns emitting solemn vows, according to the respective Institute or rule." S. C. Indulg., 10 July 1843; S. Poenit., 12 July 1847.

But Institutes of Tertiaries dwelling in Community and emitting simple vows participate in all Indulgences directly granted to the First and Second Orders, provided they are legitimately aggregated to the Orders. S. C. Indulg., 28 Aug. 1903; E. M., de Stat. part., n. 248.

It must further be noted that personal privileges and indulgences in churches of regulars vanish when the religious have been driven out, although some religious remains in the church as chaplain or custodian. But real privileges, such as the right of burying, when a religious is left there under the name of chaplain or custodian, must be exercised by him. S. C. C., 29 May 1841; 29 Aug. 1864; 16 Sept. 1871; S. C. Indulg., 24 May 1819; A. S. S., vol. 1, p. 287; vol. 4, p. 228; vol. 7, p. 34. - E. M.

281 bis. Secular Tertiaries of St. Francis, by force of the Apostolic Letters of 5 May 1909 and the Rescript of 17 May 1909, enjoy communication of all Indulgences and spiritual fruits with the First and Second Order of St. Francis, the extension then having been made to General Absolutions. S. O., 12 June 1913, A. A. S., vol. 5, p. 306 ff. Secular Franciscan Tertiaries reciting in place of the canonical hours twelve Our Fathers, Hail Marys, and Glory Bes cannot by this recitation alone satisfy all other obligations, as regards prayers, which they have contracted from enrollment in other pious sodalities. S. O., 11 June 1913. Third Orders proceeding collegially, in their own habit and under a cross, always and everywhere have precedence over any Sodalities whatsoever. S. R. C., 18 Feb. 1899; E. M.

XI. All who, making gain from Indulgences and other spiritual graces, are struck with the censure of excommunication by the constitution of St. Pius V Quam plenum, January 2, 1569.

All who, etc. By the aforesaid constitution of St. Pius V, it is decreed only that inferiors to Bishops incur the sentence of excommunication, sec. 6. Making gain: therefore it is necessary that at least part of the price be received. Making gain, etc., namely 1. by dispensing indulgences and other spiritual graces, not to be conferred with any temporal thing, to those paying a certain sum of money, so that this payment of money is a condition owed for that concession, as if its price, although this is done under pretext of promoting a pious work; 2. by presuming to publish letters which contain graces of this kind, or by commanding an index of cases and indulgences to be hung in sacred buildings, by which they seem to hunt buyers, since it is openly signified that the aforesaid things are conceded to those paying, although again this is done under pretext of a pious work. Cited Constitution, secs. 1, 2, 3, 4.

And other spiritual graces: these are enumerated in the aforesaid Constitution: 1. the faculty of choosing any priest whatsoever by whom someone may be absolved not only from non-reserved cases, but also from reserved cases, sec. 1; 2. "remissions of enjoined penances," sec. 2; the sacrifice of Mass, burial in the time of interdict; the use of prohibited foods; the assumption of two or more godparents at sacred baptism, contrary to the Tridentine Decree, besides those who are chosen, as they say, by synodal Constitutions; absolution from the guilt of simony reserved to the Apostolic See, sec. 3.

Of excommunication, etc. Therefore the suspension imposed in the same Constitution of St. Pius V against Bishops and Cardinals, sec. 6, has by no means been renewed by the constitution Apostolicae Sedis. Bonacina, disp. 2, q. 3, part 20.

What about images and indulgences? "Images of Our Lord Jesus Christ, the Blessed Virgin Mary, Angels and Saints, or other Servants of God, printed in any way whatsoever and differing from the sense and decrees of the Church, are altogether forbidden. But new ones, whether they have prayers annexed or are edited without them, are not to be published without permission of ecclesiastical power." § 15. Images, not statues, not medals, not paintings. Printed in any way whatsoever, for they can be printed in various ways. Already printed ones are forbidden if they differ from the sense and Decrees of the Church. Cf. Trent, sess. 25, *de Sacr.

Imag.*; Benedict XIV, Constitution Sollicitudini, October 1, 1745. Altogether forbidden: therefore they can neither be publicly exposed nor privately retained. Except unless they are retained as a mere historical monument of art. New ones, or those to be printed hereafter, and new as regards their form, cannot be printed and published without permission of ecclesiastical power. Published without it, they were indeed illicitly published, but they are not proscribed unless they differ from the sense and Decrees of the Church. "It is interdicted to all in any way to spread indulgences which are apocryphal and proscribed or revoked by the Holy Apostolic See.

Those which have already been spread are to be removed from the hands of the faithful." § 16. Apocryphal, namely false. Cf. true indulgences in authentic Collections of Indulgences approved by the Sacred Congregation, Raccolta delle Indulgenze, etc. Proscribed by the Holy Apostolic See: cf. Ferraris, v. Indulgentia, art. 4. To spread: reading in itself is not interdicted, but it is prescribed that those spread, whether in print or in manuscript, be removed from the hands of the faithful, which especially pertains to ecclesiastical superiors. "All books of indulgences, summaries, booklets, leaves, etc., in which grants of them are contained, are not to be published without permission of the competent authority." § 17.

Of the competent authority, namely either of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences or of the Bishop; of the Sacred Congregation, if there is question of new indulgences and of new summaries of them; of the Bishop, if there is speech of indulgences and summaries already approved by the Sacred Congregation, according to the norms established before the new Constitution Officiorum ac munerum. Sacred Congregation of the Index, Constitution, August 7, 1897. Permission: without it they are illicitly published, but those published are not for that reason proscribed by that very fact. E.M. 1310, 1355.

What is an indulgence? "Indulgence is accustomed to signify remission and facility, or, so to speak, condescension, in the holy Scriptures and in other authors..." Bellarmine, de Indulg., book 1, chap. 1. Hence Indulgence, taken theologically, is defined: the remission of temporal punishment owed to God for sins remitted as regards guilt, granted by a legitimate minister outside the sacrament of penance, through the application of the satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints.

Remission of temporal punishment: for remission of eternal punishment together with remission of mortal guilt is not obtained except through the sacrament of penance, or through charity and perfect contrition with the vow of the sacrament. But when guilt and eternal punishment have been remitted, temporal punishment, also owed to sin, is not always remitted. St. Thomas, III, q. 80, art. 4. Now this temporal punishment is that which is then remitted through satisfactory works and through Indulgence in this life; otherwise it will be paid after this life in Purgatory. The same must be said, by proportionate reasoning, of venial sin, to which only temporal punishment is owed. St. Thomas, loc. cit. Its guilt is remitted by charity and other pious acts, by which temporal punishment is also remitted; but again this is not always wholly remitted, whence it must be remitted either by other satisfactory works or by Indulgence in this life, otherwise it too will have to be paid in Purgatory after this life. Trent, sess. 6, canon 30; sess. 14, canons 5, 8, 9, chaps. 12, 15; St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 16, q. 2, art. 2, q. 4; dist. 17, q. 2, art. 5, q. 2; supplement, q. 15, art. 3. Therefore indulgence is neither remission of the guilt, Benedict XIV, de Syn., book 13, chap. 18, n. 7; Suarez, de Poenit., disp. 50, sect. 1, n. 14, nor is it remission of the debt of eternal punishment; rather it is only remission of the debt of temporal punishment still owed to sin. Of temporal punishment, namely to be inflicted by God in Purgatory, and therefore it is remission before God. It is by no means a mere remission either of penance imposed or to be imposed on the penitent by the confessor, or of canonical penance, which the Church formerly inflicted. Indulgence would not then be most salutary for us. Trent, sess. 25, Decree on Indulgences. "This opinion," says St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 20, q. 1, art. 3, q. 1, "does not seem true, first because it is expressly against the privilege given to Peter, that what he would remit on earth would be remitted also in heaven; whence remission which is made as regards the forum of the Church is valid also as regards the forum of God; and besides, the Church, granting or giving Indulgences of this kind, would harm rather than help, because she would remit to graver penalties, namely of Purgatory, by absolving from imposed penances." But although indulgence is remission of temporal punishment, and from this head frees us from other satisfactory works, nevertheless we cannot for that reason absolutely neglect these; since they serve at the same time both for satisfying for sins committed and for preventing sins in the future. St. Thomas, Quodlibet 2, art. 16, ad 3.

This remission of temporal punishment is made through application of the satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints, by force of the communion of Saints which is present in the Church, and of the power by which one can satisfy for another. "The work of one," says St. Thomas, Quodlibet 2, art. 16, "can be satisfactory for another, to whom it is referred by the intention of the one doing it. But Christ poured out his Blood for his Church, and did and sustained many other things, the valuation of which is of infinite value because of the dignity of the person... similarly also all the other Saints had the intention in those things which they suffered and did for God, that this would be for the utility not only of themselves, but also of the whole Church." Cf. Contra Gentiles, book 3, chap. 158, n. 4. Now the satisfactions of infinite price of Jesus Christ, to which accede the satisfactions of the Blessed Virgin and also the superabundant satisfactions of the Saints, constitute the treasury of the Church, of which we participate through indulgences. Extravagant Unigenitus 2, de Poenit. et remiss.; Benedict XIV, Constitution Pia Mater, April 5, 1747, at the beginning. Superabundant: "And therefore," says St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 20, q. 1, art. 3, q. 1, "it must be said that [indulgences] are valid both as regards the forum of the Church and as regards the judgment of God, for the remission of the punishment remaining after contrition and absolution and confession, whether it has been imposed or not. But the reason why they can be valid is the unity of the mystical body, in which many have supererogated by works of penance beyond the measure of their debts; and many have also patiently sustained unjust tribulations, through which a multitude of punishments could be expiated, if they were owed to them; and the abundance of their merits is so great that they exceed every punishment owed by those now living, and especially because of the merit of Christ, which, although it operates in the sacraments, nevertheless its efficacy is not included in the sacraments, but by its infinity exceeds the efficacy of the sacraments. But it was said above, art. 2, q. 3, that one can satisfy for another. But the Saints, in whom a superabundance of works of satisfaction is found, did not perform works of this kind determinately for this man who needs remission; otherwise he would obtain remission without any indulgence. But they did so commonly for the whole Church, as the Apostle says to the Colossians 1, that he fills up those things which are lacking of the Passion of Christ in his body for the Church to which he writes. And thus the aforesaid merits are common to the whole Church. But those things which are common to some multitude are distributed to individuals of the multitude according to the judgment of him who presides over the multitude. Whence just as someone would obtain remission of punishment if another had satisfied for him, so also if the satisfaction of another is distributed to him by one who can do it." Cf. Quodlibet 2, art. 16; supplement, q. 25; L., book 6, n. 531; E.M.

Does the Church have the power of granting indulgences? R. Affirmatively, and it is of faith. Trent, sess. 25, Decree on Indulgences; Pius IV, Bull Iniunctum nobis, November 18, 1564. But indulgences cannot be granted without cause, neither licitly nor validly. The reason is that the prelates of the Church are nothing other than delegates of Christ for dispensing the treasury of the Church. L., book 6, n. 532. Now "whatever cause is present which turns to the utility of the Church and the honor of God is a sufficient reason for bestowing indulgences." St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 20, q. 1, art. 3, q. 2. Indulgences can be granted "principally by the Pope; but by others insofar as they receive power from him, whether ordinary or committed, or delegated." St. Thomas, Quodlibet 2, art. 16; Suarez, de Poenit., disp. 53.

The Supreme Pontiff can delegate this faculty both to Bishops and to simple priests. Indeed, as St. Thomas says, Quodlibet 2, art. 16, ad 2, "an indulgence does not extend to the remission of guilt, because it is not sacramental; whence it does not follow order, but jurisdiction; for even one who is not a priest can make an indulgence, if it has been committed to him." Hence 1. the application of indulgences is made outside the sacrament. 2. A Bishop-elect and canonically instituted, although not yet consecrated, can grant indulgences, but by no means a titular Bishop, or coadjutor, or resigned Bishop. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 12, 1878, to 4. 3. Personal indulgences granted by a Bishop can be acquired only by diocesan subjects, since no one can be bound or absolved by a judge not his own. Chap. Quod autem 4, de Poenit. et remiss. But a Bishop can grant indulgences to his subjects staying outside his diocese, because he has personal jurisdiction over them. St. Thomas, supplement, q. 26; L., book 6, nn. 532-533.

Note: Those who obtain general concessions of indulgences, general not personal, for the recitation, for example, of prayers, etc., must, under penalty of nullity, bring a copy of the same concessions to the Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences. Same Sacred Congregation, January 28, 1756; April 14, 1856. He who has obtained the faculty of blessing Beads, Crosses, Rosaries, Medals, etc., with application of Apostolic Indulgences and of St. Bridget, cannot validly exercise it unless he has been approved for receiving sacramental confessions, at least of men. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 14, 1901. And the same faculty must be recognized by the Holy Office. Pius X, motu proprio, April 7, 1910. Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 2, p. 225 ff. All confessors can commute the abstinence of Wednesday and Saturday, to which those who do not know how to read are bound, in place of reciting the little office, for the effect of enjoying the Sabbatine privilege of the scapular of the Blessed Virgin Mary of Mount Carmel. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 14, 1901. Trent, sess. 21, chap. 9, de Ref.; E.M.

Privileges of Cardinals. "6. Of gaining in their own chapels the indulgences for acquiring which the visit of some church or public chapel of the city or place in which the Cardinals are actually staying is prescribed; their familiars can also enjoy this privilege. "7. Of blessing everywhere, by the sign of the cross alone, with all indulgences customarily granted by the Holy See, rosaries and other prayer beads, crosses, medals, statues, scapulars approved by the Apostolic See, and of imposing these without the burden of inscription. "8. Under one blessing, of erecting in churches and oratories, even private ones in which Mass can be celebrated, and in other pious places, the Stations of the Way of the Cross with all indulgences which have been imparted to those performing an exercise of this kind; and also of blessing for the faithful who, because of infirmity or another legitimate impediment, cannot visit the sacred stations of the Way of the Cross, images of the Crucified with application of all the indulgences annexed by the Apostolic See to the devout exercise of the same Way of the Cross. "14. Of granting an indulgence of two hundred days in places or institutes and for persons of their jurisdiction or protection; likewise in other places, but to be gained only by those present, each time." First Supplement. E.M.

What do the words in forma Ecclesiae consueta, in the accustomed form of the Church, signify in Concessions of indulgences? The words in forma Ecclesiae consueta, which are used in Concessions or Indults, signify nothing other than that the indulgences are granted to the faithful truly penitent, or truly contrite. Lavorius, tract. de Iubilaeo et Indulg., part 2, chap. 14; Theodorus a Spiritu Sancto, part 1, p. 284. Nor indeed do they signify that some special formula is to be used in the blessing of pious objects so that indulgences may be applied to them. For this the simple sign of the cross suffices, except for Rosaries of the Fathers Preachers and Servites, for which the prescribed formula is required. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, April 11, 1840; January 7, 1843; February 29, 1864. The prescribed formula is also required for the Crosses of Stations of the Way of the Cross, for aggregation to various Confraternities, for a plenary Indulgence in the article of death through the Apostolic Blessing, and for the Apostolic Blessing besides the aforesaid.

Several objects can be blessed at the same time, and indulgences can be applied to them. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 12, 1855. Several indulgences can be applied to the same object. And thus Apostolic indulgences, those of the Fathers Preachers, Crucigeri, and St. Bridget can be applied to the same beads. Nevertheless, to gain them, the imposed repeatable works must be renewed. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 29, 1820. Indulgences can generally be applied to any solid and durable things, but by no means to fragile ones. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 24, 1846. But specifically beads or rosaries can be blessed if made from polished steel (acciaio polimentato), from iron, tin, lead, and from solid and compact glass. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 29, 1820; March 22, 1839. But whether someone can gain the same indulgences several times in a day, by several times repeating the imposed works, must be determined from another clause of the Concession, toties quoties, as often as, or if the Concession determines nothing. Holy Office, June 24, 1914, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 6, p. 379. On the same day the indulgences of Stations, or of the Visitation of a Church, cannot be obtained several times. On the contrary, indulgences of the Rosary, acts of Faith, Hope, Charity, etc., can be obtained several times. E.M.

For the Way of the Cross to be erected, a written faculty obtained from the General of the Order of St. Francis or from the Holy See is required. It is to be exhibited to the Ordinary, who must give consent in writing, as also the Superior of the place. The customary form must be used, and the document of erection is to be kept in the place. Thus several decrees of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences.

Apostolic Blessing to be imparted at the end of sermons. This blessing is given by one sign of the cross with a Crucifix, with the following formula: Benedictio Dei Omnipotentis Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti descendat super vos, et maneat semper. R. Amen. Sacred Congregation of Rites, May 11, 1911.

General Absolution and papal Blessing to Secular Tertiaries. "Regular Superiors can delegate Priests of their own Order, even those not approved for hearing confessions, to impart General Absolution and the papal Blessing to secular Tertiaries in their own churches." Holy Office, May 27, 1914, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 6, p. 347.

Manner of blessing certain devotional things by Apostolic authority. Declaration. "In blessing several similar or diverse objects of religion which are offered to a priest furnished with several faculties, joined or mixed together, and in enriching them with indulgences by force of diverse faculties, one sign suffices for several blessings and annexations of indulgences. And the declaration is not extended to metallic medals to be substituted for scapulars, concerning which in the Decree of the Holy Office, December 16, 1910." Holy Office, May 18, 1914, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 6, p. 346.

Blessing of medals for scapulars. Several medals, to be substituted for scapulars, can be blessed at the same time, by one sign of the cross, by a Priest having the power. Nor is it necessary that the persons to whom they are distributed have already been enrolled in the Scapulars. Holy Office, June 4, 1903, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 5, p. 303 ff.

Indulgence toties quoties, annexed to Crucifixes. "The faculty of blessing Crucifixes with application of the Plenary Indulgence called toties quoties, whether obtained personally from the Supreme Pontiff, or in any way from the Apostolic See through the channel of any Office or person, is to be understood thus and not otherwise: that any of Christ's faithful, constituted in the article of death, who shall have kissed or in any way touched one of these blessed Crucifixes, even if it does not belong to him, provided that, confessed and refreshed by holy Communion, or, if he could not do this, at least contrite, he has devoutly invoked the Most Holy Name of Jesus by mouth, if he could, otherwise by heart, and has patiently accepted death from the hand of the Lord as the wages of sin, can acquire the Plenary Indulgence." Holy Office, June 10, 1914, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 6, p. 348.

To whom can indulgences be applied? Since the living are subject to the authority of the Church, the Church directly remits temporal punishments to them through indulgences; and consequently indulgences are said to be granted by way of payment and absolution, namely by paying those penalties through the application of the satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints. St. Thomas, IV, dist. 20, q. 1, art. 3, q. 1, ad 2. Indulgences can also be applied to the dead dwelling in Purgatory, and they are applied to them by way of suffrage, since the Church no longer has jurisdiction over the souls which are detained in Purgatory. By way of suffrage, namely by offering to God a part of the satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints which corresponds to the granted indulgence, asking God that he will console the souls of Purgatory by remitting to them as much punishment as corresponds to the obtained indulgence. But the real effect of such an indulgence cannot be infallibly affirmed, namely whether it is applied totally and to such a soul. For God has made no formal promise of this matter. But, the communication of the Saints being considered, it can very piously be believed and hoped. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, July 28, 1840. Hence it is very useful to apply to the dead as great a number of indulgences as we can. Therefore "although the effect of indulgences for the living is infallible, nevertheless it is not infallible for the dead, since for them there is no promise present, whence God accepts them only according to his good pleasure." L., book 6, n. 534. And this is confirmed from the use and practice of the Church of celebrating Masses for several years and for the same souls, e.g., anniversaries, even on privileged altars, or those to which the privilege of plenary indulgence adheres.

But that practice would be vain if it were established with infallible certainty that immediately, when the first Mass was applied to them, they would be freed. All and individual indulgences which are reviewed in the Collection of prayers, etc., commonly Raccolta di orazioni, etc., are applicable also to the faithful departed. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, September 30, 1852. St. Thomas, supplement, q. 27, art. 4, q. 71; Lugo, disp. 27, n. 58; La-Croix 1336; Billuart, Appendix, art. 6; E.M.

Of how many kinds is Indulgence? One Indulgence is plenary, another partial. Plenary is that by which the whole temporal punishment owed to sins is remitted. But partial is that by which some certain quantity of the aforesaid punishment is remitted. St. Thomas, Quodlibet 2, art. 16. Now a partial indulgence, e.g., of forty days or one year, does not import remission of forty days or one year of the punishment of Purgatory, but only remission of that punishment of Purgatory which someone would once have obtained before God through canonical penance of forty days or one year. But how great is the remission of the punishment of Purgatory corresponding to the aforesaid canonical penance is a matter unknown to us and is reserved to divine mercy. Benedict XIV, de Syn., book 13, chap. 17; St. Thomas, supplement, q. 28; L., book 6, nn. 530, 535.

Besides, one Indulgence is local, another personal, another real. Local is that which is affixed to a determined place, e.g., to a determined church, to a determined chapel and altar, statue or image, placed in some Sanctuary. Personal in the stricter sense is that which is granted to some person or persons, without being granted to all the faithful. But less strictly it is that which is granted to the faithful independently of place or of a determined object, on account of some act of piety. Finally, real is that which is annexed to portable objects or things of devotion, e.g., a crucifix, medal, rosary, small statue, etc. This real Indulgence is regularly also personal, since regularly only the owners of these things, to whom the aforesaid things were first handed over, can gain the indulgences. And if the same things are lent to others so that they may gain the indulgences, or are given to them, the indulgences are lost. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 6, 1657; February 3, 1745. Blessed objects can neither be sold nor exchanged, otherwise the indulgences are lost. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 4, 1721; December 4, 1722. Indeed, if someone buys them so that he may then distribute them blessed, he can neither seek back their price, nor anything even under the title of alms, without the indulgences being lost. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 22, 1847; January 31, 1837; July 16, 1887. But real indulgences of this kind endure as long as the object is not at least morally destroyed; and thus, if a rosary is repaired because some beads have been lost, the indulgences are not for that reason lost. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 10, 1839.

Moreover one Indulgence is perpetual, another temporary. The former endures until it is revoked; the latter endures only for a determinate time, e.g., three, five, seven years. But indulgences granted at the good pleasure of the Roman Pontiff or of the Apostolic See are judged perpetual, because they are referred not to the person, but to the dignity. Rule 16 of Law in 6.

Finally, one Indulgence is only for the living, another only for the dead, another for the living with the faculty of applying it to the dead. This Indulgence granted for the living and also applicable to the dead does not signify that someone can gain the indulgence twice, for himself and for the dead, but only that he can gain it at his choice either for himself or for the dead. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 15, 1839. Therefore, in order that an indulgence can really be applied to the dead, it is required: 1. that in the Pontifical Indult it be granted as applicable to the dead; 2. that there be an intention of making such application. Suarez, disp. 53, sect. 14. But it can be applied either generally to all souls dwelling in Purgatory, or in particular to some or to one only. E.M.

Is intention prerequired for gaining indulgences? R. Affirmatively, for an indulgence is a grace which is made to those willing to enjoy it; and therefore certain works to be fulfilled are always prescribed. But it is not necessary that this intention be actual; rather a virtual intention suffices, namely one once had and not revoked, which moves us to fulfill the prescribed works. But whether even a merely habitual intention suffices, i.e., once had and not retracted, without it moving us to fulfill the prescribed works, is controverted. Grave doctors affirm, because an indulgence is granted by the Church by way of payment for the work imposed. Therefore, this having been furnished, the power of the keys of the Church pays the penalty. Cf. Schmalzgrueber, book 5, tit. 38, n. 133. In the book of indulgences La Raccolta, p. XII, it is said: "it is necessary to have at least in general the intention of gaining indulgences." Therefore it suffices if someone in the morning forms the intention of gaining, during the day, all indulgences which are annexed to the pious works which he is going to do. Nor indeed is it necessary to know determinately what these indulgences are, and whether in fact they are. Laymann, book 5, tract. 7, chap. 6, n. 5; Diana, tom. 4, res. 18; Billuart, Appendix de Indulg., art. 5; Lugo, de Poenit., disp. 27, n. 80.

Is it required, for gaining indulgences, that someone be in the state of grace? R. Affirmatively. "No punishment can be remitted to anyone unless guilt has already been remitted to him." St. Thomas, IV Sent., dist. 20, q. 1, art. 5, q. 1; L., book 6, nn. 533, 534. Besides, an Indulgence depends on the intention of the one granting it. Now an indulgence is granted only to the contrite and confessed. St. Thomas, supplement, q. 27, art. 1. Nevertheless, if a plenary indulgence requires several works of piety, it is enough that the last be performed in the state of grace. Raccolta, p. XII; L., loc. cit. If, when Confession is prescribed, after Confession someone falls into grave sin, an act of contrition suffices, and a new Confession is required only in a Jubilee. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 14, 1852.

What is generally required as regards the fulfillment of the works imposed for acquiring indulgences? Someone must fulfill them piously and devoutly, personally and integrally, at the time and place and with the other circumstances established in the indult. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 21, 1820. Personally; nevertheless the alms prescribed in a Jubilee can be fulfilled through another. Integrally: a small omission does not impede gaining the indulgence; a small thing is reputed as nothing. But they need not be fulfilled among themselves in any determined order.

That formula, those who, truly penitent, confessed, and refreshed by holy communion, have visited the church, indeed imports that Confession must be performed even by those who are not conscious to themselves of lethal sin; which Confession nevertheless can also suffice if it is completed on the vigil of the festivity. But the visitation of the church can be fulfilled either before or after the fulfillment of the other pious works. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 19, 1859. When in partial Indulgences the clause is added, with heart at least contrite, contrition is required only as a disposition, not as an imposed work, and therefore it is not necessary that an act of contrition be elicited by those who are in the state of grace. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, December 17, 1870. A work which must be performed from obligation from elsewhere cannot suffice for gaining an indulgence without the express concession of the Supreme Pontiff, unless it is a work imposed by the confessor as penance. Benedict XIV, Constitution Inter praeteritos, § 53; Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 29, 1841; March 7, 1888. Cf. Benedict XIV, Inst. 53, § 11. Cf. here 734. But by the same pious work, to which indulgences are annexed under various titles, all can be gained, provided that the imposed works truly cannot or are not accustomed to be repeated, such as Confession, unless it is necessary from elsewhere. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, January 12, 1878, to 3. In the recitation alone of the Marian Rosary, the cumulation of Indulgences called those of the Fathers Preachers and of the Fathers Crucigeri was granted, provided the Beads have received each blessing. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 12, 1907. In the recitation alone of the Rosary, etc.; for the Indulgence of five hundred days, which is annexed to Beads blessed by the Fathers Crucigeri, or by others having the faculty, is acquired as often as with the said Beads the Pater noster or Ave Maria is recited. Acta Sanctae Sedis, vol. 40, p. 443. The Most Holy One granted "that the sick or those worn out by old age in a community and living under a rule, who cannot visit churches or oratories or execute other things prescribed for indulgences, may nevertheless be able to gain indulgences by fulfilling other pious works to be prescribed at the judgment of the confessor." Leo XIII, January 16, 1886. Pius IX had already granted the same privilege earlier, on September 18, 1862, to the habitually sick outside a community, unable to leave the house. St. Thomas, supplement, q. 27, art. 3; L., book 1, s., nn. 533, 534; E.M. "The faithful of each sex who, for zeal of perfection, or for the sake of instruction or education, or even of health, live a common life in houses lacking a church or public chapel, but established with the consent of the Ordinaries, and also all persons staying there to minister to them, whenever the visitation of some church in general is prescribed for gaining indulgences, i.e., not of a determined church, or of some indeterminate public oratory, can visit the chapel of their own house, in which by law they can satisfy the obligation of hearing Mass, provided that they have duly performed the other works imposed." Holy Office, January 14, 1909, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 1, p. 210.

When are Confession and Communion to be performed? For an indulgence of Jubilee, or in the form of a Jubilee, all the prescribed works, and therefore also Confession and Communion, must be performed during the time designated for the duration of the Jubilee. For other indulgences, Confession and Communion are not always required. And thus they are not necessary for indulgences of the Way of the Cross. Nevertheless they are ordinarily required as regards most plenary indulgences. Now Confession and Communion can be performed on the vigil of the festivity, or of the day to which the indulgences are affixed; and even eight days before the feast, where because of the scarcity of confessors the faithful frequently cannot confess. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 19, 1750; June 12, 1822; October 6, 1870; Raccolta, p. XXI; L., loc. cit., n. 534.

When Confession is prescribed for gaining an indulgence, it is necessary for all, even for those who already are in the state of grace; but for these only Confession without absolution suffices. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 19, 1759; August 20, 1822; December 15, 1841; May 6, 1852. All those who have the custom of making Confession at least once in each week can gain all and any indulgences whatsoever which occur from one Confession to another, except the indulgence of Jubilee, and others granted after the likeness of a Jubilee. Confession would then be necessary only if they have sinned gravely. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, December 9, 1763; March 5, 1855; December 4, 1843; November 23, 1878; February 25, 1886; Raccolta, pp. XVII-XVIII. Besides, all who daily approach Communion, although they abstain from Communion once or twice during the week, gain all occurring Indulgences without the obligation of weekly Confession. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 14, 1906. Easter Communion suffices for gaining indulgences affixed to the same day or to the following day. Nevertheless the same does not suffice for gaining the indulgence of Jubilee. And the same must be said of annual Confession. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 10, 1844; March 19, 1841; December 15, 1841; May 10, 1884.

Outside Jubilee the same Confession and Communion suffice for gaining several plenary indulgences on the same day or the following, provided nevertheless that the other prescribed works are fulfilled. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 29, 1841; February 29, 1864. When for gaining a local or personal indulgence a determined church is to be visited, it is not necessary to receive Communion in the same church, unless this also has been prescribed. But if Communion is received in it on the same day to which the indulgence is annexed, and prayers are poured forth according to the intention of the Supreme Pontiff, it is not necessary to make another visitation. Raccolta, p. XXV. Since in the article of death it is not possible to receive Communion, then to gain a plenary indulgence it suffices to invoke, with contrition and at least by heart if one cannot by mouth, the Name of Jesus. E.M. "... It is granted that the Confession to be performed for gaining an Indulgence, if this has been granted several times on the same day, can be anticipated during the three immediately preceding days; but if it has been granted once in a day, only two whole days beforehand... yet in such a way that besides Communion permitted on the day before the day to which the Indulgence is annexed, in fulfilling the other imposed works the general rule concerning the manner and time prescribed in the concessions is observed." Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 11, 1908, Acta Sanctae Sedis, vol. 41, p. 359 ff.

All who daily approach Communion, although they abstain from Communion once or twice during the week, gain all occurring Indulgences without the obligation of weekly Confession, nothing nevertheless being innovated concerning Indulgences of Jubilee. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 14, 1906.

With regard to those who are refreshed daily or almost daily by the Bread of Angels, the broader concessions already made remaining firm, and by name that of February 14, 1906, sacramental confession made within the last eight days before the day designated for gaining the Indulgence suffices for gaining any Indulgences whatsoever. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, April 23, 1914, Acta Apostolicae Sedis, vol. 6, p. 309.

What prayers are to be recited? The prayers regularly to be recited according to the intentions are often not determined. Therefore someone is free to recite whatever prayers he wishes. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 29, 1841; September 13, 1888. From accepted use, five Pater and Ave suffice. Nevertheless vocal prayers are to be recited. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, September 13, 1888; Benedict XIV, Convocatis, November 25, 1749, § 51; Encyclical to the Roman Penitentiaries Inter praeteritos, December 3, 1729, § 83. Prayers are to be recited in the church if it is prescribed to visit the church and pour forth prayers there; otherwise they can be recited in any place. Raccolta, p. XXIV. Prayers are not to be recited on bent knees unless this also is prescribed. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, September 18, 1862; Raccolta, p. XV. But someone can recite them alone, or alternately with a companion according to custom. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 29, 1820. Prayers are to be recited as many times as there are diverse indulgences which someone wishes to gain on the same day. Raccolta, p. XXV. The intentions of the Supreme Pontiff, which he almost always requires, are the exaltation of the Catholic Church, the propagation of the faith, the extirpation of heresy and schism, the conversion of sinners, peace and concord among Christian Princes, and other necessities of the Christian people. It is not necessary to have these intentions explicitly; it suffices generally to pray according to the intention of the Supreme Pontiff. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, July 12, 1847. Prayers to which indulgences are annexed can be recited in any language, provided the translation is faithful. So that the faithfulness of the translation may be established, the Declaration of the Cardinal Prefect of the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, or of the Bishop of the place to whom that translation is a vulgar language, suffices. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, December 29, 1864. The Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary is excepted, which is to be recited in Latin. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, September 13, 1888. The same must be said of the Office of the Dead. The recitation of the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the vernacular language is valid only for private recitation. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, August 28, 1903. But that is still private "although its recitation takes place in common within the enclosure of a religious house, indeed even in the church itself or public oratory annexed to the aforesaid house, but with doors closed." Sacred Congregation of Rites, December 18, 1906. For deaf-mutes, when visitation of a church is prescribed, it suffices devoutly to visit the church; when public prayers are prescribed, it suffices to pray by heart, provided they are found together with other faithful in the same place; when private prayers are prescribed, the confessor can commute them into other pious acts in some way sensible. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 15, 1852; Raccolta, p. XVI. And by a general Decree it was conceded to them to acquire indulgences by pouring forth the imposed prayers by signs or by mind, or only by reading the same without any pronunciation. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, July 18, 1902. E.M.

A daily plenary indulgence for those visiting some church, unless otherwise expressly declared, signifies that each one of Christ's faithful can gain that indulgence only once in the year. Pius IX, March 15, 1852.

At what time must the prescribed works be fulfilled? They must be fulfilled at the time determined in the indult itself. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, September 25, 1841. Nevertheless Confession and Communion, as was said, can always be made on the vigil. The time of an indulgence granted for one determined day begins from midnight to midnight, unless something else is expressed. Sacred Congregation, January 12, 1878. "When in the concession the words are had, from first vespers, the visitation can be made on the preceding day, but not before the hour at which vespers are commonly accustomed to be publicly recited." Authentic Raccolta delle Indulg., p. XXII. Cf. 1370. But afterwards, from the Holy Office, January 26, 1911, the time for the visitation of a church, when this is prescribed, begins from noon of the day preceding that to which the Indulgence is affixed until midnight of the following day. When a plenary Indulgence is granted once in a month, the month is not necessarily to be computed from its first day, but a continuous space of thirty days suffices. Pius IX, August 9, 1852, by Decree Urbis et Orbis, "benignly commanded that all indulgences which up to now have been granted to certain feasts, and will be granted hereafter, or which for the same feasts have likewise been granted to some churches and public oratories and will be granted hereafter, or even, if it please, with the consent of the Ordinary, those granted in sacred supplications, or in novendial, or septenary, or triduan prayers before or after the feast, or while its octave endures, are to be understood as transferred for that day on which feasts of this kind, even only as regards solemnity and external celebration, but not as regards office and Mass, are legitimately transferred in some places, or churches, and public oratories, whether perpetually, or on some occasion, or for a time and while it endures. But when only the office with Mass is transferred, but not the solemnity and exterior celebration of the feast, he decreed that no transfer of indulgences is made." E.M.

When the faculty is granted of commuting the works imposed for gaining indulgences, must the commutation be made in Confession? One must stand, says Gury, n. 1016, by the rule which Benedict XIV hands down in the Constitution Inter praeteritos, § 63, where he establishes that commutations of this kind must be made in Confession alone. For, after reviewing the controversy concerning the commutation of vows, absolution from censures, and the power of dispensing in other matters, or of commuting the prescribed works, whether all these must be done by the confessor in the act of sacramental confession or not, he thus concludes: But We, to remove every difficulty, in the Instruction, Constitution Convocatis, enjoined that no absolutions, commutations, and dispensations can be given by the penitentiaries outside the act of sacramental confession; and this seemed to Us both fitting and suitable to the gravity of the matter and the quality of the ministry, and removes every occasion of controversy, and is conformable to the practice of Our Apostolic Penitentiary. But Ballerini there observes that Benedict XIV, loc. cit., speaks of faculties conceded and of the mode of using them on the occasion of the Jubilee of the year 1750, but does not establish a general law. Whence he concludes that only then must commutations, etc., necessarily be made in Confession, when in the concession a condition of this kind is expressly provided. Indeed, from various Responses of the Sacred Penitentiary, March 16, 1865, January 30, 1886, the matter is one which depends on the will of the one granting the Indulgence. If it is not positively granted, since in Jubilees the cited Constitution of Benedict XIV is for a norm, this faculty in reality is not had. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 15, 1852.

In the Warnings for the Jubilee of the Holy Year 1900, § II, it is said: "Let confessors observe that absolutions and commutations, the power of which has been conferred on them, cannot be exercised by them outside the act of sacramental confession." Nevertheless for confessors outside Rome delegated by the Bishop by force of the Bull of Jubilee, as regards those impeded from coming to Rome, the Sacred Penitentiary declared, May 10, 1900, that they can use the faculties of commuting the visitations of the Basilicas outside Confession, but toward their own penitents.

What is Jubilee? The word Jubilee is derived, according to many, from the Hebrew iobel, which signifies fiftieth, because among the Hebrews the year of Jubilee recurred in the fiftieth year; or, according to others, from the same word signifying the sound of the trumpet, by which the fiftieth year was announced. According to others also, Jubilee is derived from iubai or iobal, which signifies to germinate, because in the fiftieth year the land was not cultivated, and the inhabitants fed on fruits springing up of themselves.

In imitation of the Jubilee of the Old Testament, the ecclesiastical Jubilee was instituted, which first was celebrated at Rome, but afterwards began to be celebrated in the whole world, with the fullest indulgence of sins, with great joy and solemnity. It was instituted by Boniface VIII, Constitution Antiquorum habet, February 23, 1300, and was to be celebrated in every hundredth year. But Clement VI, by a Constitution of the year 1343, decreed that thereafter it should be celebrated in every fiftieth year. By decree of Urban VI it began to be celebrated in every thirty-third year; and by the statute of Paul II, in every twenty-fifth year.

Jubilee is defined: a solemn plenary indulgence, which the Supreme Pontiff sometimes grants to all the faithful, with the obligation of performing certain pious works, at the same time giving to confessors special power of absolving from reserved sins and censures, of commuting most vows, and of dispensing in other matters. Hence Jubilee does not differ except accidentally from an ordinary plenary indulgence, namely by reason of the solemnity and of the privileges annexed to it; and also by reason of the most abundant and extraordinary graces which accompany it. For the wonderful and astonishing effects which Jubilee is accustomed to produce point to these altogether special graces, even if solemn gatherings of the faithful are not held, nor the divine word preached, by reason of the prayers of the whole Church.

What is required for gaining Jubilee? It is necessary to have the intention of gaining Jubilee, virtual or at least habitual. Moreover the prescribed works must be exactly fulfilled, and they cannot be commuted without the express faculty of the Supreme Pontiff. This faculty the Pontiff ordinarily grants to confessors for those impeded. Laymann, book 5, tract 8, chap. 8, n. 12.

In the general lesser Jubilee, the following works are regularly enjoined: fasting, alms, visitation of churches, with pious prayer according to the intention of the Supreme Pontiff, Confession, Communion. In the general greater Jubilee the prescribed works are: Confession, Communion, visitation of churches. Benedict XIV, Brief Inter praeteritos, December 3, 1749, for the Jubilee of the holy year; L., book 6, n. 536. For a particular Jubilee attention must be paid to the tenor of the Indult granted. Cf. Benedict XIV, Constitution In suprema, November 20, 1744, and Constitution Nullis verbis, February 20, 1745.

Works already owed from some other obligation cannot serve for gaining Jubilee, unless this is granted by the Supreme Pontiff. Benedict XIV, Encyclical Inter praeteritos, § 53; L., book 6, nn. 536, 538. They can be fulfilled in whatever order, as one wishes. Nevertheless it is necessary that one be in the state of grace when he fulfills the last one. Benedict XIV, Encyclical Inter praeteritos, §§ 73, 77. There is no obligation of completing the same works in one and the same week. Sacred Penitentiary, March 16, 1865; Acta Sanctae Sedis, vol. 1, p. 176.

They can be fulfilled in one's own diocese, or in another diocese, conforming oneself to the prescriptions of the Ordinary of the place. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, November 28, 1759; Acta Sanctae Sedis, vol. 8, p. 486, vol. 18, p. 334. Likewise someone can perform Confession and Communion in a foreign diocese, and the other works in his own, again conforming himself to the prescriptions of the Ordinary of the place. Sacred Penitentiary, 1875; January 15, 1886; Acta Sanctae Sedis, vol. 8, p. 486, vol. 18, p. 334. If Jubilee is prolonged for those traveling by sea, they can gain the Jubilee after their return to their homeland, by fulfilling the prescribed works, or gain it when they have arrived at some place of station. Sacred Penitentiary, 1875; Acta Sanctae Sedis, vol. 8, p. 485; L., n. 538. E.M.

What is a privileged altar? A privileged altar is an altar to which the Supreme Pontiff has annexed a plenary indulgence, which, if the mind of the one granting and the use of the power of the keys are considered, would immediately free a soul from all the punishments of Purgatory; but if the effect of application is considered, it is understood as an indulgence whose measure corresponds to the good pleasure and acceptance of divine mercy. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, July 28, 1840; Benedict XIV, Instruction 56, n. 15.

This indulgence does not differ from other plenary indulgences which are applied to the departed, except insofar as it has a more certain effect. For, according to the common opinion of the doctors, it does not depend on the personal dispositions of the priest, but on the offering of the divine victim, since it is attached solely to the celebration of the divine sacrifice on such an altar. Hence a priest who, from a stipend received, must celebrate at a privileged altar, does not satisfy the obligation undertaken by celebrating at another altar and gaining a plenary indulgence annexed to some pious work or object; but he does satisfy if he enjoys the privilege of a personal privileged altar. Those who make the heroic act of charity have such a privilege. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, February 13, 1745; February 22, 1847; May 2, 1852.

For a privileged altar is one thing local, another personal, according as the privilege adheres either to a determined altar or to a person, in whatever altar he celebrates, whether privileged or not, whether fixed or portable. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 15, 1852; March 20, 1846.

"17. The treasures of the Church, from which the Pope grants indulgences, are not the merits of Christ and of the Saints. - 18. Indulgences are pious frauds upon the faithful and remissions of good works; and they are among those things which are lawful, and not among those which are expedient. - 19. For those who truly obtain them, indulgences do not avail for the remission of the punishment due before divine justice for actual sins. - 20. Those who believe that indulgences are salutary and useful for the fruits of the spirit are deceived. - 21. Indulgences are necessary only for public crimes and are properly granted only to the hard and impatient. - 22. Indulgences are neither necessary nor useful to six classes of men: namely, to the dead or dying, the sick, those legitimately impeded, those who have not committed crimes, those who have committed crimes but not public ones, and those who perform better works. - 40. Souls freed from Purgatory by the suffrages of the living are less blessed than if they had made satisfaction for themselves." Propositions of Martin Luther condemned by Leo X.

"60. Through the sufferings of the Saints communicated in indulgences, our offenses are not properly redeemed; but through the communion of charity their sufferings are imparted to us, so that we may be worthy to be freed by the price of the Blood of Christ from the punishments due for sins." Proposition of Michael Baius condemned by Saint Pius V.

"16. It is not fitting to seek indulgences for the punishment due to one's own sins, because it is better to satisfy divine justice than to seek divine mercy; since the former proceeds from pure love of God, while the latter proceeds from interested love of ourselves, and is neither pleasing to God nor meritorious, because it is to wish to flee the cross." Proposition of Michael de Molinos condemned by Innocent XI.

"40. The proposition asserting that an indulgence, according to its precise notion, is nothing other than the remission of a part of that penance which was established by the canons for the sinner; as though an indulgence, besides the bare remission of canonical punishment, does not also avail for the remission of the temporal punishment due before divine justice for actual sins: False, rash, injurious to the merits of Christ, long ago condemned in article 19 of Luther. - 41. Likewise, insofar as it adds that the Scholastics, puffed up by their subtleties, introduced an ill-understood treasury of the merits of Christ and the Saints and substituted for the clear notion of absolution from canonical punishment the confused and false notion of the application of merits; as though the treasures of the Church from which the Pope grants indulgences are not the merits of Christ and the Saints: False, rash, injurious to the merits of Christ and of the Saints, long ago condemned in article 17 of Luther. - 42. Likewise, insofar as it adds further that it is still more lamentable that this chimerical application was wished to be transferred to the departed: False, rash, offensive to pious ears, injurious to the Roman Pontiffs and to the practice and sense of the universal Church, leading into the error branded with a heretical note in Peter de Osma and again condemned in article 22 of Luther. - 43. Finally, insofar as it most shamelessly inveighs against certificates of indulgences, privileged altars, etc.: Rash, offensive to pious ears, scandalous, insulting to the Supreme Pontiffs and to the practice frequented by the whole Church." Propositions of the Synod of Pistoia condemned by Pius VI.

"I also affirm that the power of indulgences was left by Christ in the Church and that their use is most salutary for the Christian people." Tridentine Profession of Faith.

1041. • Indulgence, as the word itself indicates, is the same as favor, condonation, mercy, remission. For an indulgence is the condonation of the penalty due to sins through the application of the satisfactions of Christ and the Saints; for Christ our Savior offered His satisfactions to God the Father for the full remission of our sins. These satisfactions of infinite value, to which are also added the satisfactions of the Blessed Virgin and the superabundant satisfactions of the Saints, are called the treasure of the Church, in which we participate through Indulgences.

Definition. An indulgence is the remission of temporal penalty due to God for sins remitted as to guilt, granted by a legitimate minister outside the Sacrament of Penance through the application of the treasure of the Church.

Division. An indulgence is distinguished in manifold ways:

1. Plenary or partial, insofar as the whole temporal penalty is remitted, or only a part of it.

2. Personal, local, or real, insofar as it is granted immediately to persons, for example, to a Confraternity; or is attached to some place, for example, a Church, Oratory, etc.; or is joined to some thing, for example, an Image, Cross, Rosary, etc.

3. Temporary or perpetual, insofar as it is granted for a determinate time or without any prescribed term.

1046. • QUESTION 3. Can an Indulgence which is granted as PLENARY be obtained at least PARTIALLY if there is an obstacle preventing it from being obtained in its entirety, for example, an attachment to some venial sin?

Reply. Affirmatively. The reason is: 1. because, from what was said in the preceding question, some unremitted venial sin does not prevent the penalty due for other sins from being remitted; 2. because the Supreme Pontiff, in granting a plenary Indulgence, is not presumed to will to restrict it only to those to whom all venial sins are remitted, but rather is deservedly considered to grant it according to the capacity of the subject, so that at least the penalty which can be remitted is remitted, namely, the penalty of remitted sins. For otherwise plenary Indulgences would often be of no benefit, since the faithful rarely cast off every, even the least, attachment to any venial sin and conceive sufficient sorrow for all venial sins in such a way that they obtain the remission of all. Hence it would come about that partial Indulgences were preferable to plenary ones, which is repugnant to common sense. St. Alphonsus, book 6, no. 534.

Nevertheless, some teach that a plenary Indulgence is not granted except plenarily or most fully, as they say, so that it must obtain either the whole effect or none. But this opinion does not appear probable.

1. Candidus, a priest, asks: 1.º Whether a plenary indulgence at the article of death is acquired, during life, by the sick person when he has fulfilled all the enjoined works, or after his death. 2.º Whether, if someone then fulfills several pious works to which a plenary indulgence at the article of death is attached, he gains all these indulgences.

R. To the 1st. In the Case, someone does not acquire the plenary indulgence after his death; for then it would no longer be an indulgence for a living person at the article of death, but for a deceased person. Likewise the sick person does not acquire it while his life is still lasting, when, for example, he has already fulfilled all the works; for if in reality he does not immediately die, there would not be a true article of death, but only, at most, a presumed one. S. C. Indulg., Apr. 23, 1675. Therefore the sick person does not acquire it except at the true article of death, which consequently death itself in reality follows. The reason is that the end of the Supreme Pontiffs granting a grace of this sort is that for those dying nothing remain to be expiated after this mortal life, and that, by this remission of sins, being truly contrite for sins, they be brought immediately to possess eternal beatitude.

To the 2nd. From the very nature of the plenary indulgence at the article of death, explained in the above manner, it is clear that the sick person acquires it only once. Nevertheless, those several works to which this same indulgence is attached are useful for making it more secure. If perhaps the sick person does not gain it by one work, he can gain it by another work. Nor is it valid to say that someone can gain one such plenary indulgence for himself, another or others for the souls of Purgatory. For it is clear from the very nature of a plenary indulgence at the article of death that it is altogether personal and is applied only to the dying person.

"... Therefore, consulting in this manner for the salvation of souls, as far as it was permitted to Us in the Lord, We have taken care to enlarge and render easier the pious custom of applying the plenary Pontifical Indulgence to the children of the Church constituted in the article of death; and, the faculty having been permitted to Venerable and Beloved Sons, Bishops and Prelates of Churches, of subdelegating other Priests for this effect, both in Cities and in Dioceses, We think that no small alleviation has been brought by Us to their anxieties and solicitudes. Nevertheless We wish it declared to them that it was not Our purpose to exempt them altogether from this office of paternal charity, of approaching by themselves miserable sick persons desiring to obtain plenary absolution in the final article, but to aid their piety opportunely, lest, while they themselves are detained by other pastoral cares, they must grieve that the faithful committed to them migrate from this life destitute of so great a spiritual benefit. But those who rejoice to exercise a pious work of this sort by themselves - which indeed We trust all will do as often as they shall not have been legitimately impeded - should remember that this must be furnished not merely toward the more noble and powerful of this age, but also toward the poor and men of lowly lot. Concerning this matter, the 28th homily of Our predecessor St. Gregory the Great on the Gospels, at chapter IV of John, There was a certain ruler, whose son was sick at Capharnaum, can usefully be read; in it he observes the wonderful and heavenly manner of acting of Our most loving Redeemer Jesus Christ, who, invited to visit the sick son of the ruler, refuses to go, but declares that He will go to the servant of the Centurion even not invited. What is this, that the ruler asks that He come to his son, and yet He refuses to come; but He is not invited to the servant of the Centurion, and yet He promises that He will go bodily? He does not deign to be present by bodily presence to the son of the ruler; He does not disdain to meet the servant of the Centurion.

And since the Roman Ritual enjoins upon Priests, who piously aid the faithful laboring in their final agony, or minister to them the Sacraments of the Church, that if the sick person can obtain a plenary Indulgence conceded by legitimate authority, they recall it to his mind and propose what things he ought to do to obtain it; but of those who have been reduced to a state of this sort, some indeed with full cognition retain the entire use of speech, while others have lost the faculty of speaking, although previously they had given indications of sincere contrition and, while still using reason, do not cease repeatedly to give it: therefore, that all the aforesaid more certainly may be able to obtain the fruit of the Indulgence, We command the aforesaid Priests that by every means they strive to excite dying faithful persons to elicit new acts of sorrow for sins committed, and to conceive most fervent affections of charity toward God; but especially to receive death itself from the hand of the Lord with an even and willing soul. For this work We especially impose and enjoin upon those constituted in an article of this sort, by which they may prepare and dispose themselves for obtaining the fruit of the plenary Indulgence." Constitution of Benedict XIV, Pia Mater. Cf. Acta S. Sed. Vol. 11, p. 405 ff.

"Lest, for the Christian faithful living in places of the Missions in whatever part of the World, and constituted in the final crisis of life, there be lacking those spiritual helps which the Catholic pious Mother Church is accustomed mercifully to impart to her children departing from this world, Our Most Holy Lord Clement XIV, Pope by divine providence, on account of the eminent charity by which he paternally embraces them, most lovingly concedes to all and singular Reverend Fathers and Lords, Patriarchs, Archbishops, Bishops, Apostolic Vicars, and also Reverend Prefects or Superiors of Missions, both of the secular clergy and of the regular, now existing in places of Missions, as above, or existing at whatever time, permanently, the faculty of imparting the Blessing with plenary Indulgence to the aforesaid faithful reduced to the final agony, with this extension also, that they can and may communicate a faculty of this sort to Priests and respectively to Missionaries subject to their jurisdiction, nevertheless only for the places of their Dioceses or for the districts of the Missions, provided that in imparting this Blessing the formula prescribed by Benedict XIV of holy memory in the Constitution given 9 Apr. 1747, which begins Pia Mater, to be registered below, is observed.

But since it will easily happen that some of the aforesaid Christian faithful depart from this life without having been fortified by the Sacraments of the Church, and without the assistance of any Priest, therefore His Holiness, from the rich fountain of apostolic benignity, bestows also upon them a plenary Indulgence, if, contrite, they shall have invoked the name of Jesus at least in the heart, and shall have received death from the hand of the Lord with that Christian submission of soul and humility of spirit which is fitting, and shall have commended their soul into the hands of their Creator. That this last part of the Decree may become known to all the Christian faithful, let the aforementioned Prelates and Superiors take care and strive to publish it repeatedly in their Dioceses and Missions, and especially at the time of holy visitation." S. C. de P. F. 5 Apr. 1772.

"According to the Indult conceded by the Holy See, all Missionaries have by communication the faculty of bestowing the plenary Indulgence upon those constituted in the article of death. But since they rarely find faithful persons constituted precisely in the article of death, it comes about that some bestow the said Indulgence where there is only danger of death, although it does not seem to be very nearly imminent; but others, according to the strictness of the words, do not apply it except at the time when the agony seems near; and then, when they do not observe so near a danger of death, either by means of medals to which, by authority of the Holy See, Indulgences of this sort are annexed, which they give to the faithful, or by invocation of the Most Holy Name of Jesus, as has been conceded by several Supreme Pontiffs, they warn the faithful to place the conditions by which they may merit to obtain so great a benefit. If the S. C. judges that it should determine which course should rather be adhered to, all of us, as many as we are, will stand ready for the judgment of the Holy See. Resp. To that which is controverted among the Missionaries concerning the time of imparting the plenary Indulgence to those constituted in the article of death, the S. C. judged that circumstance of time sufficient for it to be rightly conferred which suffices for conferring Extreme Unction itself, namely when the infirm person, by force of disease, is seen to verge toward death. Nor is a nearer time of agony to be awaited, in which the sick person, scarcely master of himself, is plainly unequal to bringing forth those motions of soul which the Roman Ritual demands, so that the fruit of so great a benefit, as also of Extreme Unction, may be more richly received. Wherefore it will be the duty of Missionaries, after sacramental Unction has been applied to the infirm person, to excite the same to conceive in soul those things which are read in the same Ritual book, and soon after to fortify the same with so notable a benefit of plenary remission; and to furnish this especially then, when they foresee that they will not return." S. O. Jan. 1780.

"Whether the Apostolic Blessing with Plenary Indulgence in the article of death can be given after the last Sacraments have been conferred, when indeed danger of death is present, but not imminent? Resp. Affirmatively." S. Indulg. C. 19 Dec. 1885. Acta S. Sed. Vol. 18, p. 414.

"Whether the Blessing with plenary Indulgence according to the Constitution of Benedict XIV, Pia Mater, 5 Apr. 1747, is to be imparted to children who, because of defect of age, have not yet made first Communion? Resp. Affirmatively." S. R. C. 16 Dec. 1826.

"Whether the plenary Indulgence in the article of death can be conceded to those condemned to death, while they are being led to undergo it, or on the same day on which they are to undergo it? Resp. Affirmatively, when it can be done." S. C. de P. F. 10 Aug. 1841.

"Whether the apostolic Blessing can be imparted several times when a new danger of death returns? Resp. Negatively, while the infirmity remains, although prolonged; but affirmatively if the infirm person has recovered, and afterward from whatever cause returns into a new danger of death." S. Indulg. C. 24 Sept. 1838.

"1. Whether by force of the preceding resolution (Valentinen., 5 Feb. 1841, by which an infirm person cannot in the same article of death gain the plenary Indulgence to be imparted by several Priests having the faculty) it is prohibited that, to an infirm person remaining in the same danger of death, the plenary Indulgence in the article of death, which is commonly called the Papal Blessing, be imparted several times by the same or by several Priests having this faculty? 2. Whether by force of the same resolution it is likewise prohibited that, to an infirm person placed in the same circumstances as above, the plenary indulgence in the article of death be imparted several times by several Priests having this faculty under a diverse title, by reason of aggregation to the Confraternity of the Most Holy Rosary, of the Holy Scapular of Mount Carmel, of the Most Holy Trinity, etc.? Resp. Affirmatively to both, the Valentinen. resolution remaining firm under the day 5 February 1841." S. Indulg. C. 12 March 1855, 12 June 1884.

"1. Whether the plenary Indulgence in the article of death, which is usually conceded without another declaration added, is to be taken in the true article of death, or in the presumed, or finally in both? 2. Whether the plenary Indulgence in the article of death is to be conceded to all asking? 3. Whether the contrite, but neither confessed nor refreshed by Most Holy Communion, obtain the plenary Indulgence which the Roman Pontiffs everywhere bestow upon suppliants for the article of death? Resp. To the 1st: It is to be taken in the true article only. To the 2nd: It is to be conceded to all asking. To the 3rd: Contrite persons of this sort gain the Indulgence, if the Pontiff in his concession does not require Confession or another similar thing." S. C. Ind. 23 Apr. 1675.

599. 1° Definition. Indulgence (from indu-licentia)² has the same sound as mildness, condonation; as it is used here, it is usually defined: the remission of temporal punishment, owed to sin, valid before God, made through the application of the treasury of the Church, by a legitimate Superior, outside the sacrament.

² Cf. M. Bréal, Diction. étymolog. latin, Paris, 1885, p. 134.

It is declared: (a) remission of temporal punishment, but not of guilt, whether past or future, whether mortal or venial, as Protestants falsely assert; since, although in some old formulas there occur words by which an indulgence is granted from guilt and from punishment, these nevertheless were inserted not by the Church but by some questors, against the will of the Roman Pontiffs, who reproved an abuse of this kind;¹ hence deservedly Cardinal Cusanus in the provincial Synod of Magdeburg said: "The Apostolic See has never been accustomed to give indulgences under the words from punishment and guilt." Nor is it an obstacle that in some Apostolic Letters indulgences granted are said to be unto the remission of sins: for these words are understood by all concerning the remission of the punishment owed to sins; nor is anyone ever freed from punishment unless he has first been absolved from guilt.²

¹ Cf. Clementin., bk. V, tit. 9, c. 2.

² A few older theologians, such as Paludanus, had said that venial guilt can probably be remitted through indulgences; but this singular opinion is commonly rejected; for from what was said, n. 197, venial guilt is remitted through contrition.

(b) Valid before God; namely the remission of punishment has force not only in the external forum, before the Church, but also in the internal forum, before God; otherwise, as St. Thomas says,³ the Church would harm sinners more than help them, because, by absolving them from imposed penances, she would condemn them to graver punishments, namely those of purgatory.

³ Supplem., q. 25, a. 1.

(c) Through the application of the treasury of the Church; for, in remitting punishment, the Church nevertheless offers to God a payment, or some compensation, drawn from her own treasury: for there is a spiritual treasury, formed from the superabundant satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints, whose supreme dispenser is the Pontiff, and from which, for a just cause, the debts of the faithful can be paid; therefore he who grants an indulgence does not simply relax temporal punishment, but furnishes to the penitent something from which he may pay, by applying to him the superabundant satisfactions of Christ.

(d) By a legitimate Superior ...; hence not any man whatsoever can grant indulgences, but only those to whom the care of the treasury of the Church has been committed, namely the Pontiff or a general Council for the universal Church, Cardinals in the church of their title, and Bishops for their own diocese; yet it is said outside the sacrament, so that in this way an indulgence may be distinguished from sacramental satisfaction.

600. 2° Species. Indulgences are divided: (a) by reason of effect, into plenary and partial: by the former the whole punishment which remains to be expiated is remitted, by the latter some part of the same punishment. Hence indulgences of forty, or one hundred days, seven years, etc., are granted; this must be understood not in the sense that so many days or years of Purgatory are remitted, but in the sense that so much of the punishment owed is condoned as would have been remitted by forty or one hundred days of canonical penance, such as flourished in the first centuries of the Church. Hence the measure of the remission of the punishment itself remains unknown to us, and depends much on the fervor with which the conditions necessary for gaining Indulgences are fulfilled. - Sometimes an indulgence of six or seven years and as many quarantines is granted; the name quarantine signifies so many Lenten fasts, so that the sense is that there is granted a remission of punishment which corresponds not only to six or seven years of canonical penance, but also to as many Lenten fasts added over and above.

601. (b) By reason of subject, they are divided into indulgences for the living and indulgences for the departed, or those which are applicable to the souls of Purgatory.¹ Indulgences are granted to the living by way of juridical absolution, which nevertheless at the same time includes payment of the debt from the treasury of the Church; for these truly are subject to the jurisdiction of the Church; but to the departed by way of suffrage, or of payment of debt: for since these are not subject to the jurisdiction of the Church, ecclesiastical Superiors cannot directly apply an indulgence to them, but can only offer to God the satisfactions of Christ and of the saints and ask Him that, according to His mercy, He accept them as the payment of the price owed for the sins of the departed. Therefore the departed do not gain indulgences, properly speaking; but the living are permitted by the Church to apply to the departed certain indulgences which they themselves gain; however, in what measure they are in fact applied to the souls of Purgatory is unknown, and depends on the will of God alone.

¹ "All indulgences granted by the Roman Pontiff are applicable to souls detained in purgatory, unless the contrary is established" (Code, c. 930).

But the living cannot apply indulgences to other living persons, since the Supreme Pontiff, on whose will the matter depends, has not up to this time granted this faculty; and this indeed is consonant with reason: for if indulgences could be applied to the living, not a few would become more sluggish, thinking that others would make satisfaction for them.

602. (c) By reason of mode, indulgences are personal, real, or local: personal, when they are immediately granted to persons or communities; real, which are immediately attached to some thing, for example, to a rosary, or prayer beads, a medal, an image of the Crucifix, etc.; local, which are immediately attached to a pious place, or to some thing which is placed in a determinate place.

603. Here it is useful to explain what must be understood by those formulas which are sometimes found in grants of indulgences. Toties quoties signifies, from a special grant, that the faithful can gain the indulgence as many times as they repeat the pious works to which it is attached. Now there are many partial indulgences of this kind; but generally plenary indulgences can be acquired only once in the day, with a few exceptions, for example, the indulgence which is called of the Portiuncula, which those visiting, on the day of August 2, the Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels, or other churches to which the same privilege has been granted, gain. - A perpetual daily plenary indulgence, which is granted to those visiting some church, must not be understood in such a way that it can be acquired daily, but only once in the year, on any day of the year, to be chosen by the judgment of each one, unless nevertheless it is expressly said in the grant that it is acquired daily.

647. 1° Nature. Under this name comes a plenary indulgence which the Roman Pontiff imparts to the dying, either by himself or through a delegate; it is also called the Papal Blessing, because it is granted under the form of a blessing, in the name of the Supreme Pontiff. It is altogether distinguished from the plenary indulgence which all those can gain in the article of death, without any blessing, who hold some object to which Apostolic indulgences are annexed, or are members of a Confraternity to which such a privilege has been granted. - Here we treat only of that indulgence which is annexed to the Papal Blessing in the article of death.

This can be acquired in the true, not in the presumed, article of death;² now the true article of death is that which death really follows, while the presumed article is verified when the sick person, in the judgment of skilled persons, is believed shortly to die. Although, however, the indulgence is not acquired except in the true article of death, it can be granted to the faithful constituted in grave danger of death,³ namely to those to whom Viaticum can be given; but the indulgence remains suspended until they are in the true article of death, since it has been granted by the Roman Pontiffs for this end: that provision may be made for the faithful at precisely that moment at which they are about to appear before the Supreme Judge.

² Decret. authent., n. 9, April 23, 1675.

³ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, December 18, 1885, in Acta S. Sedis, XVIII, p. 414.

Hence it must not be repeated in the same infirmity, however long-lasting, since this would be altogether useless; but only if the sick person has recovered and afterwards falls into a new danger of death.⁴ Nor is it permitted to repeat it even if the sick person received it in the state of mortal sin, or, after having received it, has relapsed into venial or mortal sin;¹ nevertheless the sick person will gain it if he dies in the state of grace; nor is it permitted to give it several times under several titles.²

⁴ Decret. authent., n. 263, September 24, 1838.

¹ Decret. authent., n. 257, June 20, 1836, ad 7.

² Decret. authent., n. 362, March 12, 1855. - These various decrees you will find in Beringer, op. cit., vol. I, pp. 518-519.

648. 2° Conditions for acquiring it. (A) On the part of the one granting. From the Code, c. 468, § 2, "the parish priest or another priest who assists the sick has the faculty of granting them the Apostolic blessing with plenary indulgence in the article of death, according to the form handed down by approved liturgical books, which blessing let him not omit to impart." Thus henceforth there will be no need of an Indult or of delegation for imparting this blessing.

649. (B) On the part of the sick person: (a) that he not be excommunicated or manifestly impenitent; yet it can be granted to those who even culpably have not received the sacraments, if they suddenly fall into danger of death; in one word, to all those, even destitute of their senses, to whom sacramental absolution can be given; also to children who have been able to sin; probably also to those who are in danger of death from another cause than illness, for example, those condemned to death.

(b) That, if he can, he has received the sacraments of Penance and Eucharist; if he cannot, the state of grace suffices while he breathes his last breath.

(c) That he offers himself prepared to accept whatever shall have pleased God, and to undergo death itself patiently in satisfaction for the punishments which he himself has merited by sinning; so explicitly in the Bull Pia Mater.

(d) That he invoke, at least in his heart, the Most Holy Name of Jesus, when he is composed of mind; and elicit an act of sorrow and charity.

650. 3° Rite for imparting this blessing.³ (a) The priest, clothed in surplice and violet stole, upon entering the room of the sick person, says: Peace be to this house, etc.; then he sprinkles the sick person, the room, and those standing around with blessed water, saying Thou shalt sprinkle me, etc., without the Psalm Miserere. - If the blessing is given immediately after Viaticum and Extreme Unction, very probably the words Peace be to this house can be omitted, because they have already been said at the beginning; nevertheless more securely they are prefaced, since they are contained in the formula prescribed by Benedict XIV. But it is certain that the Confiteor must be repeated before the application of the indulgence, unless death is imminent.¹

³ Cf. Rit. Rom., Tit. V, c. 6, Rite of the Apostolic Blessing; Excerpta ex Rit. Rom., Baltimore, 1884, pp. 248-251, where, however, not all conditions necessary for obtaining this indulgence are declared; therefore the Roman Ritual itself should be approached, tit. V, c. 6.

¹ Decret. authent., n. 286, February 5, 1841, ad 5 and 6.

The practice of giving the blessing to several dying persons at the same time can be tolerated, by reciting the prior admonitions and prayers in the plural, but by pronouncing the formula of the blessing itself, "Our Lord Jesus Christ" down to the words "Spiritus S. Amen," singularly over each one.²

² Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, June 10, 1886.

(b) If the sick person wishes to confess, let the priest hear him and absolve him; if he does not ask for confession, let him excite him to an act of contrition; let him admonish him concerning the efficacy of this blessing, and exhort him to be prepared willingly to accept whatever shall have pleased God, and patiently to undergo death itself in satisfaction for the punishments which he has merited by sinning. Yet he must propose this prudently and gently, lest he incur the indignation of relatives and friends; wherefore, if difficulties are foreseen, let this exhortation be made privately, for example, in the confession itself.

(c) Then let him console the sick person with pious words, and raise him into hope, whereby he may more abundantly obtain remission of punishments. Finally let him pronounce the words described in the Ritual: "Our help... Most merciful God... Our Lord... Through the most sacred... May He bless thee..."

(d) But if the sick person is so near to death that there is not time for reciting all the prayers, it is enough to say: "I grant to you plenary indulgence and remission of all sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen."³

³ Beringer, I, p. 515.

From the concession of Pope Pius X, March 9, 1904, any Christian, the required conditions having been fulfilled, can gain for himself a plenary indulgence for the instant of his death, provided that he emits an act by which he receives death with all its distresses with an even and willing soul. (Ami du Clergé, vol. XXVI, 1904, p. 631.)

651. 1° Notion and species. (A) By this name is understood a plenary indulgence to be applied to the dead alone; which, "if the mind of the one granting and the use of the keys of power are considered, immediately frees the soul from all the punishments of Purgatory; but if the effect of the application is considered, it is to be understood as an indulgence whose measure corresponds to the good pleasure and acceptance of divine mercy."¹

¹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, Decret. authent., n. 283, July 28, 1840. Cf. Codex, c. 916.

(B) A privileged altar is local, personal, or mixed: local is annexed to a determinate altar, so that all celebrating on it can enjoy this privilege; personal is granted to the priest himself celebrating at any altar whatsoever; mixed is annexed to a determinate altar, yet so that only determinate priests can use this privilege, for example, only those who are members of such a Confraternity. On November 2, all altars enjoy this privilege, for all celebrating.

A privileged altar after the manner of the altar of St. Gregory, or a Gregorian after the manner², is now no longer granted.

² Holy Office, December 12, 1912, A. A. S., V, 33.

652. 2° Conditions for gaining the indulgence. (A) General: (a) A "Requiem" Mass is not required even when the Rubrics permit it.³

³ Holy Office, February 20, 1913.

(b) The indulgence must be applied to him for whom the Mass is celebrated, because, although of itself it is not repugnant that the Mass be applied to one and the indulgence to another, in fact the Roman Pontiff wills that it aid only the soul for whom the Mass is offered.⁴

⁴ Even virtual intention is required neither in the Priest nor in the one offering the stipend for gaining this indulgence. (Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office, June 17, 1915.)

(c) If the Mass is applied to several, the privilege of the Altar can be attributed to only one of them. Thus, for example, on the day of the Commemoration of All the Faithful Departed, on which all altars are privileged, the priest can celebrate Mass for one or several deceased persons, but can apply the indulgence to only one of them.

(B) Special: (a) for the privilege of a local Altar: the altar must be fixed, but for this it suffices "that in the middle of a stable and immovable altar, although not consecrated, a consecrated stone, even movable, be placed"⁵; nevertheless the privilege is granted to the altar, not to the stone, so that the latter can be changed. - The church or public oratory in which the altar exists must be at least blessed. - In older concessions the privilege was limited to days on which the Mass of the dead could be said; but this restriction has been removed.

⁵ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, March 26, 1867.

(b) For the privilege of a personal Altar: he who has obtained it is not bound to exhibit it to the Ordinary, unless otherwise is declared in the concession itself. - He who uses this privilege satisfies the burden undertaken of celebrating at a privileged altar.

N. B. "Bishops, Abbots or Prelates nullius, Vicars and Prefects Apostolic, and major Superiors of exempt clerical religion, can designate and declare one perpetual daily privileged altar, provided another is not had, in their cathedral, abbatial, collegiate, conventual, parochial, quasi-parochial churches..."¹

¹ Codex, c. 916.

Character of the article

86. 1. By this first article concerning indulgences, severity is exercised against apocryphal indulgences, yet in such a way that simple faithful are burdened with no excessive weight. Wherefore:

Force of the law

2. The spreading of apocryphal and proscribed or revoked indulgences is strictly prohibited; to ecclesiastical Superiors is commended the care of taking them from the hands of the faithful; but upon the faithful themselves who have received such sheets or booklets nothing is directly enjoined. Therefore it will be sufficient if they obey commands which are promulgated concerning this matter by their Superiors. Thus the common opinion.

What apocryphal, proscribed, revoked indulgences are

3. Apocryphal indulgences are those which have not emanated from legitimate power; proscribed, those which have been pierced by a positive decree; revoked, those which were legitimate but afterwards abrogated.

Norms for discerning apocryphal Indulgences

4. On August 3-10, 1890, the Sacred Congregation promulgated these norms, by which true Indulgences could be distinguished from counterfeit ones:

Rule I. All indulgences which are contained in the most recent collection published by the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences¹ are authentic.

Rule II. General indulgences which are not exhibited in the above-said collection, or which are said to have been granted after the Collection was published, are then only to be held as authentic when the autograph document of the granting of the same has been recognized by the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, to which, under penalty of nullity, it must be exhibited before they are published.

Rule III. Indulgences granted to Orders and religious Congregations, Archconfraternities, Confraternities, Archsodalities, Sodalities, pious Unions, pious Societies, certain more celebrated Churches, pious Places, and Objects of devotion, which are contained in Summaries recognized and approved by the Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, and published in print by its authority or permission, are to be held authentic.

Rule IV. Indulgences, whether general or particular, are not to be held as authentic which are contained in books, in booklets, in summaries, in sheets, in little papers, or even in images, printed without the approval of competent authority; which approval is to be granted after diligent review, and distinctly expressed.

Rule V. Apocryphal, or now entirely revoked, are all indulgences of a thousand or many thousands of years, at whatever time they may be said to have been granted.

Rule VI. Plenary indulgences are to be held suspect which are asserted to have been granted to those reciting only a few words: excepting Indulgences at the moment of death.

Rule VII. As apocryphal are to be rejected indulgences which are carried about in booklets, sheets, or little papers, printed or manuscript, in which, from slight or even superstitious causes and uncertain revelations, or under illusory conditions, indulgences and graces exceeding usage and measure are promised.

Rule VIII. As counterfeit are to be rejected sheets and booklets in which there is promised to the faithful reciting one or another prayer the liberation of one or several souls from Purgatory; and Indulgences which are commonly added to the said promise are to be held as apocryphal.

Rule IX. Indulgences of more recent asserted concession, if they are extended to an unusual number of years or days, are to be held as apocryphal, or at least as gravely suspect.

¹ The collection is entitled: Raccolta di orazioni e pie opere per le quali sono state concesse dai Sommi Pontefici le Indulgenze, Rome, Propaganda Fide, 1898.

538. Preliminary note. The treatise on indulgences is a certain complement of the treatise on penance. For it is Catholic dogma that, when guilt has been remitted, the whole punishment due is not always remitted. In satisfaction for this punishment, the confessor is bound to impose a salutary penance, which the penitent must fulfill. But even when the salutary penance has been fulfilled, all the punishment due has not yet always been remitted. Indulgences, however, are the most efficacious means of entirely destroying all punishment when guilt has been remitted. Hence moralists commonly treat indulgences as a complement of sacramental satisfaction and of the sacrament of penance. Since many controversies exist concerning indulgences which are freely disputed among theologians, it is worthwhile here to set forth briefly in one view those things which are beyond controversy and must be admitted by every Catholic. All these things are contained in the Council of Trent,¹ which defines: "Since the power of conferring indulgences was granted by Christ to the Church, and she has used this power divinely handed down to her even from the most ancient times, the holy Synod teaches and commands that the use of indulgences, most salutary for the Christian people and approved by the authority of sacred Councils, is to be retained in the Church; and it condemns with anathema those who either assert that they are useless or deny that there is in the Church the power of granting them."² Therefore two things must altogether be held by faith:

1. The power of granting indulgences was divinely handed down to the Church.

2. The use of indulgences is salutary and therefore is to be retained.

Furthermore, it is certain (on account of the condemnation of proposition 17 of Luther³ and proposition 41 of the Synod of Pistoia) that there exists a treasury of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints, from which the Church can dispense indulgences.

We divide this treatise on indulgences into five articles: 1. the nature and division of indulgences; 2. the authority of granting indulgences; 3. the conditions required for gaining indulgences; 4. the jubilee indulgence; 5. certain indulgences in particular.

¹ Sess. 25, De indulg. (Denz., n. 989).

² Cf. also the condemned propositions 40-43 of the Synod of Pistoia (Denz., nn. 1540-1543).

³ Denz., n. 757.

539. Nominal definition. Indulgentia is so called from indulgere and signifies nothing other than the remission of one's own right in favor of another, or the condonation of some fine to be exacted. The name indulgence was already known in the time of St. Thomas; but in patristic times other names were customarily employed, for example, peace, condonation, reconciliation, and so forth.

540. Real definition. An indulgence is the remission before God of the temporal punishment due, actual sin having been remitted as regards guilt, made outside the sacrament of penance by a legitimate superior through the application of the treasury of the Church.⁴

It is explained: a) The remission of temporal punishment, but not of guilt, whether mortal or venial. Hence it is a pure and rank calumny if certain non-Catholics babble that, according to Catholic doctrine, any sins whatever, even future ones, are remitted through indulgences. What is related concerning Tetzel, as though he had sold indulgences for future sins, is a fable already exploded a hundred times and nevertheless revived again and again by malicious or overly credulous men.⁵ Nor is it an objection that in certain Apostolic Letters indulgences are said to be granted for the remission of sins. For the name sin is sometimes taken for the punishment due to sin. Thus, for example, it is said: "Him [Christ], who knew no sin, he made sin for us, that we might be made the justice of God in him."⁶ Therefore, if indulgences are granted for the remission of sins, this signifies nothing other than for the remission of the punishment due to sins. Eternal punishment is always remitted with the guilt of sin; hence an indulgence is not granted even for the remission of eternal punishment. The punishments which are due to original sin are remitted by the sacrament of baptism; and therefore an indulgence destroys only temporal punishments due for actual sins. These punishments, however, it truly remits before God and not merely in the forum of the Church. Therefore Leo X proscribed proposition 19 of Luther: "Indulgences, for those who truly obtain them, do not avail for the remission before divine justice of the punishment due for actual sins."⁷ Pius VI condemned proposition 40 of the Synod of Pistoia: "The proposition asserting that an indulgence according to its precise notion is nothing other than the remission of a part of that penance which had been established by the canons for the sinner, as though an indulgence beyond the bare remission of canonical punishment does not also avail for the remission before divine justice of the temporal punishment due for actual sins: false, rash, injurious to the merits of Christ, long ago condemned in article 19 of Luther."⁸ St. Thomas⁹ already rightly observed that, if indulgences liberated only from ecclesiastical punishments and not from punishments to be discharged before God and in the other life, they would do more harm than good, and the Church would deceive the faithful in a matter of grave importance. For by exempting them from the lighter punishments of this life, she would send them to the far more bitter punishments of purgatory, relaxation from which they would have obtained through the punishments of this life. Furthermore, indulgences would then be useless for the souls in purgatory, which are no longer bound to canonical punishments.

b) Made outside the sacrament of penance by a legitimate superior. In the sacrament of penance not only guilt and eternal punishment are remitted, but temporal punishment also, at least in part. But since it is certain by faith that when guilt is remitted the whole temporal punishment is not always remitted at the same time,¹⁰ other remedies against the remaining punishment must be present. These remedies are: 1. sacramental satisfaction; 2. works of mortification freely undertaken; 3. the hardships and miseries of this life sent by God and patiently endured by man; 4. indulgences. But if a man has not by these remedies satisfied for the punishments due in this life, he must suffer in purgatory until the entire punishment has been destroyed. That the Church possesses the power of conferring indulgences will be proved in the following article.

⁴ Cf. Code of Canon Law, c. 911.

⁵ Cf. N. Paulus, Johann Tetzel, der Ablaßprediger, p. 130 ff. The same author also explains well what the so-called confessionalia were, and the indulgences from punishment and from guilt formerly granted by the Supreme Pontiffs.

⁶ 2 Cor. 5:21.

⁷ Denz., n. 759.

⁸ Denz., n. 1540.

⁹ Suppl., q. 25, a. 1.

¹⁰ Council of Trent, sess. 14, c. 8 and cann. 12 and 15 (Denz., nn. 904, 922a, 925).

541. c) Through the application of the treasury of the Church. The treasury of the Church, as we speak of it here, is nothing other than the accumulation of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints which the Church can dispense. This treasury has two foundations, namely, the communion of saints and vicarious satisfaction. That the communion of saints exists in the Church is a dogma of faith; and therefore a threefold Church is customarily distinguished: the Church militant, the Church suffering, and the Church triumphant. The communion of saints is that most intimate bond uniting all members of the Church into one body. St. Paul speaks beautifully and concisely of this union, concluding with these words: "Now you are the body of Christ and members of member."¹¹ Hence the Roman Catechism¹² says: "Whatever things are piously and holily undertaken by one belong to all, and that they may profit them is effected by charity, which seeks not the things that are its own." Upon this radical foundation of the communion of saints another is built, namely, vicarious satisfaction. For since so intimate a union exists among the individual members of the Church, one member of her can satisfy for another.

It must be noted that a supernaturally good work produces a threefold fruit: meritorious fruit, impetratory fruit, and satisfactory fruit. A work is meritorious insofar as it proceeds from charity; it is impetratory insofar as there is joined with it a petition to obtain something from God; finally, it is satisfactory insofar as it is done with a certain burdensomeness. Meritorious fruit properly so called is inalienable, according to the saying: "And every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labor."¹³ Nothing prevents it, however, from being said that one person can merit something for another by merit of congruity. Therefore St. Thomas teaches:¹⁴ "By merit of congruity someone can merit the first grace for another; because when a man constituted in grace fulfills the will of God, it is congruous according to the proportion of friendship that God fulfill the will of the man in the salvation of another, although sometimes there can be an impediment on the part of him whose justification some saint desires."

That one person can impetrate something from God for another is clear of itself, since so many prayers are made in the Church for the conversion of sinners, for the souls in purgatory, for benefactors, for enemies, and so forth.

That satisfactory fruit can be communicated to another is clear from Sacred Scripture, from the unanimous doctrine of theologians, and from the example of the ancient martyrs. St. Paul admonishes: "Bear ye one another's burdens,"¹⁵ and says of himself: "I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ in my flesh for his body, which is the Church."¹⁶ From among the doctors of the Church, let us hear St. Thomas alone:¹⁷ "What we do through friends we appear to do through ourselves, because friendship makes one from two through affection, and especially the love of charity; and therefore, just as through himself, so also through another can someone satisfy God, especially when there is necessity. For someone also regards the punishment which a friend suffers on his account as though he himself were suffering it, and thus punishment is not lacking to him while he suffers together with his suffering friend, and all the more insofar as he himself is the cause of his suffering. And again, the affection of charity in him who suffers for a friend makes the satisfaction more acceptable to God than if he suffered for himself; for the former belongs to ready charity, but the latter to necessity. From this it is gathered that one person can satisfy for another, provided that both are in charity." In the ancient Church, martyrs and confessors were able to remit to penitents part of their penance, insofar as their tortures were regarded as satisfactions for the punishments due to sinners.¹⁸

From what has been said it is clear that the whole doctrine concerning indulgences is founded upon these three principles: 1. There exists a most intimate union among the diverse members of the mystical body of Christ. 2. Vicarious satisfaction exists. 3. There exist superabundant satisfactions of Christ and the saints which are contained in the treasury of the Church, from which indulgences are imparted to the individual members.

¹¹ 1 Cor. 12:27.

¹² Part I, c. 10, q. 20.

¹³ 1 Cor. 3:8.

¹⁴ S. theol. 1, 2, q. 114, a. 6.

¹⁵ Gal. 6:2.

¹⁶ Col. 1:24.

¹⁷ Summa c. gent. 3, 158; cf. also Quodl. 2, a. 16 and Suppl., q. 25, a. 1.

¹⁸ Cf. Tertullian, Ep. ad martyres, c. 1 (Migne, Patr. lat. 1, 621).

542. The doctrine of St. Thomas concerning the nature of indulgences. Since not a few non-Catholic authors think that the doctrine concerning indulgences was invented at the time of the pseudo-Reformation, it is worthwhile to attend to those things which St. Thomas handed down concerning indulgences; for in a few words he comprehends the whole doctrine, and all Catholic theologians have embraced the same doctrine. The Angelic Doctor teaches:¹⁹ "[Indulgences] avail both as regards the forum of the Church and as regards the judgment of God for the remission of punishment remaining after contrition, confession, and absolution, whether it be enjoined or not. The reason why they can avail is the unity of the mystical body, in which many have supererogated in works of penance beyond the measure of their debts, and many also have patiently endured unjust tribulations, through which a multitude of punishments could have been expiated if they had been due to them; of whose merits there is so great an abundance that they exceed all the punishment due to those now living; and especially on account of the merit of Christ, which, although it operates in the sacraments, nevertheless its efficacy is not enclosed in the sacraments, but by its infinity exceeds the efficacy of the sacraments. But it was said above²⁰ that one person can satisfy for another. The saints, however, in whom a superabundance of works of satisfaction is found, did not perform such works determinately for this person who needs remission, but commonly for the whole Church; as the Apostle says that he fills up those things wanting of the sufferings of Christ in his body for the Church to which he writes.²¹ And thus the aforesaid merits are common to the whole Church. But things which are common to some multitude are distributed to individuals of the multitude according to the discretion of him who presides over the multitude. Hence, just as someone would obtain remission of punishment if another had satisfied for him, so also if the satisfaction of another is distributed to him by one who has the power."

¹⁹ Suppl., q. 25, a. 1.

²⁰ Suppl., q. 13, a. 2.

²¹ Cf. Col. 1:24.

543. Scholion. On the intimate nature of indulgences. Among modern authors it is disputed whether an indulgence is rather an absolution granted through an act of jurisdiction, or only a payment or donation from the treasury of the Church. The truer and more common opinion teaches that indulgences granted to the living are at the same time an absolution and a payment;²² those applied to the dead, however, are only payments offered from the treasury of the Church.

It is certain that an indulgence granted to the living is a true absolution made by the power of jurisdiction. Hence, by granting indulgences, the Supreme Pontiff really absolves the living from temporal punishments; but since, in the present order of salvation, no liability either of guilt or of punishment is remitted without satisfaction, the Supreme Pontiff takes from the treasury of the Church satisfactions as great as correspond to the indulgences granted.

Nor may anyone say that then the Pope himself cannot gain indulgences, since no one can exercise an act of jurisdiction upon himself; for St. Thomas already foresaw and solved this difficulty,²³ saying that no one indeed can exercise an act of jurisdiction upon himself, but that a superior can use for himself those things which he himself has granted to all by the authority of jurisdiction. Hence, just as the Pope cannot absolve himself from sins, but can grant to a priest jurisdiction to absolve him, so he can grant an indulgence to all for a pious work, and he himself, performing this work, gains the indulgence, as do the other faithful.

For the dead existing in purgatory, since they are no longer under the jurisdiction of the Pope, indulgences avail not by way of absolution properly so called, but by way of payment and suffrage. Therefore the Supreme Pontiff offers satisfactions from the treasury of the Church and applies them to the souls in purgatory by way of petition or suffrage.²⁴

What an indulgence is not. Thus far it has been said what an indulgence is. In order that its nature may become known still more clearly, it must be said briefly what it is not. An indulgence is not: a) the remission of guilt, whether venial or mortal; b) the remission of ancient canonical punishments; c) liberation from amendment of life through works which guard against future falls; d) liberation from the obligation of repairing injuries perhaps inflicted upon one's neighbor.

Against an exaggerated opinion concerning the utility of indulgences, St. Thomas rightly warns:²⁵ "Although indulgences avail much for the remission of punishment, nevertheless other works of satisfaction are more meritorious with respect to the essential reward, which is infinitely better than the remission of temporal punishment."

²² St. Thomas says: "He who receives indulgences is not, simply speaking, absolved from the debt of punishment, but there is given to him that from which he may pay the debt" (4, dist. 20, q. 1, a. 3, sol. 1 ad 2; cf. Code, c. 911).

²³ Suppl., q. 27, a. 4 ad 1.

²⁴ Cf. Billot, De Eccl. sacr. II, 221 ff.; Chr. Pesch, Prael. theol. VII, n. 474 ff.; Beringer-Steinen, Die Ablässe¹⁵ I, n. 25.

²⁵ Suppl., q. 25, a. 2 ad 2.

544. Species of indulgences. Indulgences are divided:

a) By reason of their effect, into plenary and partial.

The former remit (according to the intention of the grantor) all the temporal punishment of some person which still remains. The latter remit part of the temporal punishment. Since the extent of an indulgence depends upon the intention of the grantor, ecclesiastical law establishes²⁶ that one who, because of venial guilt not yet destroyed, cannot gain a plenary indulgence in a perfect manner, nevertheless gains it partially, insofar as he is capable. The practice of the faithful also accords with this; and therefore, for example, the faithful are accustomed to gain for themselves several times the indulgence called "As often as" (Toties quoties). If someone has truly gained a plenary indulgence, he is in the same state in which an adult is immediately after receiving baptism, and consequently, if he were to die after gaining the indulgence, he would immediately fly to heaven (without passing through purgatory). A partial indulgence remits part of the temporal punishments, as was said above. But if it is now asked how great this part is, nothing certain can be answered. Authors most commonly teach that, if the Supreme Pontiff grants, for example, an indulgence of seven years and seven forty-day periods, then so great a part of the punishments is remitted as was remitted through a penance of seven years and seven forty-day periods performed according to the ancient ecclesiastical discipline. The penances of the ancient Church were most rigorous; thus, for example, if someone had to perform a forty-day penance, he could eat nothing except bread and salt; and for drink he had nothing except water. Sometimes, indeed, such rigor was mitigated a little, insofar as the eating of legumes and other light foods was permitted, but the eating of meat was never permitted, and a strict fast was always prescribed.²⁷

b) By reason of the subject, indulgences are distinguished into those for the living and those for the dead.

As is evident from what was said above, indulgences are granted to the living by way of juridical absolution, which nevertheless includes the payment of the punishment due from the treasury of the Church. Indulgences, however, are granted for the dead by way of suffrage, insofar as the Supreme Pontiff offers to God, from the treasury of the Church, satisfactions for the punishments still to be discharged by the souls in purgatory. All indulgences granted by the Supreme Pontiff are applicable to the souls in purgatory, unless the contrary is certainly established, as happens, for example, with the indulgence to be gained at the moment of death.²⁸

c) By reason of their mode, indulgences are distinguished into personal, real, and local.

In the strict sense, those indulgences are called personal which are granted immediately to determinate persons, whether physical or moral, for example, to the members of some confraternity, religious institute, and so forth. In a broader sense, however, those indulgences are called personal which, independently of any place or thing, are granted to all the faithful who perform some pious work; for example, an indulgence of three hundred days is granted to those reciting certain ejaculatory prayers.

Real indulgences are those which are immediately attached to some portable thing, for example, a Rosary, a medal, and so forth. Real indulgences can be applied only to solid things which are not easily broken or torn, and not to such things as hollow, non-solid glass, paper, and so forth. Real indulgences cease only: a) if the things entirely cease to exist, for example, if the image of a crucifix is broken into two parts. The indulgence does not perish, however, if the alteration is slight, for example, if a few beads of some Rosary are lost and new ones are substituted; nor even (according to the modern discipline) if someone other than the owner uses these things with the intention of gaining the indulgences; b) if the thing endowed with indulgences is sold.²⁹ In order to avoid even the appearance of simony, the Church has gravely forbidden, under penalty of the loss of the indulgences, that things enriched with indulgences be sold or bought, even if no profit is thereby received. Nothing, however, prevents someone from acquiring for himself several things enriched with indulgences and afterward, before using them, giving them to others as a gift. Several indulgences can be applied to the same thing. Thus, for example, the same Rosary can receive the indulgences of the Dominicans, the Crucigers, and St. Bridget.

Local indulgences are those which are immediately affixed to a pious place, such as a church, an altar, a miraculous image, and so forth. Attention must be paid to the clauses under which indulgences have been granted to some place. Thus, for example, if an indulgence has been granted to all who make a pious pilgrimage to some church, the inhabitants of the place where the church is situated cannot gain this indulgence, because they are not considered pilgrims.³⁰ If the church or altar to which the indulgence was granted is destroyed, the indulgence ceases, as is evident of itself. If, however, the same church or the same altar is afterward rebuilt in almost the same place (that is, within a space of thirty paces), and this under the same title and at least within fifty years, the indulgence revives.³¹

²⁶ Code of Canon Law, c. 926.

²⁷ Cf. Beringer-Steinen, Die Ablässe¹⁵ I, n. 29. All partial indulgences of one thousand or several thousand years have been revoked. Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, May 26, 1898, and August 10, 1899.

²⁸ Code of Canon Law, c. 930.

²⁹ Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, July 16, 1887; Code of Canon Law, c. 924, § 2.

³⁰ Decreta authentica Indulgentiarum, n. 202.

³¹ Code of Canon Law, c. 924, § 1.

545. Note. Indulgences granted to some church of regulars cease if such churches pass into the possession of the bishop or of another religious order.³² The reason is that indulgences are granted to these churches principally because they are administered by such a religious order. Consequently, if such an order afterward (even after a long time) recovers the same church, the indulgences also revive. There are considered churches of regulars not only those which are possessed by them, but also all those which have merely been entrusted to them permanently, although the bishop or someone else is the owner.³³ But if some church is administered by a regular priest, even permanently, it is not yet considered a regular church, but is secular, and does not have the indulgences of churches of regulars.³⁴

³² Decreta authentica Indulgentiarum, n. 246.

³³ Cf. Beringer-Steinen, Die Ablässe¹⁵ I, n. 177.

³⁴ Cf. Decreta authentica Congregationis Indulgentiarum, nn. 47 and 395.

S. Th., Suppl., q. 25-27.

671. An indulgence (aflaat), in ecclesiastical usage and theological speech, is called the remission before God of the temporal punishment due for sins, already blotted out as regards guilt, which ecclesiastical authority grants from the treasury of the Church, for the living by way of absolution, for the dead by way of suffrage (can. 911). Therefore it differs both from sacramental absolution and the connected satisfaction, the obligation of which it does not take away, and by which the debt of punishment is diminished without an equivalent compensation; and from private satisfaction, which the just man can offer for himself and for others.

The power which belongs to the Church of granting indulgences is included in the most ample power of the keys, as we know both from the tradition of the Church, which from ancient times has used that power, although not always under the same form, and from the definition of faith in the Council of Constance, sess. 8, a. 42, against Wicleff, and Trent, sess. 25, against the Protestants; that they can also be granted to the dead is certain from the practice of the Church (can. 911 and 913), and from the condemned proposition 22 of Luther and 42 of the Synod of Pistoia. - The concession is made from the treasury of the Church, that is, from the superabundant satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints, which the Church can dispense to the faithful because of the communion of Saints (Clement VI, const. Unigenitus; condemned proposition 17 of Luther and 41 of the Synod of Pistoia). Hence an indulgence is nothing other than an indirect absolution of punishments; directly and formally it is a concession from the treasury of the Church, from which the remission of punishment follows: for the living it is made by way of a payment authoritatively made and applied to them, insofar as the Church from her treasury pays in place of her faithful the satisfactions to be furnished by them (q. 25, a. 1 and ad 2 and 3); for the dead, over whom she has no authority of jurisdiction, only by way of suffrage, insofar as she offers the payment to God, at the same time beseeching him that he deign to apply it to the dead: but in what measure this is done by God we do not know.

Therefore three things are required for an indulgence: a good work, regularly still to be performed; - on the occasion of this, a payment from the treasury of the Church; - consequently, the remission of temporal punishment due for sins.

Moreover indulgences have force, not only in the external forum before the Church, as certain men formerly said erroneously, but also in the internal forum and before God: 1) because according to the express privilege given to Peter (Mt. 16:19), what he remits on earth is also remitted in heaven; 2) because if the Church were to relax and not God, it would be more a deception than a true relaxation; 3) and the Church would harm rather than help, because she would remit to a graver punishment, namely of purgatory, by diminishing present penance (a. 1; cf. proposition 19 of Luther and 40 of the Synod of Pistoia). Hence simply they have as much force as they are proclaimed to have, "provided that on the part of the giver there is authority, and on the part of the recipient charity (or the state of grace), and on the part of the cause piety" (a. 2), namely a reasonable and pious motive: then they have force of themselves, according to the use of the power of the keys and the mind of the one granting, who truly makes the payment, but not always according to the effect of application, which in the living depends on certain conditions, and in the dead is made according to the measure of the divine good pleasure and acceptance (S. C. Indg., July 28, 1840).

Lest the ease of gaining indulgences furnish an occasion of diminishing good works, the words of St. Thomas are to be noted: "Although indulgences avail much for the remission of punishment, nevertheless other works of satisfaction are more meritorious in respect of the essential reward: which is infinitely better than the dismissal of temporal punishment" (ad 2).

1741. I. The dying can, by various titles, gain SEVERAL INDULGENCES, which they call latae, that is, to be obtained without the ministry of a priest, namely: 1. If they possess sacred things, for example crosses, medals, rosaries, enriched with apostolic Indulgences; - 2. if they are members of some Confraternity, for example of the Most Holy Rosary, of the Third Order of St. Francis, etc.; or if they wear some approved Scapular; 3. if they have frequently in life elicited acts of the theological virtues, etc.⁴

The conditions required for gaining these indulgences are the same as for the indulgence of the Apostolic Blessing (see below, q. 2). But if they are annexed, for example, to a cross, rosary, etc., it is required that the sick person have these things with him, or near the bed, although he does not see them, and that he invoke the Most Holy Name of Jesus as many times as there are indulgences to be gained.

II. Among the indulgences which they call ferendae (or to be granted through the ministry of a priest), which can be gained in the article of death, there especially stands forth the APOSTOLIC BLESSING for the article of death, or GENERAL ABSOLUTION, which the Roman Ritual reports.

1742. Questions. Q. 1. When can GENERAL ABSOLUTION be imparted?

Resp. In grave infirmity, namely in the imminent article of death, under which is understood not indeed the agony, but an evident and proximate danger of death, as is gathered from the Bull of Benedict XIV. The rubric of this blessing says: "It is customarily imparted after the Sacraments of Penance, Eucharist, and Extreme Unction." In which case the Confiteor must be said three times (S. C. Indulg., February 5, 1841, to the 6th).⁵

Q. 2. What is required ON THE PART OF THE PRIEST for VALIDLY imparting this Indulgence?

Resp. 1. That he be delegated. This delegation is made by the Roman Pontiff to all Bishops requesting it, together with the power of subdelegating priests, both secular and regular; and indeed in such a way that neither the Indult granted to Bishops expires by the death of the S. Pontiff, nor the subdelegation by the departure or death of the subdelegating Bishop (Thus Benedict XIV, Constitution Pia Mater, April 5, 1747).⁶

2. That he use the formula prescribed by Benedict XIV: if this is omitted, even because of the lack of a book, the indulgence is not conferred, because it is not only directive, but preceptive. S. C. Indulg., February 5, 1841, in Valentinen., to the 8th.⁷

NB. This formula, according to the Brief of our Most Holy Lord LEO XIII, Quo universi (July 7, 1882), must be used by all, even if by another title, for example from a privilege conceded to some Order or Confraternity, General Absolution is given. Wherefore, in the typical edition of the Roman Ritual (Regensburg, 1884), all other formulas which were formerly read in the appendix have been expunged.

Q. 3. What is required ON THE PART OF THE INFIRM?

Resp. 1. The intention of gaining the indulgence, at least interpretative, as is clear from the words of the Rubric. For it is said that it is to be imparted to those "who either have even requested it... or probably would have requested it, or have given signs of contrition." 2. That the sick person be "confessed and refreshed with holy Communion, or insofar as he has been unable to do this, at least contrite, and has devoutly invoked the NAME OF JESUS by mouth, if he could, but if not, in the heart." 3. An act of contrition and charity; and 4. An act by which the sick person receives death from the hand of the Lord with a calm and willing soul, as is clear from the Bull. - And these conditions indeed, as long as the sick person is in possession of his mind, are required as conditions sine qua non for gaining the indulgence, as the Authors commonly teach, and concerning the invocation of the Most Holy Name of Jesus the S. C. OF INDULGENCES expressly declared on September 23, 1775.⁸

Wherefore the RITUAL admonishes: "But if the sick person wishes to confess, let him (the Confessor) hear him and absolve him. If he does not ask for confession, let him excite him to eliciting an act of contrition; concerning the efficacy and power of this Blessing, if time allows, let him admonish him briefly; then let him instruct and exhort him, that he willingly bear the inconveniences and pains of illness in expiation of his past life, and offer himself ready to God for freely accepting whatever shall please Him, and patiently undergoing death itself in satisfaction for the punishments which he has merited by sinning." - It is a matter of prudence to moderate this exhortation (which can already be made in confession) in such a way that disturbance of the sick person, or indignation of the bystanders, is avoided.

Q. 4. Whether this Apostolic Blessing can be REPEATED?

Resp. 1. Affirmative, in a different danger of death; 2. negative, in the same article of death. - For, from the Decree of the S. C. of Indulgences, March 12, 1855,⁹ it is prohibited "to impart several times to a sick person, remaining in the same danger of death, by the same or by several priests having this faculty, the plenary Indulgence in the article of death which is commonly called the papal blessing." - Likewise, there it is prohibited "to impart several times to a sick person, in the same circumstances, a plenary Indulgence from another reason, for example aggregation to the Confraternity of the Most Holy Rosary, of the Holy Scapular, etc." Nor is it permitted to repeat it because the sick person received it in the state of mortal sin, or relapsed into sin, or received Extreme Unction or absolution again. The reason is because the sick person gains the indulgence in the true article of death, if then he is in the state of grace and has already fulfilled the other conditions.

VI. Observations. - 1) To the dying to whom the sacraments are ministered, the general absolution according to can. 468 is also to be granted by any priest: "To any priest who assists the sick there belongs the faculty of granting to them the Apostolic Blessing with plenary indulgence in the article of death, according to the form handed down by approved liturgical books, which blessing he should not omit to impart."

Therefore under the name of general absolution comes the plenary indulgence which the Roman Pontiff imparts to the dying, by himself or by delegates, under the form of a blessing; and under this aspect it is altogether distinguished from the plenary indulgence which, without any blessing, those can gain in the article of death who possess a blessed or pious object, e.g., a cross or plaque, to which an apostolic indulgence is attached, or members of a confraternity to which such a privilege has been granted.

General absolution can be granted to all placed in grave danger, even from a cause other than illness, but the indulgence remains suspended and does not attain its effect except in the true and physical article of death. And therefore it neither ought nor can be repeated, nor given under several titles, in the same illness however long-lasting, since this would be altogether useless, even if afterward the dying person fell into a new mortal sin; - but it is to be repeated only if the sick person recovers and afterward falls into a new danger, S. C. Indulgences, 24 Sept. 1838; 12 March 1855; 12 Feb. 1842.

The conditions required in the sick person for gaining it, from the bull of Benedict XIV Pia mater, 5 Apr. 1747, are: a) that he not be excommunicated or manifestly impenitent; but if he is doubtfully disposed, let the apostolic blessing be granted as often as absolution or Extreme Unction is given, even only under condition;

b) that he has received the sacraments of Penance and Eucharist, if he can; but if he cannot, the state of grace suffices while he gives forth his supreme breath;

c) that he offer himself prepared to accept whatever shall please God, and to undergo death itself patiently in satisfaction for the punishments which he has merited by sinning;

d) that he devoutly invoke the most holy Name of Jesus by mouth if he can, otherwise in heart; and elicit an act of sorrow and charity.

Indulgence, taken in a broader sense, imports any remission whatever of sins, or concession of grace and mercy; but accepted in the stricter sense, Indulgence can be defined: the remission before God of temporal penalty owed for sins, already blotted out as regards guilt, which ecclesiastical authority concedes from the treasury of the Church, for the living by way of absolution, for the dead by way of suffrage (Can. 911).

Indulgence accepted in this strict sense is distinguished in many ways; for it is: 1°. plenary or partial, according as the whole temporal penalty is remitted or only a part of the same; 2°. personal or local or real, according as it is conceded immediately to persons, or is affixed to some place, or is attached to some thing; 3°. temporal or perpetual, according as it is conceded for a determined time or without any fixed term.

I say 1°. The Church has the power of conceding Indulgences; but this power, in the concrete, is found only among those who are called and are true Prelates of the Church. The reason for the first is taken both from the Council of Trent, sess. 25, Decree on Indulgences, where those are condemned with anathema who "deny that there is in the Church the power of conceding them (Indulgences)"; and because Christ conceded to the Apostles the general power of loosing whatever would impede the attainment of eternal beatitude. But the reason for the second is both because only the Prelates of the Church are successors of the Apostles, to whom alone that general power of loosing was conceded, and because only the Prelates of the Church can dispense from its treasury, since to them alone belongs full power over the mystical body of Christ. - Hence:

1°. Besides the Roman Pontiff, to whom the dispensation of the entire spiritual treasury of the Church was committed by Christ the Lord, only those can by ordinary power lavish indulgences to whom this has been expressly conceded by law (Can. 912).

2°. Cardinals . . . enjoy the faculty of conceding indulgences of two hundred days, to be gained even as often as, in places or institutes and for persons of their jurisdiction or protection; likewise in other places, but to be gained only by those present, each time (Can. 239, § 1, n. 24).

From possession having been taken, residential Bishops have the right of conceding indulgences of fifty days in the places of their jurisdiction (Can. 349, § 2, n. 2).

In suffragan dioceses the Metropolitan can concede indulgences of one hundred days, just as in his own diocese (Can. 274, n. 2).

§ 3. When a church or altar is consecrated, the consecrating Bishop, although he lacks jurisdiction in the territory, concedes an indulgence of one year to those visiting the church or altar on the day itself of consecration; but on the anniversary day one of fifty days, if he is a Bishop; one hundred, if an Archbishop; two hundred, if a Cardinal of the Holy Roman Church (Can. 1166).

Cf. Can. 294, §§ 1, 2; Can. 323, §§ 1, 2.

3°. A delegate, according to the measure which the delegating one has established, can concede indulgences no otherwise than he by whom he was delegated, because an act of jurisdiction, as is the faculty of conceding indulgences, can be exercised through a delegate.

Those inferior to the Roman Pontiff cannot:

1°. Commit to others the faculty of conceding indulgences, unless this has been expressly granted to them by the Apostolic See;

2°. Concede indulgences applicable to the dead;

3°. Attach other indulgences to the same thing or act of piety or sodality to which indulgences have already been conceded by the Apostolic See or by another, unless new conditions to be fulfilled are prescribed (Can. 913).

4°. The Church has always taken care to exercise moderation, lest through indiscreet and superfluous indulgences the keys of the Church be contemned and the satisfaction of penance be weakened (Cap. Cum ex eo, 14, de Poenitent. et Remiss.). Wherefore Bishops cannot attach other indulgences to crosses, etc., already legitimately enriched with indulgences, unless the fulfilling of a new condition is prescribed. - Cf. S. C. Indulg., 12 Jan. 1878.

5°. Prelates inferior to a Bishop cannot concede any indulgences, neither Vicars general nor Capitular Vicars, the see being vacant, and by like reason administrators among us; much less Parish Priests. - Cf. Lacroix, lib. 6, part. 2, nn. 1323 and following. - Ferraris, under the word Indulgentiae.

6°. An indulgence of fifty days, applicable also to the dead, has been conceded to those kissing the ring of Cardinals and Bishops. S. Off., 18 Mar. 1909.

I say 2°. § 1. That someone may be capable of gaining indulgences for himself, he must be baptized, not excommunicated, in the state of grace at least at the end of the prescribed works, and a subject of the conceding one.

§ 2. But that a capable subject may really gain them, he must have at least a general intention of acquiring them and fulfill the enjoined works at the appointed time and in the due manner according to the tenor of the concession (Can. 925).

The principal conditions which are required in the subject for gaining indulgences are the following: 1°. that he be baptized, because the treasury of the Church cannot be dispensed to infidels, and that he not be excommunicated, because otherwise he is deprived of the communion of spiritual goods; 2°. that he duly fulfill the enjoined works, according as they have been prescribed as to time, mode, and place, because under these conditions indulgences are conceded; 3°. that he be in the state of grace, at least when he places the last prescribed work, because penalty is not remitted unless guilt has been dismissed; except probably, if they are applied to the dead; 4°. that he have the intention of gaining them.¹

¹ Cf. Addenda, p. 1092, n. 22.

Question 1. Whether the concession of an Indulgence made without cause is valid?

Resp. Negatively, and the reason is because the Prelates of the Church are only delegates of Christ for dispensing the treasury of the Church. But Christ cannot hold ratified the lavish distributions of his treasury made by prodigal dispensers. Moreover, it does not belong to the faithful, nor to simple priests, to judge concerning the sufficiency of the cause on account of which an Indulgence is conceded; for they ought simply to judge that it is just, because presumption always stands for superiors, unless the contrary is certainly established. Cf. St. Alphons., de Sacram. Paenit., n. 532. - Lehmkuhl, nn. 535 and following.

Question 2. Whether venial sin is an obstacle to gaining an Indulgence?

Resp. Negatively, and the reason is because, although the penalty owed to such a sin cannot be remitted, nevertheless the penalty owed for other sins already blotted out can be remitted: for just as it is not repugnant that the guilt of some venial sin be remitted without the guilt of others being remitted, so neither is it repugnant that the penalty of some remitted venial or mortal sins be blotted out, although the penalty for one or several other venials remains to be paid. Nevertheless, from these reasons it is manifest that venial sin is an obstacle to gaining a plenary indulgence as such. - Cf. St. Alphons., de Sacram. Paenit., n. 534.

Question 3. Whether an Indulgence which is conceded as plenary can be obtained at least partially, if there is present an obstacle impeding it from being obtained entirely, for example, affection toward some venial?

Resp. Affirmatively. A plenary indulgence conceded in such a way is understood so that if someone cannot gain it plenarily, nevertheless he gains it partially according to the disposition which he has (Can. 926).

Question 4. What is understood by Indulgences of 10 or 15 days, years, quarantines, etc., etc.?

Resp. There is understood, according to the common opinion, the remission of so much penalty as formerly was remitted, or would have been remitted, through canonical penance of the same time. Thus, for example, through an indulgence of seven years so much penalty is remitted as was remitted through penance of seven years accustomed to be enjoined according to the ancient canons. But how much canonical penances were worth before God, and how much partial indulgences of so many days or years are now worth, is altogether hidden from us; because we are ignorant what proportion our satisfactions have with the penalty owed for our sins. - Thus commonly the theologians.

Question 5. Whether he gains Indulgences who does not complete the work prescribed for them entire?

Resp. Negatively, if he omits a notable part of the work, so that according to moral estimation he does not complete it as to substance; because he is not judged simply to satisfy the required conditions. But otherwise if he passes over a very small part; because then morally, or as to substance, the prescribed work is judged to be completed. - But a very small part is to be taken respectively. Thus in the Rosary the omission of one Pater and Ave seems very small; but otherwise if five Pater and Ave are required, because omission of the fifth part of the work is notable. - Cf. St. Alphons., ibid.

Question 6. Whether and how Indulgences can be applied to the dead?

Resp. They can be applied if the two following conditions are present: 1°. that they be specially conceded in the rescript of the Pontiff as applicable to them; 2°. that there be present the intention of making such an application. - Yet observe that an indulgence cannot be applied to the dead by way of absolution, but only by way of suffrage, namely by beseeching God that he may benignly will to accept such application and lavish it upon the souls of Purgatory. The reason is because the Pontiff does not have jurisdiction over the souls of the dead, and therefore cannot absolve them from penalties, as by sentence. Cf. Lacroix, n. 1336 - Lugo, de Paenit., disp. 27, n. 58.

When the Supreme Pontiff concedes an indulgence to the living, he absolves them from penalties owed to sins already remitted, and at the same time exhibits payment from the treasury of the Church. For every indulgence conceded to the living imports these two things, absolution and payment. Not likewise when an indulgence applicable to the dead is conceded. Now he who gains some indulgence is not an administrator of the treasury of the Church, nor are the satisfactions of Christ subjected to his administration. And therefore he cannot himself transfer them to others according to his own pleasure. Since the Supreme Pontiff can concede by way of absolution and suffrage, he himself is able to exercise this power. In fact, when he concedes an indulgence applicable to the dead, he certainly does not lavish it so that it may profit both the living person gaining it and the dead person, but so that it may profit the living person, if he so wishes, or, if he prefers, so that it may be applied to the dead: if he retains it for himself, it profits him by way of absolution; if he offers it to the dead, it profits these by way of suffrage. Payment and absolution are had for the living; not absolution, but payment is offered to God by asking him that he may will to accept that application in favor of the dead.

Question 7. Whether an Indulgence infallibly profits the souls of Purgatory to whom it is applied?

Resp. It is controverted; for some affirm, because Christ gave the Church an infallible power by these words: "Whatever you shall loose" . . ., etc. But the concession of an Indulgence for the dead is truly an act of the keys, since it proceeds from Apostolic authority; but the key always opens, the due conditions having been placed: therefore an Indulgence is always efficacious and infallible both for the dead and for the living, provided the requisites are present. But others deny, because no divine promise is present by force of which God is judged certainly to accept the offered Indulgence. Hence he seems to admit it to be applied only according to his good pleasure. Besides, the Church keeps the usage of celebrating anniversary Masses for several years and for the same souls, even at privileged altars, or those to which inheres the privilege of a plenary indulgence. But that practice would be vain if immediately in the first Mass applied to them their liberation took place. - Cf. Suarez, disp. 53, sect. 3, n. 3. - St. Alphons., de Sacram. Paenit., n. 534. - Lehmkuhl, nn. 530 and following.

But it is certain that indulgences profit the dead at least for the most part; for otherwise the Church would act in some useless thing by applying them to those souls; which certainly cannot be said without impiety.

Question 8. Whether a special application must be made to certain determined souls, or whether a general one suffices?

Resp. A general application made to all souls dwelling in Purgatory suffices, because suffrages are divisible, and therefore can be distributed among all souls. It shines forth besides from the practice of the Church, which orders Masses to be celebrated for the dead in general, especially on the second day of November. Likewise when collections are made in Churches for the souls of Purgatory, the Masses to be celebrated from them ought to be applied for all in general. But if someone wishes to restrict his application, then he ought to determine certain souls specially, whether expressly or implicitly and equivalently.

Question 9. Whether the state of grace is required for gaining an Indulgence for the dead?

Resp. It is controverted among theologians, of whom some affirm, because no one can apply an indulgence to another unless he has first made it his own; but others deny, because the application is made directly and immediately to the dead, and the work is placed only as a condition, not for gaining the indulgence for oneself, but so that it may be applied to the dead. The first opinion, which seems truer to St. Alphonsus, is to be counseled in practice as safer. - Cf. St. Alphons., loc. cit., n. 534. - Baller., note (c), p. 1051.

Question 10. Whether confession and absolution are required even for venials for gaining Indulgences which are conceded with the clause: to the contrite and confessed?

Resp. Affirmatively, as regards confession, notwithstanding the state of grace; and the reason is because, although confession then is not necessary for remitting sins, nevertheless it is required as a condition or prescribed work. It is established from the Decree of the S. Congregation of Indulgences approved by Clement XIII, on the day 19 May 1759. But as regards absolution, one must answer negatively, as is clear from the Declaration of the same S. Congregation of Indulgences given on the day 15 Dec. 1841.

Question 11. Whether confession is required as often as a plenary Indulgence is to be gained?

Resp. Affirmatively, as regards most of them, as is proved from the rescripts of many concessions. - I said most, for although for all the state of grace is certainly required, nevertheless confession is not likewise required, as is clear by the example of the plenary indulgence conceded for the exercise of the Way of the Cross. - But here it must be observed:

1°. § 1. For gaining any indulgences whatever, confession perhaps required can be performed within eight days which immediately precede the day to which the indulgence was affixed; but communion on the vigil of the same day; but both also within the whole subsequent octave.

§ 2. Likewise, for gaining indulgences conceded for pious exercises led through a triduum, week, etc., confession and communion can also be made within the octave which immediately follows the completed exercise.

§ 3. The faithful of Christ who are accustomed, unless legitimately impeded, to approach the sacrament of penance at least twice in a month, or to receive holy communion daily in the state of grace and with a right and pious mind, although once or twice in the week they abstain from the same, can obtain all indulgences, even without actual confession which otherwise would be necessary for gaining them, except indulgences either of the ordinary and extraordinary jubilee or after the manner of a jubilee (Can. 931).

2°. Not a few Bishops have obtained an equivalent privilege in favor of those who are accustomed to confess twice in a month, namely in any space of fourteen days.

3°. Those privileges do not regard the plenary indulgence which is conceded after the form of a Jubilee, for whose right understanding the very words and tenor of the concession must always be attended to. - Cf. Prinzivalli, n. cclix. - Acta S. Sedis, vol. 11, pp. 358 and following, and vol. 18, p. 412.

Question 12. What do the clauses import: to the contrite - with contrite heart - with heart at least contrite - and other similar ones?

Resp. They certainly do not signify that an act of contrition is required as an enjoined work, but express only the necessity of the state of grace for gaining an indulgence. - Cf. Acta S. Sedis, vol. 6, p. 388.

Question 13. Whether someone can on the same day gain diverse Indulgences, or several times the same Indulgences?

Resp. § 2. A partial indulgence, unless the contrary is expressly noted, can be gained several times in a day, the same work being repeated (Can. 928).

Question 14. Whether several Indulgences can be attached to one and the same thing, or place, or work?

Resp. Several indulgences can be attached to one and the same thing or place under various titles; but by one and the same work, to which indulgences have been attached under various titles, several indulgences cannot be acquired, unless the required work is confession or communion, or unless something else has expressly been provided (Can. 933).

Question 15. Whether several plenary Indulgences can be acquired on the same day?

Resp. § 1. A plenary indulgence, unless something else has expressly been provided, can be acquired only once in a day, even if the same prescribed work is placed several times (Can. 928).

Provision has been made as regards indulgences which are called of the Portiuncula, and certain few others. Likewise it must be noted that the decree of Innocent is to be understood concerning gaining the same plenary indulgence several times by placing the same work several times on the same day. For it is certain that someone can obtain, even with one confession and communion, several plenary indulgences which are conceded on account of diverse actions on the same day. But it is evident that someone cannot gain for himself several plenary indulgences on the same day unless, sin having been committed after the first one has been obtained, he has duly received its remission; but if nevertheless the plenary indulgences are applicable to the dead, then he can gain one for himself and others for the souls in Purgatory. - Cf. Beringer, Die Ablässe, p. 95, n. 10.

Question 16. Whether, or what kind of, intention is required for gaining Indulgences?

Resp. § 2. But that a capable subject may really gain them, he must have at least a general intention of acquiring them . . . (Can. 925).

When, for gaining indulgences, a prayer is prescribed for a determined end, for example, for the extirpation of heresies, an explicit intention, expressed each time, is not required. S. Cong. Indulg., 12 July 1847.

Question 17. Whether, if the faculty of commuting the works enjoined for gaining Indulgences is conceded, the commutation must necessarily be made in confession?

Resp. Negatively, unless in the concession of a faculty of this kind such a condition is expressly provided. - Which is drawn out, as we think, from the response of the S. C. of Indulg., 20 Feb. 1801. In the new Code the faculty has now been handed over to all confessors.

Pious works enjoined for gaining indulgences can be commuted by confessors into others for those who, detained by a legitimate impediment, cannot perform the same works (Can. 935).

Question 18. Whether, and how, deaf-mutes can gain Indulgences to which vocal prayers are attached?

Resp. Mutes can gain indulgences attached to public prayers, if together with the rest of the faithful praying in the same place they raise their mind and pious affections to God; and if there is question of private prayers, it is enough that they recollect them in the mind, or pour them forth by signs, or merely run through them with the eyes (Can. 936).

Question 19. Whether those who, impeded by chronic infirmity, cannot visit a church and frequently receive communion, can nevertheless gain Indulgences, when the two aforesaid conditions are required?

Resp. Affirmatively, from the special concession of Pius IX, provided nevertheless that the other conditions are fulfilled. For on the day 18 Sept. 1862, "His Holiness graciously granted that the aforesaid faithful of Christ [the habitually infirm chronically, unable to go out from home on account of some physical permanent impediment], excepting nevertheless those who dwell in a Community, can acquire all and each plenary Indulgences already conceded or to be conceded in the future, and whatever others they could acquire in the places in which they live, if they were not in that physical state, for whose acquisition Sacred Communion and visitation of some Church or public Oratory in the same places is prescribed, provided that, truly penitent and confessed, and with all the other conditions fulfilled, if any have been enjoined, in place of Holy Communion and Visitation they faithfully fulfill other pious works to be enjoined by the respective confessor. The present to be valid in perpetuity without any expedition of a Brief. Notwithstanding whatever things make to the contrary."

The faithful of either sex who, for pursuit of perfection, or for instruction or education, or even for reason of health, live common life in houses lacking a church or public chapel, constituted with the consent of the Ordinaries, and likewise all persons dwelling there for ministering to them, as often as for gaining indulgences there is prescribed the visitation of some church not determined, or of some indeterminate public oratory, can visit the chapel of their own house in which they can by law satisfy the obligation of hearing Mass, provided they have duly performed the other enjoined works (Can. 929).

Question 20. Whether Indulgences are lost if a movable thing to which they are attached is handed over to another?

Resp. Negatively, by force of canon 924, § 2.

Question 21. To what things can Indulgences be applied?

Resp. Indulgences can be applied to any solid things whatever, not even iron or wood being excepted, as formerly. Even a rosary made of solid glass can be blessed with attached indulgences. Therefore only things which can easily be broken or torn, such as paper, blown glass, etc., must be excepted. - Cf. Prinzivalli, n. CDXX.

Question 22. What are the rules for discerning true Indulgences from false ones?

Resp. The Sacred Congregation of Indulgences, by the Decree Urbis et Orbis, confirmed by the Supreme Pontiff on 10 Aug. 1899, established the following rules. Rule I. "All Indulgences are authentic which are contained in the newest Collection edited by the S. Congregation of Indulgences." Rule II. "General Indulgences which are not exhibited in the above-mentioned Collection, or which are said to have been conceded after the Collection was edited, will then only have to be held as authentic when the autograph document of their concession has been recognized by the S. Congregation of Indulgences, to which, under penalty of nullity, it must be exhibited before they are published." Rule III. "Indulgences conceded to Orders and religious Congregations, Archconfraternities, Confraternities, Archsodalities, Sodalities, pious Unions, pious Societies, certain more celebrated Churches, pious Places, and Objects of devotion are to be held authentic, which are contained in summaries recognized and approved by the S. Congregation of Indulgences, and printed by its authority or permission." Rule IV. "Indulgences, whether general or particular, are not to be held as authentic which are contained in books, booklets, summaries, sheets, small papers, or even in images, printed without the approbation of the competent authority; which approbation will have to be conceded after diligent recognition and distinctly expressed." Rule V. "Apocryphal, or now altogether revoked, are all Indulgences of a thousand or more years, at whatever time they are said to have been conceded." Rule VI. "Plenary Indulgences which are asserted to have been conceded to those reciting merely a few words are to be held suspect, with the exception of Indulgences in the article of death." Rule VII. "Indulgences are to be rejected as apocryphal which are circulated in booklets, sheets, or little printed or manuscript papers, in which, from slight or even superstitious causes and uncertain revelations, or under illusory conditions, Indulgences and graces exceeding use and measure are promised." Rule VIII. "As counterfeit are to be rejected sheets and booklets in which liberation of one or several souls from Purgatory is promised to the faithful reciting one or another prayer; and the Indulgences which are accustomed to be added to the said promise are to be held as apocryphal." Rule IX. "Indulgences of more recent asserted concession are to be held apocryphal, or at least gravely suspect, if they are extended to an unusual number of years or days." An authentic declaration of these rules and other things necessary to know concerning Indulgences are found in Beringer, Die Ablässe, pp. 808 and following.

Question 23. How is the faculty of blessing crucifixes with application of a plenary indulgence, called toties quoties, conceded by the Apostolic See in whatever way, to be understood?

Resp. "It is to be understood thus and not otherwise, that any faithful Christian constituted in the article of death, having kissed one of such blessed crucifixes, even if it does not belong to him, or having touched it in any way, provided that, confessed and refreshed by sacred communion, or if he could not do this, at least contrite, he devoutly invokes the Most Holy name of Jesus, by mouth, if he can, but if not, by heart, and patiently receives death as the wage of sin from the hand of the Lord, can acquire a plenary indulgence." S. C. S. Offic., 10 June 1914.

Question 24. If prayer in general is prescribed for gaining Indulgences, what kind is required?

Resp. § 1. If for gaining indulgences prayer in general according to the mind of the Supreme Pontiff is prescribed, merely mental prayer does not suffice; but vocal prayer can be chosen at the judgment of the faithful, unless some particular one is assigned.

§ 2. If a particular prayer has been assigned, indulgences can be acquired in whatever language the prayer is recited, provided the fidelity of the version is established from the declaration either of the Sacred Penitentiary or of one of the Ordinaries of the place where the language is common into which the prayer is translated; but indulgences entirely cease on account of any addition, subtraction, or interpolation.

§ 3. For the acquisition of indulgences it is enough to recite the prayer alternately with a companion, or to follow it in the mind while it is recited by another (Can. 934).

You Will Resolve. - Unless something else appears from the tenor of the concession, indulgences conceded by a Bishop can be gained both by subjects outside the territory, and by pilgrims, wanderers, and all exempt persons dwelling in the territory (Can. 927).

2°. No one acquiring indulgences can apply them to others dwelling in life; but all indulgences conceded by the Roman Pontiff, unless something else is established, are applicable to souls detained in purgatory (Can. 930).

Concerning this matter Cardinal De Lugo says: "Commonly the faculty of gaining indulgences for other living persons is not conceded, because, since they themselves can also come to their own aid, it is not expedient to foster their laziness, so that they take care neither to satisfy nor even to gain indulgences for themselves." - Cf. Lugo, disp. 27, n. 77. - Lacroix, n. 1328. - Baller., note (a), n. 1056.¹

3°. § 1. According to the norm of can. 75, indulgences attached to some church do not cease if the church is utterly destroyed and again is built within fifty years in the same or nearly the same place and under the same title.

§ 2. Indulgences attached to rosaries or other things cease only then when the rosaries or other things altogether cease to be or are sold (Can. 924).

Nor are they lost if through successive repairs they should be totally renewed, since they would remain morally the same. Therefore a rosary also does not lose indulgences which is repaired successively, although the beads have afterward been renewed entirely by parts. - Cf. Prinzivalli, CDLXXXII.

4°. Indulgences do not expire by the death of the one conceding them, since they are graces, nor before notice of revocation. Indulgences are to be accepted as they sound; nevertheless, since they are graces, they are to be interpreted broadly, while nonetheless preserving the propriety of the words. Hence they are to be judged perpetual if they have been given without restriction of time. - Cf. St. Alphons., n. 534.

5°. Blessed things enriched with indulgences ought not to be sold, and if they are sold, they lose the indulgences. - Cf. Can. 924, § 2.

6°. Cardinals have the faculty:

Of blessing everywhere, by the sign of the cross alone, with all indulgences usually conceded by the Holy See, rosaries and other prayer-beads, crosses, medals, statues, scapulars approved by the Apostolic See, and of imposing them without the burden of enrollment;

Of erecting, under one blessing, in churches and Oratories, even private ones, and other pious places, Stations of the Way of the Cross with all indulgences which have been imparted to those performing a pious exercise of this kind: and also of blessing, for the faithful who by reason of infirmity or another legitimate impediment cannot visit the sacred stations of the Way of the Cross, images of the Crucified with the application of all indulgences attached by the Roman Pontiffs to the devout exercise of the same Way of the Cross (Can. 239, § 1, nn. 5, 6).

7°. For gaining an indulgence affixed to some day, if visitation of a church or oratory is required, this can be made from noon of the preceding day up to midnight which closes the stated day (Can. 923).

8°. By a work which one is bound to perform by law or precept an indulgence cannot be gained, unless something else is expressly said in its concession; yet he who performs a work enjoined on him as sacramental penance and perhaps enriched with indulgences can at the same time both satisfy the penance and gain the indulgences (Can. 932).

9°. Our Most Holy Lord Benedict XV deigned to concede that indulgences, for the gaining of which the recitation of prayers together with some bodily act is enjoined, which the mutilated are unequal to performing, can be gained by them merely with prayers poured forth. Sac. Poen. Apost., 22 Oct. 1917.

10°. § 3. A plenary indulgence conceded as daily, perpetual, or for a time, to those visiting some church or public oratory is to be understood in such a way that it can be acquired by each faithful person on any day whatever, but only once in a year, unless something else is expressly said in the decree (Can. 921).

11°. The daily morning intention in the Apostleship of Prayer must be expressed by a vocal formula. - S. Off., 10 June 1915.

12°. If crosses of the Way of the Cross first blessed perish entirely, a canonical erection is again necessary; if they perish in the smaller part, it is permitted to substitute others for them without any blessing; if for some particular reason they are completely removed, and only for a time so that they may be restored again to the same place, neither erection nor blessing is needed for gaining indulgences. S. C. Indulg., 30 Jan. 1839.

Note. - To understand the nature of the Jubilee Indulgence, just as also the other concessions of the same, one must attend especially to the words and tenor of the Constitution by which the Jubilee itself is promulgated. For the latest Jubilees have borne a certain diversity with respect to the required conditions, and therefore one would argue badly from one to another, independently of the apostolic words themselves.

¹ Cf. Addenda, p. 1112, n. 57.

I. In few words I touch upon the doctrine of indulgences. These things concerning indulgences Trent prescribes, session 25: Since the power of conferring indulgences has been granted by Christ to the Church, and she has used such power divinely delivered to her even from the most ancient times, the holy Synod teaches and commands that the use of indulgences, most salutary to the Christian people and approved by the authority of the sacred Councils, is to be retained in the Church; and condemns with anathema those who either assert that they are useless, or deny that there is in the Church a power of granting them. In granting them, nevertheless, she desires that moderation be employed, according to the ancient and approved custom in the Church, lest by excessive facility ecclesiastical discipline be enervated. But the abuses, and so forth.

II. Three things the Council lays down: first, the power given by Christ to the Church of granting indulgences; second, that they are salutary; third, moderation in the bestowal of them. An indulgence is a remission of temporal punishment. Indulgences are imparted out of the common treasury of the Church. But that treasury is the infinite merits of Christ, and afterwards of all the saints, which receive their value from Christ himself the Head.

III. It is of faith that there exists in the Church a power of granting indulgences, and that the use of them is salutary to the faithful.

VIII. In few words it is proved that plenary indulgences profit little those who neglect according to their strength to satisfy the divine justice by laborious works, as Trent teaches. Bring forth fruits worthy of penance, says Matthew. St. Paul did not indulge the incestuous Corinthian save after an austere and long-lasting penance. From the time of the Apostles down to about the fourteenth century we read of no plenary and general indulgence indiscriminately for all the faithful. Now a frequent use of indulgences obtains, which are imparted according to the dispositions of the faithful. They are called plenary indulgences, because the Church on her part remits the whole temporal punishment, which the faithful cannot execute, to those who are disposed for receiving so great a benefit. But we say that those faithful are indisposed for this benefit who do not execute those laborious and satisfactory works which they can. They ought to render that part of the debt which they are able; that which remains the plenary indulgence fully supplies.

XIV. Indulgence is manifold. Some are perpetual, others temporary; some plenary, others partial. Those partial indulgences, which are granted only for several days or years, have respect to the ancient penitential canons, which enjoined so many days or years of penance.

Caius, a missionary priest, was called to a dying member of the Third Order of St. Francis who, after receiving the sacraments, asked that, according to the privilege granted to Tertiaries, the Apostolic Blessing with a plenary indulgence at the moment of death be given to him. Caius indeed granted it according to the approved formula and, so that the dying man might be more secure, immediately gave him the apostolic blessing according to the Ritual. When another priest heard these things, he rebuked him, saying that a plenary indulgence at the moment of death can be gained only once, and that it is better to give the apostolic blessing when the dying man is at the point of dying, lest by sinning afterwards he incur penalties to be discharged. Hence it is asked:

1. Can the apostolic blessing with a plenary indulgence at the moment of death be given several times to a dying person?

2. Must the actual moment of death be awaited for this blessing to be given?

3. What is to be said of the case?

1. Can the apostolic blessing with a plenary indulgence be given several times to a person in danger of death?

No, it can only be given once while the person is in the same danger of death either by different priests or by the same priest on different titles.¹

1 Ojetti, Synopsis Rer. Moral., s.v. Indulgentia.

2. Is the moment of death to be waited for in order that the blessing may be given?

No, the apostolic blessing may be given as soon as the recipient is in danger of death and capable of receiving the sacrament of Extreme Unction. The blessing only takes its effect in the true moment of death, and in the meantime its effect is suspended.²

2 Génicot, vol. ii, n. 410.

3. The case, Caius did right to accede to the pious wish of the dying tertiary, and give him the papal blessing to which he had a right. He did wrong to repeat it immediately after according to the form in the Ritual. The Sacred Congregation of Indulgences has several times answered that the blessing may be given only once. On the other hand the second priest was wrong in saying that the papal blessing should be given when the recipient is actually dying; it takes its effect at that time if it were validly given and received, but it may be given as soon as the recipient is in danger of death, as was said above.