Part 37

32. The personal immunity exonerating the clergy from military law may be abrogated without violation either of natural right or of equity. This abrogation is called for by civil progress, especially in a society modelled upon principles of liberal government.

(Letter to Bishop Montisregal, "Singularis nobilisque," September 29, 1864.)

33. It does not appertain to ecclesiastical jurisdiction, by any right, and inherent to its essence, to direct doctrine in matters of theology.

(Letter to Archbishop Frising, "Tuas libenter," December 21, 1863.)

34. The doctrine of those who compare the sovereign pontiff to a free sovereign acting in the universal church is a doctrine which prevailed in the middle ages.

(Apostolic Letter, "Ad Apostolicas," August 22, 1851.)

{2472}

35. There is no obstacle to the sentence of a general council, or the act of all the nation transferring the pontifical sovereign from the bishopric and city of Rome to some other bishopric in another city.

(Apostolic Letter, "Ad Apostolicas," August 22, 1851.)

36. The definition of a national council does not admit of subsequent discussion, and the civil power can require that matters shall remain as they are.

(Apostolic Letter, "Ad Apostolicas," August 22, 1851.)

37. National churches can be established without, and separated from, the Roman pontiff.

(Allocution, "Multis gravibus," December 17, 1860; "Jamdudum cernimus," March 18, 1861.)

38. Many Roman pontiffs have lent themselves to the division of the church in Eastern and Western churches.

(Apostolic Letter, " Ad Apostolicas," August 22, 1851.)

VI.—ERRORS OF CIVIL SOCIETY, AS MUCH IN THEMSELVES AS CONSIDERED IN THEIR RELATIONS TO THE CHURCH.

39. The state of a republic, as being the origin and source of all rights, imposes itself by its rights, which is not circumscribed by any limit.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

40. The doctrine of the Catholic church is opposed to the laws and interests of society.

(Encyclical, "Qui pluribus," Nov. 9, 1846; Allocution, "Quibus quantisque," April 20, 1849.)

41. The civil government, even when exercised by a heretic sovereign, possesses an indirect and negative power over religious affairs.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.)

42. In a legal conflict between the two powers, civil law ought to prevail.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.)

43. The lay power has the authority to destroy, declare, and render null solemn conventions or concordats relating to the use of rights appertaining to ecclesiastical immunity, without the consent of the priesthood, and even against its will.

(Allocution, "In consistoriali," November 1, 1850; "Multis gravibusque," December 17, 1860.)

44. The civil authority may interfere in matters regarding religion, morality, and spiritual government, whence it has control over the instructions for the guidance of consciences issued, conformably with their mission, by the pastors of the church. Further, it possesses full power in the matter of administering the divine sacraments and the necessary arrangements for their reception.

("In consistoriali," November 1, 1858; Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

45. The entire direction of public schools in which the youth of Christian States are educated, save an exception in the case of Episcopal seminaries, may and must appertain to the civil power, and belong to it so far that no other authority shall be recognized as having any right to interfere in the discipline of the schools, the arrangement of the studies, the taking of degrees, or the choice and approval of teachers.

(Allocution, "In consistoriali," Nov. 1, 1850; "Quibus luctuosissimis," September 5, 1861.)

46. Further, even in clerical seminaries the mode of study must be submitted to the civil authority.

(Allocution, "Nunquam fore," December 15, 1856.)

47. The most advantageous conditions of civil society require that popular schools open without distinction to all children of the people, and public establishments destined to teach young people letters and good discipline, and to impart to them education, should be freed from all ecclesiastical authority and interference, and should be fully subjected to the civil and political power for the teaching of masters and opinions common to the times.

(Letter to Archbishop of Friburg, "Quum none sine," July 14, 1864.)

48. This manner of instructing youth, which consists in separating it from the Catholic faith and from the power of the church, and in teaching it above all a knowledge of natural things and the objects of social life, may be perfectly approved by Catholics.

(Letter to Archbishop of Friburg, "Quum none sine," July 14, 1864.)

49. The civil power is entitled to prevent ministers of religion and the faithful from communicating freely and mutually with the Roman Pontiff.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

50. The lay authority possesses of itself the right of presenting bishops, and may require of them that they take possession of their diocese before having received canonical institution and the Apostolical letter of the Holy See.

(Allocution, "Nunquam fore," December 15, 1856.)

51. Further, the lay authority has the right of deposing bishops from their pastoral functions, and is not forced to obey the Roman Pontiff in matters affecting the filling of sees and the institution of bishops.

(Apostolic Letter, "Multiplices inter," June 10, 1851; Allocution, "Acerbissimum.")

52. The government has a right to alter a period fixed by the church for the accomplishment of the religious duties of both sexes, and may enjoin upon all religious establishments to admit nobody to take solemn vows without permission.

(Allocution, "Nunquam fore," December 15, 1856.)

53. Laws respecting the protection, rights, and functions of religious establishments must be abrogated; further, the civil government may lend its assistance to all who desire to quit a religious life, and break their vows. The government may also deprive religious establishments of the right of patronage to collegiate churches and simple benefices, and submit their goods to civil competence and administration.

(Allocution, "Acerbissimum," September 27, 1862; "Probe memineritis, " January 22, 1885; and "Quum sæpe, " July 26, 1858.)

54. Kings and princes are not only free from the jurisdiction of the church, but are superior to the church even in litigious questions of jurisdiction

(Apostolic Letter, "Multiplices inter," June 10, 1851.)

55. The church must be separated from the State and the State from the church.

(Allocution, "Acerbissimum," September 27, 1862.)

VII.—ERRORS IN NATURAL AND CHRISTIAN MORALS.

56. Moral laws do not stand in need of the Divine sanction, and there is no necessity that human laws should be conformable to the laws of nature and receive their sanction from God.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

57. Knowledge of philosophical and moral things and civil laws may and must be free from Divine and ecclesiastical authority.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

58. No other forces are recognized than those which reside in matter, and which, contrary to all discipline and all decency of morals, are summed up in the accumulation and increase of riches by every possible means and in the satisfaction of every pleasure.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862. Encyclical, "Quanto conficiamur," August 10, 1863.)

{2473}

59. Right consists in material fact. All human duties are vain words, and all human facts have the force of right.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

60. Authority is nothing but the sum of numbers and material force.

(Allocution, "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.)

61. The happy injustice of a fact inflicts no injury upon the sanctity of right.

(Allocution, "Jamdudum cernimus," March 18, 1861.)

62. The principle of non-intervention must be proclaimed and observed.

(Allocution, "Novos et ante," September 27, 1860.)

63. It is allowable to withdraw from obedience to legitimate princes and to rise in insurrection against them.

(Encyclical, "Qui pluribus," November 9, 1846; Allocution, "Quisque vestrum," October 4, 1847; Encyclical., "Noscitis et nobiscum," December 8, 1849; Apostolic Letter, "Cum Catholica," March 25, 1860.)

64. The violation of a solemn oath, even every guilty and shameful action repugnant to the eternal law, is not only undeserving rebuke, but is even allowable and worthy of the highest praise when done for the love of country.

(Allocution, "Quibus quantisque," April 20, 1849.)

VIII.—ERRORS AS TO CHRISTIAN MARRIAGE.

65. It is not admissible, rationally, that Christ has raised marriage to the dignity of a sacrament.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1852.)

66. The sacrament of marriage is only an adjunct of the contract, from which it is separable, and the sacrament itself only consists in the nuptial benediction.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1852.)

67. By the law of nature the marriage tie is not indissoluble, and in many cases divorce, properly so called, may be pronounced by the civil authority.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1852; Allocution, "Acerbissimum," September 27, 1852.)

68. The church has not the power of pronouncing upon the impediments to marriage. This belongs to civil society, which can remove the existing hindrances.

(Apostolic Letter, "Multiplices inter," June 10, 1851.)

69. It is only more recently that the church has begun to pronounce upon invalidating obstacles, availing herself, not of her own right, but of a right borrowed from the civil power.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.)

70. The canons of the Council of Trent, which invoke anathema against those who deny the church the right of pronouncing upon invalidating obstacles, are not dogmatic, and must be considered as emanating from borrowed power.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.)

71. The form of the said council, under the penalty of nullity, does not bind in cases where the civil law has appointed another form, and desires that this new form is to be used in marriage.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.)

72. Boniface VIII. is the first who declared that the vow of chastity pronounced at ordination annuls nuptials.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.)

73. A civil contract may very well, among Christians, take the place of true marriage, and it is false, either that the marriage contract between Christians must always be a sacrament, or that the contract is null if the sacrament does not exist.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851.; Letter to King of Sardinia, September 9, 1852; Allocutions, "Acerbissimum," September 27, 1852; "Multis gravibusque," December 17, 1860.)

74. Matrimonial or nuptial causes belong by their nature to civil jurisdiction.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1851; Allocution, " Acerbissimum," September 27, 1852.)

N. B.—Two other errors are still current upon the abolition of the celibacy of priests and the preference due to the state of marriage over that of virginity. These have been refuted—the first in Encyclical, "Qui pluribus," November 9, 1846; the second in Apostolic Letter, "Multiplices inter," June 10, 1851.

IX.—ERRORS REGARDING THE CIVIL POWER OF THE SOVEREIGN PONTIFF.

75. The children of the Christian and Catholic Church are not agreed upon the compatibility of the temporal with the spiritual power.

(Apostolic Letter, August 22, 1852.)

76. The cessation of the temporal power, upon which the Apostolic See is based, would contribute to the happiness and liberty of the church.

(Allocution, "Quibus quantisque," April 20, 1849.)

N. B.—Besides these errors explicitly pointed out, still more, and those numerous, are rebuked by the certain doctrine which all Catholics are bound to respect touching the civil government of the Sovereign Pontiff. These doctrines are abundantly explained in Allocutions, "Quantis quantumque," April 20, 1859, and "Si semper antea," May 20, 1850; Apostolic Letter, "Quum Catholica Ecclesia," March 26, 1860; Allocutions, "Novos" September 28 1860; "Jamdudum" March 18, 1861; and "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862.

X.—ERRORS REFERRING TO MODERN LIBERALISM.

77. In the present day it is no longer necessary that the Catholic religion shall be held as the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other modes of worship.

(Allocution, "Nemo vestrum," July 26, 1855.)

78. Whence it has been wisely provided by law, in some countries called Catholic, that emigrants shall enjoy the free exercise of their own worship.

(Allocution, "Acerbissimum," September 27, 1852.)

79. But it is false that the civil liberty of every mode of worship and the full power given to all of overtly and publicly displaying their opinions and their thoughts conduce more easily to corrupt the morals and minds of the people and to the propagation of the evil of indifference.

(Allocution, "Nunquam fore," December 15, 1856.)

80. The Roman pontiff can and ought to reconcile himself to and agree with progress, liberalism, and modern civilization.

(Allocution, "Jamdudum cernimus," March 18, 1861.)

Syllabus: End--------

PAPACY: A. D. 1869-1870. The Œcumenical Council of the Vatican. Adoption and Promulgation of the Dogma of Papal Infallibility.

"More than 300 years after the close of the Council of Trent, Pope Pius IX., … resolved to convoke a new œcumenical Council. … He first intimated his intention, June 26, 1867, in an Allocution to 500 Bishops who were assembled at the 18th centenary of the martyrdom of St. Peter in Rome. … The call was issued by an Encyclical, commencing 'Æterni Patris Unigenitus Filius,' in the 23rd year of his Pontificate, on the feast of St. Peter and Paul, June 29, 1868. It created at once a universal commotion in the Christian world, and called forth a multitude of books and pamphlets even before the Council convened. … {2474} It was even hoped that the Council might become a general feast of reconciliation of divided Christendom; and hence the Greek schismatics, and the Protestant heretics and other non-Catholics, were invited by two special letters of the Pope (September 8, and September 13, 1868) to return on this auspicious occasion to 'the only sheepfold of Christ.' … But the Eastern Patriarchs spurned the invitation. … The Protestant communions either ignored or respectfully declined it. Thus the Vatican Council, like that of Trent, turned out to be simply a general Roman Council, and apparently put the prospect of a reunion of Christendom farther off than ever before. While these sanguine expectations of Pius IX., were doomed to disappointment, the chief object of the Council was attained in spite of the strong opposition of the minority of liberal Catholics. This object … was nothing less than the proclamation of the personal Infallibility of the Pope, as a binding article of the Roman Catholic faith for all time to come. Herein lies the whole importance of the Council; all the rest dwindles into insignificance, and could never have justified its convocation. After extensive and careful preparations, the first (and perhaps the last) Vatican Council was solemnly opened amid the sound of innumerable bells and the cannon of St. Angelo, but under frowning skies and a pouring rain, on the festival of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, December 8, 1869, in the Basilica of the Vatican. It reached its height at the fourth public session, July 18, 1870, when the decree of Papal Infallibility was proclaimed. After this it dragged on a sickly existence till October 20, 1870, when it was adjourned till November 11, 1870, but indefinitely postponed on account of the extraordinary change in the political situation of Europe. For on the second of September the French Empire, which had been the main support of the temporal power of the Pope, collapsed with the surrender of Napoleon III., at the old Huguenot stronghold of Sedan, to the Protestant King William of Prussia, and on the 20th of September the Italian troops, in the name of King Victor Emmanuel, took possession of Rome, as the future capital of United Italy. Whether the Council will ever be convened again to complete its vast labors, like the twice interrupted Council of Trent, remains to be seen. But, in proclaiming the personal Infallibility of the Pope, it made all future œcumenical Councils unnecessary for the definition of dogmas and the regulation of discipline. … The acts of the Vatican Council, as far as they go, are irrevocable. The attendance was larger than at any of its eighteen predecessors. … The whole number of prelates of the Roman Catholic Church, who are entitled to a seat in an œcumenical Council, is 1,037. Of these there were present at the opening of the Council 719, viz., 49 Cardinals, 9 Patriarchs, 4 Primates, 121 Archbishops, 479 Bishops, 57 Abbots and Generals of monastic orders. This number afterwards increased to 764, viz., 49 Cardinals, 10 Patriarchs, 4 Primates, 105 diocesan Archbishops, 22 Archbishops in partibus infidelium, 424 diocesan Bishops, 98 Bishops in partibus, and 52 Abbots, and Generals of monastic orders. Distributed according to continents, 541 of these belonged to Europe, 83 to Asia, 14 to Africa, 113 to America, 13 to Oceanica. At the proclamation of the decree of Papal Infallibility, July 18, 1870, the number was reduced to 535, and afterwards it dwindled down to 200 or 180. Among the many nations represented, the Italians had a vast majority of 276, of whom 143 belonged to the former Papal States alone. France with a much larger Catholic population, had only 84, Austria and Hungary 48, Spain 41, Great Britain 35, Germany 19, the United States 48, Mexico 10, Switzerland 8, Belgium 6, Holland 4, Portugal 2, Russia 1. The disproportion between the representatives of the different nations and the number of their constituents was overwhelmingly in favor of the Papal influence."

_P. Schaff, History of the Vatican Council (appendix to Gladstone's 'Vatican Decrees' American edition)._

The vote taken in the Council on the affirmation of the dogma "showed 400 'placet,' 88 'non placet,' and 60 'placet juxta modum.' Fifty bishops absented themselves from the congregation, preferring that mode of intimating their dissent. … After the votes the Archbishop of Paris proposed that the dissentients should leave Rome in a body, so as not to be present at the public services of the 18th, when the dogma was formally to be promulgated. Cardinal Rauscher, on the other hand, advised that they should all attend, and have the courage to vote 'non placet' in the presence of the Pope. This bold counsel, however, was rejected. … The recalcitrant bishops stayed away to the number of 110. The Pope's partisans mustered 533. When the dogmatic constitution 'De Ecclesia Christi' was put in its entirety to the vote, two prelates alone exclaimed 'non placet.' These were Riccio, Bishop of Casazzo, and Fitzgerald, Bishop of Peticola, or Little Rock, in the United States. A violent thunderstorm burst over St. Peter's at the commencement of the proceedings, and lasted till the close. The Pope proclaimed himself infallible amidst its tumult. … The Bishops in opposition, after renewing their negative vote in writing, quitted Rome almost to a man. … Several of the German bishops who had taken part in the opposition thought that at this juncture it behoved them, for the peace of the Church, and the respect due to the Dogma once declared, to give way at the end of August. They assembled again at Fulda, and pronounced the acceptance of the decree. … Seventeen names were appended to the declaration. Among them was not that of Hefele [Bishop of Rottenburg] who, it was soon made known, was determined under no circumstances to submit to the decision of the Council. His chapter and the theological faculty of Tübingen, declared that they would unanimously support him. A meeting of the Catholic professors of theology, held at Nuremberg, also agreed upon a decided protest against the absolute power and personal infallibility of the Pope. The German opposition, evidently, was far from being quelled. And the Austrian opposition, led by Schwarzenberg, Rauscher and Strossmayer, remained unbroken. By the end of August the members of the Council remaining at Rome were reduced to 80. They continued, however, to sit on through that month and the month of September, discussing various 'Schemes' relative to the internal affairs of the Church."

_Annual Register, 1870, part 1, foreign History, chapter 5._