Scotus Academicus, Tomus decimus: De Baptismo, De Poenitentia, De Extrema Unctione

NOTE 1. It was the opinion of certain ancient theologians that the form of absolution had to be wholly deprecative, so that it would be invalid if pronounced in indicative words, as may be gathered from St. Thomas, Opusc. 22, where he attacks this opinion. Alexander of Hales, however, IV, q. 21, memb. 1, and St. Bonaventure, In IV Sent., d. 18, part 1, a. 2, q. 11, seem to assert that the form of absolution is partly indicative and partly deprecative. For, says St. Bonaventure, “The Priest stands as God’s mediator to man and man’s to God. Hence through him the sinner ascends to God, and so the Priest is the sinner’s mouth, or speaks for the sinner; and through him God descends to man, and so the Priest is God’s angel,” indeed His mouth, “because he separates the precious from the vile. Insofar as he ascends, he acts as an inferior and a suppliant; insofar as he descends, as a superior and judge. In the first capacity he can obtain grace, and is suited to this; in the second, he can reconcile a person to the Church. Therefore, to signify this, a prayer is placed first in the form of absolution, in the deprecative mode, and absolution follows in the judicial mode. The prayer obtains grace, but absolution only presupposes it; for the Priest would never absolve anyone of whom he did not presume that he had been absolved by God. If, then, one asks whether the power of the keys extends to the guilt of the offense, it must be said that it can indeed extend to it by way of one who implores and commands absolution, but not at all by way of one who commands.” This is the Seraphic Doctor. There are also those who maintain that an absolution formulated in deprecative words would be valid. Thus Mayron, In IV Sent., d. 11, q. 1, and Aureolus, d. 23, assert that sacramental forms may be deprecative or indicative according to the differing custom of the Church. Dominic Soto is not far from them: In IV Sent., d. 3, single question, he teaches that absolution can validly, though not licitly, be conferred in deprecative words, and that this form is therefore valid: “He absolves you,” or “May Christ absolve you.” For, he says, the form of extreme unction is also deprecative, expressed in these words: “May the Lord forgive you,” etc. Gamachaeus too seems to share this view: in ch. 5, On Confirmation, he says that the form constituting Confirmation is not changed by these formulas: “I sign you,” “I confirm you,” or “May God sign you; confirm him, O Lord.”

NOTE 2. Although both ancient and more recent authors who advocate a deprecative form of absolution seem to rely chiefly on the authority and practice of the Eastern Church, as will be clear from the arguments below that are to be overturned, nevertheless, as Arcudius aptly observes, On the Agreement of the Western and Eastern Church, bk. 1, ch. 3, there was never any controversy between Greeks and Latins on this matter. “Accordingly,” he says, “it is not likely that the ancient form of this sacrament was ever changed out of hatred or malice toward the Greeks; indeed, Greeks in general do not even know what such terms as matter and form mean in the treatise On the Sacraments, with a few learned men excepted.” There is therefore no reason for certain modern writers to summon the Greek Euchologia, or Rituals, and practice so eagerly in support of their opinion and in defense of a deprecative form of absolution. For although such Euchologia and Rituals present a deprecative form, nevertheless, as will be clear from what is said on p. 331, the Greeks do not differ from the customary practice of the Latin Church.

NOTE 3. As for the second part of the question, namely, On conditional absolution, a condition may be distinguished as threefold: one concerning the past, the present, or the future. A past condition would be, for example, if someone said, “I absolve you from the sins confessed, if you truly committed them”; a present condition: “I absolve you, if you truly feel sorrow for your sins and have a firm purpose not to sin henceforth”; and a future condition: “I absolve you, if you do not sin again.” The difference among these conditions is that the sacraments are validly administered under a condition concerning the present or the past, since those conditions make a conditional intention absolute, according to Institutes, On Words, obligation, § 7: “Conditions referring to the present or past either immediately invalidate the obligation or make no difference at all,” as when you promise to give something if Titius was consul or if Maevius is alive. “For if matters are not so, the stipulation is worthless; but if they are so, it is immediately valid”; for things that are certain by the nature of things do not delay the obligation, “even if they are uncertain to us.” Such is the civil law, which the Church also uses unless it conflicts with the sacred canons. For, as is stated in On the Notification of New Works, “Just as laws do not disdain to imitate the sacred canons, so too the enactments of the sacred canons are supported by the constitutions of rulers.” Hence canon law too, in ch. 2, On Baptism, decrees that those whose baptism is in doubt are to be baptized with these words prefixed: “If you have been baptized, I do not baptize you; but if you have not yet been baptized, I baptize you.” Thus the only difficulty remaining is whether absolution given under a future condition is invalid until that condition is adjudicated.

First conclusion. — SACRAMENTAL ABSOLUTION EXPRESSED IN DEPRECATORY WORDS IS NOT VALID.

First, this is proved from the Councils of Florence and Trent, which decree, as was said in the preceding question, that the form of absolution is expressed in these words: “I absolve you.” The Council of Trent says in sess. XIV, ch. 3: “Although, according to the holy Church’s custom, certain prayers are laudably added, they in no way pertain to the essence of the form itself, nor are they necessary for the administration of the sacrament.” But if absolution formulated in deprecative words were valid, the essential words of that form would not be the foregoing “I absolve you,” and the prayers customarily added would not only be necessary for administering this sacrament but would also pertain to the essence of its form. Therefore, according to the judgment of the Councils, the form of absolution ought not to be deprecative.

It is further proved by the argument suggested by the Council of Trent in the same place, ch. 6, when it says that the Priest’s absolution is “like a judicial act, in which a sentence is pronounced by him as by a judge.” But a judge’s sentence is delivered in the indicative or imperative mood, not the optative or deprecative, as is clear in all human civil and ecclesiastical judgments. For a sentence is the act of a superior exercising authority, whereas a prayer is the act of an inferior who has no power: indeed, one who begs shows that he lacks the power to accomplish what he asks another to do for him; if he could attain it himself, he would not pray for another to do it. Therefore priestly absolution ought not to be given in deprecative words. Further, absolution ought to be given in the mode that best fits the institution and promise of the sacrament of penance. But the indicative mode fits it better than the deprecative. For Scripture, when it recounts the promise and institution of the sacrament of penance, nowhere mentions a prayer or entreaty. Christ did not say, “The sins for whose remission you pray will be remitted,” but “Whose sins you forgive,” etc. Nor did he say, “Whatever you ask to be loosed,” but “Whatever you loose,” etc. Therefore, for the institution of the sacrament of penance to be realized, the Priest must not pray but remit; otherwise he would not enact what was promised as the remission and removal of sins. The truth of our assertion will become clearer and be confirmed more forcefully by answering all the arguments certain innovators are accustomed to bring forward.

THEY OBJECT FIRST: Priests of the New Law ought to bless the faithful and reconcile to God those who have turned away from Him in the same way as the Aaronic priests blessed the Israelites and reconciled to God those who had incurred His displeasure through sin. But they did this only deprecatively. For this is how God instructed Moses in Numbers 6: “Speak to Aaron and his sons: Thus you shall bless the children of Israel, and say to them: May the Lord bless you and keep you; may the Lord show his face to you and have mercy on you; may the Lord turn his countenance toward you and give you peace. They shall invoke my name over the children of Israel, and I will bless them.” Therefore priests of the New Law will more appropriately bless the Christian people and absolve the guilty in deprecative words, such as “May God absolve you,” than in indicative words: “I absolve you.” — I DENY the major premise. For the Lord Christ had not given the Aaronic priests power to absolve from sins, nor had he said to them, “Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed also in heaven.” Add that the blessing by which the Levitical priests blessed the Israelites was not sacramental, but only impetratory and ceremonial, like the blessing bishops commonly impart to the faithful when they say, “May God the almighty Father bless you,” etc., and like the blessing with which priests bless the people at the end of the sacrifice of the Mass, saying, “May the blessing of almighty God descend upon you and remain with you, in the name of the Father,” etc. It is otherwise with sacramental blessing: when Scripture mentions it, it attributes it to the Priest. Thus St. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 10, “The cup which we bless,” etc. That is, as the gloss says, “When we priests bless it daily.” But the Priest’s absolution in the tribunal of penance is sacramental.

YOU WILL PRESS: An indicative absolution is inferred because, as just said, the Lord Christ told the Apostles, “Whose sins you forgive,” etc., by which words he granted them the power to forgive sins. But it does not follow from this that the Apostles were permitted to forgive sins in indicative words. It is proved: Christ the Lord grants the power to forgive sins in John 20 in no other way than he gives them the power to heal the sick and cast out demons in Luke 9 and Matthew 10. Yet when the Apostles healed the sick and cast out demons, they did not use indicative words, but only deprecative ones, as St. Peter said to Aeneas the paralytic: “May the Lord Jesus Christ heal you.” Therefore priests too ought not to use the indicative words “I absolve you,” but the deprecative words “May the Lord Christ absolve you.”

I DENY the minor premise. In proof of it, I say first that it is certain the Apostles, in healing the sick and raising the dead, used not only optative and deprecative words but also indicative and imperative ones, as appears from the cited chapter of Acts. For there it does not say, “May the Lord heal you,” but “He heals you”; and he immediately adds, “Rise and make your bed.” Likewise, when raising Tabitha there, he said, “Tabitha, arise.” Likewise, in Acts 3, the same Peter had said to the lame man, “What I have, I give you: in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise and walk.” Add that I could reply that the power to absolve from sins given to the Apostles was different from, and handed down differently than, the power they had to heal the sick. The latter power did not arise from a virtue and character residing in them, as did the power of absolution, which is grounded in priestly character and ministerial power: by this power, Priests apply the sacrament as a sacred sign, upon whose enactment sanctifying grace, which expunges and remits sin, is necessarily and infallibly conferred.

THEY OBJECT 2. The holy Fathers, whenever they speak of the form of absolution, call it a prayer and the Priest’s supplications, and teach that Priests remit sins only by prayer. Thus St. Dionysius, On the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, bk. 1, ch. 7, calls the Priest’s absolution a supplication; and in ch. 6, treating the ordination of a bishop, he says, “It is effected by the holiest invocations, or prayers.” Likewise St. Pacian, in his exhortation On Penance, says, “He who does not take away the sins of his brothers, aided by the Church’s tears, is absolved by Christ’s prayers.” He calls the Church’s prayers Christ’s prayers. For, as he says in the same place, “In both there is the Church, and in the Church there is Christ.” St. Ambrose, On the Holy Spirit, bk. 3, ch. 19: “We see whether the Spirit forgives sins. But there can be no doubt of this, since the Lord himself said, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit: whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven.’ Behold, sins are forgiven through the Holy Spirit; human beings, however, offer their ministry for the forgiveness of sins; they do not exercise the right of divine power. For they forgive sins not in their own name, but in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. These men serve; the Godhead grants: the service is human, but the power is manifestly from above.” Augustine, On Christian Combat, ch. 16: “What is the laying on of hands except a prayer over a person?” And from Fifty Homilies, hom. 19: “If you have slept with any woman besides your wives, do penance, so that the Church may pray for you. Let no one say to himself, ‘I do it in secret; I do it before God.’ Then it was said for no reason, ‘Whatever you loose on earth,’ etc.” St. Jerome, on “The voice of the Lord divides the flame” in Psalm 28, says: “Every day in each of us he extinguishes the flame of lust through confession and the grace of the Holy Spirit,” that is, he makes it cease through the Priests’ prayers. St. Chrysostom, On the Priesthood, after saying that Priests contribute to the salvation of souls, adds: “They do this not only by teaching or advising, but also by helping through prayers; and they have the power to forgive sins not only when they regenerate us, but thereafter as well.” St. Leo, ep. 91: “Since God’s pardon cannot be obtained except through the Priests’ supplications … if any of those for whom we have supplicated the Lord should die before receiving the present gift of pardon … it is necessary that the debt of sins be loosed by priestly supplication.” But the words “pray,” “ask,” and “supplicate” signify that the form of penance is deprecative. — I answer, The holy Fathers called the form of absolution a prayer, first, says Arcudius, because of the prayers that follow and accompany it, which are uttered before and after the form itself, much as everything said in the divine Office is called a “prayer,” although it includes histories and the lives of the Saints, which are not formally prayers but rather narratives. Second, absolution is called a prayer because it implicitly and virtually contains a prayer: by Christ’s institution, the Priest efficaciously asks in Christ the Lord’s own name for the remission of sins. For the Priest who confers the sacrament hopes to be heard by God, and the divine Majesty is immediately present, working the remission of sins through the words of His minister. For this reason the forms of all the sacraments are commonly called prayers and supplications by the holy Fathers. Thus St. Augustine, On Baptism, bk. 3, ch. 18: “God hears the murderer supplicating over the water of baptism, or over the oil, or over the Eucharist, or over the head of those upon whom hands are laid.” Third, speech from an inferior to a superior is a kind of prayer: it ought to be made with humility, reverence, and lowliness of spirit, which accompany prayers and supplications. Add to this that the holy Fathers often speak of the ceremonial absolution customarily granted publicly to penitents after they had completed their works of penance. This was granted by Priests to those who had completed penitential works, in view of the supplications and prayers of the whole Church, especially of the Priests, as well as the Martyrs and those who had steadfastly professed the faith and name of Christ before unbelievers and endured various torments for that confession. Of these prayers St. Ambrose says, On Penance, bk. 2, ch. 10: “Mother Church bends down for you and washes away your guilt with tears. May Christ see you mourning; may he love you, so that many may pray for one. Moved by a widow’s tears, because many were weeping for him, he raised her daughter.” Likewise St. Pacian says that Christ’s “prayers are the faithful’s intercessions.” Hence Tertullian, On Penance, ch. 10: “When you cast yourself at the knees of the brothers, you touch Christ. You entreat Christ when they shed tears over you; Christ suffers, Christ entreats the Father.”

THEY OBJECT 3. If Priests in St. Augustine’s time had used this form, “I absolve you,” he would not have reproved heretics for this way of speaking: “I remit your sins,” since to absolve from sins is to remit them. But in Fifty Homilies, hom. 23, ch. 8, while considering the conversion of the Magdalene and the words, “Who is this, who even forgives sins?”, after saying that Christ forgives sins not insofar as he is man but insofar as he is God, he immediately reproves those who said, “I forgive your sins.” “The good physician,” he says, “healed not only the sick who were present, but also foresaw those who would come later. For there would be men who would say, ‘I forgive sins, I justify, I sanctify, I heal whomever I baptize.’” And near the end of the chapter: “Does a man dare to claim this for himself? What of the heretic? ‘I forgive, I cleanse, I sanctify.’” He surely would not have said this if the indicative form “I absolve you” had then been in use in the Church. — I answer, St. Augustine does not reprove those who say, “I remit sins,” in the name and authority of Christ as his vicars. For in the following chapter he admits that the Apostles received from Christ the power to remit sins. Rather, he reproves them for attributing this power to sanctify and remit sins to their own holiness and merits, imagining themselves most holy because they were not contaminated by association with the wicked and could justify others through their own fellowship. Hence he applies to them Isaiah 32: “Depart from me, for I am clean.” As St. Augustine continues: “When, at our conference, one who had been confessed before the Examiner was presented to them so that they might sit with us, they answered, ‘It is written that we are not to sit with such men,’” Psalm 25: “I have not sat with the council of vanity,” lest by touching the benches our contagion should reach them. Thus St. Augustine presses them: “Why did they enter the Church with us, when it is written next, ‘I will not enter in with those who do iniquity’? … Thus the Jews seemed to understand better than the heretics. For the Jews said, ‘Who is this who forgives sins? Does a man dare to claim this for himself?’ What of the heretic? ‘I forgive, I cleanse, I sanctify,’ etc.” Therefore, although those heretics—namely, the Montanists and the Donatists who sprang from them—regarded themselves as cathari, that is, pure, and others as impure, and thus arrogated to themselves the power to sanctify others by their fellowship and merits, adducing as the foundation of their error Matthew 18, “Whatever you loose,” etc., St. Augustine does not deny that Christ gave this power to the Apostles. He says that God is the principal cause, while human beings are only ministers. “Do you not know,” he says in ch. 9, “why this was said, and how it was said? The Lord was going to give human beings the Holy Spirit, and he did not want it understood that sins were forgiven by human merits, but that they are forgiven by the Holy Spirit himself in his faithful. For what is a human being but a sick person in need of healing? Do you wish to be a physician to me? Seek the Physician with me. To make clear that sins are forgiven by the Holy Spirit, whom he gave to his faithful, and not by human merits, the Lord, rising from the dead, said in one place, namely John 20, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’; and immediately added, ‘If you forgive anyone’s sins, they are forgiven him,’ that is, the Spirit of the Lord forgives, not you. But God is Spirit; therefore God forgives, not you. Yet hear what the Spirit says: ‘Do you not know that you are the temple of God and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?’” Hence he concludes: “God, then, dwells in his temple, that is, in his holy faithful ones; in his Church he forgives sins through them, because they are living temples. But he who forgives through a human being can forgive even without a human being; for he is no less able to give through himself who is able to give through another.” St. Augustine, therefore, does not deny the words of the form of absolution; he condemns the pride of those who attributed the remission of sins to their own merits.

THEY OBJECT 4. St. Cyprian, On the Lapsed, says: “Let no one deceive himself, let no one mislead himself: the Lord alone can show mercy; only he can grant pardon for the sins committed against him, he who suffered for us, whom God handed over for our sins. A human being cannot be greater than God; nor can a servant by his own indulgence remit or forgive what has been committed against the Master in a more serious offense.” Therefore St. Cyprian judges that the Priest cannot absolve from sins by a judicial act, but that this must be attributed to God alone. — I deny the inference: For this was not St. Cyprian’s meaning; rather, he is reproving those who, before people had been properly disposed by due satisfaction and the labors of salutary penance, bestowed the benefit of absolution on those who had denied Christ and fallen from the faith. Hence he had said earlier: “God’s priest ought not to deceive by flattering favors, but to provide salutary remedies. He is an unskilled physician who handles with a gentle hand the swollen cavities of wounds, and by preserving the infection enclosed in the deep recesses of the viscera makes it worse. The wound must be opened, probed, and, after the rotten tissue is cut away, treated with a stronger remedy. Let the patient cry out and shout and complain in his impatience from pain; afterward he will give thanks when he has felt the healing.” He immediately adds the reason for this discourse: “For, dearly beloved brothers, a new kind of calamity has arisen. As though the storm of persecution had raged too little, another evil has been added to the heap, deceptive under the guise of mercy and seductively destructive. Against the vigor of the Gospel and the law of the Lord and God, through the rashness of certain people, careless persons are granted a false and empty communion, a dangerous peace that bites and profits no one who receives it. They do not seek the patience of healing or the true medicine of satisfaction; penance has been driven from their hearts, and the memory of the gravest and final offense has been removed. The wounds of the dying are covered over, and the lethal wound lodged in the deepest recesses of the viscera is touched while its pain is concealed. Those returning from the altars of the devil approach the holy Lord with hands soiled and polluted by their stench; still almost belching up the deadly food of idols, with their throats yet breathing out their crime and reeking of fatal contagion, they assail the Lord’s body.” By these words St. Cyprian means that he attacks only those Priests who did not seek to grant a pardon beyond their authority, but who bestowed it on the lapsed, not yet duly disposed, through cruel mercy and excessive ease and indulgence. Add that St. Cyprian is not speaking there of absolution from sins, but only from excommunication and the other censures of the Church with which those who had fallen into idolatry were bound until, after completing sufficient penance for their offense, they were released from them. Hence he adds: “Before their offenses have been expiated, before the confession of the crime has been made, before the conscience has been cleansed by the sacrifice and hand of the Priest, before the offended and threatening Lord has been appeased, they suppose they have peace—the peace some falsely claim with deceptive words. That is not peace but war; nor is one joined to the Church who is separated from the Gospel. Why call an injury a benefit? Why name impiety with the word piety? Why do those who ought continually to weep and beseech their Lord pretend to share communion with others, interrupting their lamentation of penance? … That easy indulgence does not grant peace but takes it away; it does not bestow communion but hinders salvation.”

THEY OBJECT 5. It is not likely that the Eastern Church, especially among the Greeks, never had a legitimate and valid form of absolution. But they absolve only in deprecative words. Therefore this form is neither illicit nor invalid. — I DENY the minor premise. The contrary appears from the Greek Euchologion. It does indeed first give these words of prayer: “May our Lord Jesus Christ and God, who gave his disciples the command to bind and loose sins, pass over all your sins.” But these words follow the prayer: “But I, his unworthy servant, absolve you from your sins.” Likewise: “May the just Lord, who assumed flesh for us and takes away the sin of the whole world, blot out your offenses; but I pardon you all your sins.” Arcudius himself, a highly skilled authority on the rite of the Greek Church, being Greek by birth and exceptionally learned in ecclesiastical matters, shows explicitly in bk. 1, On the Form of Penance, that although less learned Greeks sometimes use a deprecative form, the more learned absolve only imperatively or indicatively. For among the various forms of absolution he cites, none—apart from the prayers added—fails to display the authority of a judicial sentence. Priests commonly say to the penitent, “I have granted you pardon,” or “I have absolved you,” or something similar, which, he says, in Greek idiom is equivalent to “I grant pardon, I forgive, I pardon, I remit, or I forgive you your sins.” Prelates, out of respect for their honor and dignity, or out of humility, say, “My mediocrity,” or “my humility,” has you absolved. To show this, Arcudius cites a decree of Pachomius, Patriarch of Constantinople, issued against a certain Arsenius, a Catholic man allied with the Latins, which contains the excommunication of Arsenius in these words: “Our mediocrity has excommunicated you, or separated you from the undivided Trinity in this life and the next.” It also records the deposition of Arsenius, Bishop of Monembasia, in these words: “I have deposed you,” or “My mediocrity has deposed and stripped you of all priesthood,” that is, deposes and strips you.

But because Arsenius had excommunicated certain opponents of the Latin Catholics, Pachomius absolved them from excommunication, saying, “We hold all the orthodox absolved and blessed,” that is, we absolve and bless them. The same is also said in Latin of someone excusing himself: “I have you excused,” that is, I excuse you.

Arcudius also reports a certain absolution by Michael, Patriarch of Antioch, over a penitent, formulated as follows: “By the grace, gift, and power of the Holy Spirit, given by Christ to the Apostles for binding and loosing the sins of human beings, when he said, ‘Receive,’ etc., ‘Whatever you bind,’ etc., and transmitted in uninterrupted succession to us, my mediocrity has granted pardon to his spiritual son Theodosius for whatever he, as a human being, has committed in sin against God by word, deed, thought, or any of his senses; even if he was liable to excommunication or a curse from a bishop, Priest, father, or mother, or cursed himself, or violated an oath, or was implicated in any other errors. He has confessed these things to spiritual fathers and diligently performed the penance imposed by them. By the almighty power and grace of the holy and adorable Spirit, we loose him from the guilt, bond, and chain of all these things, and hold him free and pardoned.”

Arcudius attests that he saw this form of absolution granted at Lviv—which is the metropolis of Russia—to a certain Archdeacon Peter by Joachim, Patriarch of Antioch, who had traveled through those regions. Hence it is clear that the indicative and absolute form of absolution, expressed as “We loose,” etc., had previously been used by the Antiochene prelates. He also says that Hypatius, Metropolitan of Kyiv, showed him a manuscript book in the Russian language which, at the end of a deprecative formula of absolution, contained this form: “I, your spiritual father, by the power granted me by God and my superiors, absolve you from all your sins.” Gabriel of Philadelphia, in his little book On the Sacraments, gives this form of penance: “By the grace of the most holy Spirit, through my humility, you have been pardoned and absolved.” Therefore, in the form of this sacrament, the Greeks do not differ from the Latin Church’s practice of using an indicative form.

YOU WILL INSIST: Those past participles, absolved, pardoned, and the like, do not indicate something being done in the present, but something done earlier. Therefore the Greek form, expressed by such participles, is not indicative and does not mean the same as I absolve or I pardon. Arcudius denies the premise. For, he says, among Greek ecclesiastical authors these participles are used to signify a present action. In the first part, act 1, of the Council of Ephesus, the sentence deposing Nestorius is reported, by which he is actually removed from office, expressed in these words: “Our Lord Jesus Christ, blasphemed by him, has decreed through this present holy Synod that the same Nestorius be excluded from episcopal dignity and every priestly assembly.” And at the Council of Chalcedon, act 1, St. Flavian, Patriarch of Constantinople, together with the Synod, deposes the heresiarch Eutyches in this way: “We have decreed through our Lord Jesus Christ, blasphemed by him, that he be excluded from every priestly office, from our communion, and from the office of presiding over the monastery.” Therefore those participles “pardoned” and “absolved” mean the same as I absolve or I pardon.

YOU WILL INSIST: The indicative form “I have you absolved” or “I pardon you” is not in the Greek Euchologion, as Arcudius himself admits; in its place is this deprecative form: “Lord Jesus Christ, who gave us the power, absolve this man from his sins.” Therefore the Greeks use not an indicative but a deprecative form. — I deny the inference: For, as Arcudius himself observes, most Greeks use that form through ignorance, since they do not know that the whole force of absolution is contained in those few words, “I have pardoned you.” Hence the more learned among them use this indicative form, which is also found in the Euchologion supplied by Leo Allatius, the most learned among the more recent Greeks. For in it Germanus, Bishop of Amatunta, speaks as follows: “Our humility, through the grace and power of the most holy Spirit, given by our Savior Jesus Christ to his disciples for binding and loosing the sins of human beings when he said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit,’ etc.,—from them that divine grace passed to us in uninterrupted succession—has pardoned his daughter for all the ways in which she sinned as a human being by word, deed, thought, and all her senses.”

YOU WILL INSIST AGAIN: Not only the less learned but also the more learned Greeks, ancient and modern, use a deprecative form. Therefore there is no answer. The premise is proved first from the Dialogue of Symeon of Thessalonica, where the penitent is said to confess not to the Priest but to God; and consequently he thinks the Priest only entreats God to absolve. Moreover, in a manuscript Penitential in the Barberini Library, copied nearly a hundred years ago from an ancient codex by a certain Greek deacon named Basiliscus, the Priest addresses penitents during absolution as follows: “May God pardon you through me, a sinner, both in this age and in the next.” Third, Nicholas Cabasilas, Bishop of Thessalonica, says in bk. 1, Exposition of the Divine Liturgy, ch. 29: “The remission of sins is given to penitents through the Priests’ prayers.” Jeremiah, Patriarch of Constantinople, says the same in his first response to the Lutherans: “The Priests’ prayers turn one toward God and obtain pardon.” Therefore, etc. — I deny the premise: In reply to the first proof, I say that Symeon rightly said that the sinner confesses not to the Priest but to God, because the Priest sitting at the tribunal acts in God’s place. Thus, just as he hears confession in God’s name, so he absolves. To the second, I say that the opposite is rather inferred from it: “May God pardon you through me” means the same as “I pardon you in God’s name.” To Cabasilas I reply that he falls into various errors refuted by Bessarion, especially in saying that the Eucharist is effected by the Priests’ prayer, as though the prayers customarily said in the Canon of the Mass, rather than these words, “This is my Body,” etc., effected the presence of Christ’s body. To Jeremiah I say that he means only that the Priests’ prayers are necessary both for Priests and for the other faithful who approach the Lord’s table. He does not deny that absolution is given by the Priest’s authority; indeed, he himself writes in ch. 12, “We grant remission of sins with an imposed penalty,” etc.

THEY OBJECT 6. The form for absolving or reconciling penitents to God in the sacrament of penance ought to be the form found in the Latin Church’s older Penitentials, Sacramentaries, and Rituals. But in those books, before the year of Christ 1200, the prescribed formula of absolution is not indicative but only deprecative. Therefore it must still be so considered. The major premise is established: since these books are practical, they describe each rite and each action and ceremony customarily observed in administering the sacraments. The forms of the sacraments ought to hold a principal place among such rites, so that Priests may not fail to confer the sacraments through carelessness or ignorance by uttering an empty and invalid form. The minor premise is proved first from the Roman Order, which no one can deny is very ancient, since Amalarius and Alcuin, Charlemagne’s teacher, cite it. It reports the form of absolution customarily granted to penitents on the Wednesday of the Lord’s Supper. The Archdeacon leads the penitent from the private place where he did penance into the church’s atrium, presents him to the Bishop at its doors, and addresses the Pontiff as follows: “Restore in him, Apostolic Pontiff, whatever was corrupted at the devil’s prompting, and, through the merits that support your prayers, make the man close to God by the grace of divine reconciliation.” In these words, the Archdeacon, asking for the penitent’s absolution, requests not a judge’s sentence but the Pontiff’s prayer.

It is therefore a sign that at that time the formula of absolution was only deprecative. This is confirmed by what follows. After the Bishop has recited many prayers and supplications over the penitent, he concludes the absolution with this prayer: “Be present, O Lord, to our supplications, and mercifully hear me, who am also the first to need your mercy; and grant confidence in carrying out your office to one whom you appointed minister of this work not by merit of choice but by the gift of your grace; and may you yourself work through our ministry what belongs to your goodness.” The same Order adds many other similar prayers for the absolution and reconciliation of one penitent or several. Nearly the same formula of absolution is given by the book of Sacraments of St. Gregory, Alcuin in On the Divine Offices, ch. On the Lord’s Supper, and Burchard in Decrees, bk. 19. Many Pontificals, Rituals, Sacramentaries, and handwritten Penitentials of various cathedral churches likewise contain no other form of absolution over a public or private penitent than a deprecative one—that is, prayers and supplications by which Priests implore God to pardon the sins committed by the penitent. — I ANSWER 1. The major premise can be denied. For the principal purpose of sacramental books is to describe the prayers and prefaces of Mass and similar things that vary in the celebration of the awe-inspiring mysteries, so that Priests may have a way to celebrate properly each day throughout the year; their purpose is not to record the forms of the sacraments except incidentally. As for Rituals and Penitentials, I say that the forms of the sacraments were not set out accurately in them, lest such books, if they fell into the hands of unbelievers, expose the sacraments to ridicule. Hence Innocent I, Epistle 1, ch. 3, describes more openly the rite and manner of conferring Confirmation: he specifies the matter, but not the form. For he writes: “It belongs only to bishops to sign the forehead with oil when they confer the Spirit, the Paraclete; I cannot state the words, lest I seem to betray them rather than answer the inquiry.” Therefore it was customary for bishops and Priests to transmit the forms of such sacraments orally or in particular and more secret writings; consequently nothing at all can be inferred from such books against our assertion.

I answer second, denying the minor premise: For it appears from the words of the foregoing prayer taken from the Roman Order that the Bishop does not administer the sacrament of penance through it, but only asks God for confidence to carry out properly the divine ministry entrusted to him, namely, with the authority he possesses over penitents. Hence, in the same Order, after various prayers have been recited, these forms of absolution are given. The first is for absolving several people: “We too, according to the authority granted by God to us, unworthy though we are, absolve you from every bond of your offenses, so that you may deserve to have eternal life through him who lives,” etc. The form of absolution for one person is this: “Brother N., may the Lord Jesus, who said to the Apostles, ‘Whatever you bind,’ etc., himself absolve you through our ministry from all your sins, whatever you have negligently committed in thought, speech, or deed.” By these words the Priest means the same as if he said, “I absolve you as Christ’s minister,” etc. As for the book of Sacraments of St. Gregory and certain Rituals and Penitentials, it is no wonder that only prayers to be said over the penitent are written in them: as was just said, the indicative form was well known to Priests, since they had received it by memory, so that it would not be disclosed to outsiders. Yet many handwritten Pontificals and Penitentials contain indicative absolution with prayers added. For in the Gregorian Sacramentary, a manuscript kept in the Victorine Library in Paris, we read this formula: “We absolve you in the place of blessed Peter, prince of the Apostles, to whom the Lord gave the power to bind and loose; so that, insofar as accusation pertains to you and remission to us, the almighty Lord may be the salvation of your life and the forgiver of all your sins.” Likewise, an ancient manuscript of the church of St. Remigius at Reims, mentioned by Menard, is said to contain this among various episcopal blessings: “By the authority of blessed Peter, to whom were given the keys of the kingdom of heaven and the power to bind and loose souls—although we are far from being his equals in merit, we have become like him in the power granted by God—I absolve you by divine authority from the bonds of your sins.” At the end of the very ancient Sacramentary of the church of Tours, written in an old hand six hundred years ago, this indicative absolution is found: “We absolve you, brothers, from all your crimes.” In the library of the church of Rouen there is a Pontifical more than 450 years old, containing this formula of absolution: “May God himself absolve you, and, insofar as our frailty permits, may you be absolved before the tribunal of our Lord Jesus Christ.” From these sources it appears that the indicative form was not recently introduced into the Church, since the formula corresponds to the one now in use.

YOU WILL PRESS: That anonymous author whom St. Thomas attacks in Opusc. 22 said that the indicative form had begun only thirty years earlier. St. Thomas certainly did not deny this, nor did he show that the indicative form was much older. Moreover, the Master of the Sentences, who collected the opinions of the ancient Fathers and theologians concerning the doctrine of the sacraments, does not mention an indicative form of absolution or name anyone who used one. Finally, William of Paris says: “The confessor does not speak in the manner of civil judges, ‘We absolve you’; rather, he says a prayer over him, so that God may grant absolution, remission, and sanctifying grace.” Therefore at that time an indicative form of absolution was not in use. — I deny the inference: To the first point, I deny the premise. For St. Thomas, reproving that man for rashness, says, “How can one bear witness about everything when one has not seen everything?” But it is certain, adds the holy Doctor, “that it is now 1,200 years and more since it was said to Peter, ‘Whatever you loose.’” He rightly reproves him, since the ancient codices cited make it clear that indicative forms of absolution were in use long before that time, and that the deprecative form of absolution had not been common among everyone in earlier times before the thirty years in question. To the second point, St. Thomas replies in ch. 2: “The Master did not state the form, nor is anyone among the Saints recorded as having used another form; nor is it recorded that anyone denied this form. But it is recorded that the Institutor of the sacrament said, ‘Whatever you loose,’ etc., which outweighs every authority.” To the third point: when that anonymous author objected that famous and ancient men—Master William, Bishop of Paris, William of Auxerre, and Cardinal Hugh—held the deprecative form, the cited work replies, first, that it is not established that they thought so; second, even if they did, their opinion could not outweigh the common judgment of the Masters teaching in Paris, who think otherwise and determine that without the words “I absolve you,” absolution is not effected by a merely deprecative prayer. And it rightly says that their holding this is not established. For William of Paris means only that the Priest does not absolve by his own power but by divine power. There he asks, when in certain cases a penitent cannot confess to only one Priest and is compelled to make or divide his confession between two Priests, which of them infuses sanctifying grace. He says that both contribute to infusing that grace, because the confessor does not absolve the penitent in the manner of civil judges, but rather says a prayer over him so that God may grant absolution and sanctifying grace—as if to say that God produces the grace, which the Priest therefore asks for in prayer. Nevertheless, he attributes to the Priest the office of sanctifying through absolution and blessing: by this office the bonds of sins are broken, stains are sprinkled away from penitents’ hearts, and graces are infused, but through invocation of the divine name, as he says in ch. 21. That he did not deny that Priests have the power to remit sins by a judicial authority delegated to them, he himself teaches in ch. 4, where he says: “The keys of the Church were therefore given to Priests so that there might be those,” he says, “who would open to those who knock and bring in those who wish to enter; and, as officers of mercy itself, receive with every welcome and applause the guilty fleeing to it, absolve their sins, restore them to all the goods of grace and glory after they have been stripped by inner robbers, and heal those who are spiritually wounded and sick with heavenly medicine and the remedies of the sacraments by divine power.”

THEY OBJECT FINALLY: When the penitent himself asks the Priest for absolution in the general confession, which he partly recites before his detailed accusation of sins, he only asks the Priest to pray for him to the Lord our God. Therefore the Church’s intention is that the Priest cannot absolve in indicative words, but only in deprecative ones. — I deny the inference: First, that general confession is not a sacramental part, but only the penitent’s preparation for making an accusation and receiving absolution. A sign of this is that in this general confession the penitent directs his prayers not only to the Priest, but also asks the Blessed Virgin, blessed Michael, Peter and Paul, and all the Saints to pray for him to the Lord God. But it is certain that neither the Blessed Virgin nor the other Saints can help him by applying the sacrament, but only by way of intercession. Therefore he does not direct his prayer to the Priest either with the aim of receiving the sacrament of penance from him through deprecative absolution. This is confirmed especially by the fact that the Priest himself publicly recites a similar supplication at the beginning of Mass and asks those present to pray for him, just as those present likewise ask the Priest in turn. Yet the Priest does not ask those present for sacramental absolution, nor do they in turn ask it of the Priest. Consequently, the prayer that the penitent generally recites in confessing is only an intercession by which he entreats the Priest to obtain from God the helps of grace by which he may be properly disposed for sacramental absolution. The Priest does this as well when he immediately adds, “May he have mercy on you,” etc., and “Pardon and absolution,” etc.

Second conclusion. — ABSOLUTION GIVEN UNDER A CONDITION CONCERNING THE PRESENT OR THE PAST COULD BE VALID; BUT UNDER A CONDITION CONCERNING THE FUTURE IT WOULD BE INVALID.

The first part is established. For, as we said when treating baptism, baptism is legitimately conferred under a condition concerning the past or present, for example, in this form: “If you have not been baptized, I baptize you.” Why, then, could a Priest who doubts whether he pronounced the form of absolution correctly not repeat it under this condition: “If you have not been absolved, I absolve you”? Likewise, if he has reasonable cause to doubt the penitent’s proper disposition, he may add this condition: “If you are rightly disposed, I absolve you.” The reason is that such conditions do not suspend the present effect of sacramental absolution; they become absolute propositions when the present condition is in fact met. Yet this formula of absolution should scarcely be used, since it would indicate that the Priest was conferring absolution in doubt, whereas absolution ought not to be doubtful. Although the Priest ought to take the greatest care to ascertain the penitent’s disposition—namely, sorrow and purpose—after he has carefully examined the matter, he should trust the penitent and accordingly grant absolution, and should not regard as doubtful a matter that in fact ought not to be considered doubtful.

The second part is the more common opinion among theologians, who offer various arguments to confirm it. But no better and more effective argument occurs than the will of Christ the Lord, who did not wish the sacramental judgment and remission of sins effected through sacramental absolution to be suspended into the future at the minister’s discretion when legitimate and sufficient matter is present. This will is clear from the Church’s common understanding: it did not wish to admit sacramental absolution under a condition that suspends its validity, as is clear from continuous practice and all the Rituals, in which this kind of conditional formula of absolution concerning the future is nowhere found.

Hence the difference between Matrimony and the other sacraments is that the marriage contract admits future conditions. For example, a person may marry through a proxy to whom he delegates his role, and the proxy may take a certain spouse on his behalf if the delegating person later consents, as commonly happens in other contracts. In that case the contract is not complete but only begun until the condition is fulfilled. The reason is that Christ did not change the nature of the contract in Matrimony, but only raised it to the dignity of a sacrament. But the baptismal washing with water, for example, is perfect and complete whether or not a future condition is added. Likewise, the pronouncing of the form “I baptize you,” being an external action, once it has been performed cannot be made not to have been performed, even if the condition fails. The same must be said of the matter and form of the sacrament of penance: once they have been enacted, the effect—namely, remission of sins—is necessarily enacted; otherwise, it would not be a certain and efficacious sign of that remission.

This is not prevented by the fact that civil laws admit a public judgment conditionally, so that its execution is suspended, and also particular conditional remissions of debts; nor by the fact that canon laws admit absolution from censures under a future condition. For the case of sacramental judgment is not the same. Christ the Lord willed the sacrament of penance to subsist and be effected through words signifying the actual remission of sins, as is gathered from the Church’s use and practice, as we have already said.

YOU WILL SAY: By the words “I absolve you,” the Priest absolves not only from guilt but also from temporal punishment, at least in part, in proportion to the satisfaction he imposes. Yet he does not absolve from that part of the punishment unconditionally, but only subject to the satisfaction to be fulfilled later, in the future; consequently, he suspends the effect of absolution with respect to that part. Therefore, by the same reasoning, he can suspend it with respect to the remission of guilt. — I ANSWER, the partial effect of absolution is indeed suspended until such satisfaction is performed, because the remission of punishment is not the primary effect of that absolution, but something secondary. It is therefore no wonder if this effect can be suspended until the satisfaction is fulfilled. It is otherwise with the remission of guilt, since, being the primary effect, it cannot be suspended without making the sacrament null.