Summa summae S. Thomae, Tomus III

(St. Thomas, qq. 10, 11, 12 et 13.)

Unbelief in general is the absence of faith¹. And it is either negative, privative, or contrary. Negative unbelief is the absence of faith in one who has heard nothing of the faith, or has not heard sufficiently. Privative unbelief is the absence of faith in one who has heard sufficiently of the faith and does not will to assent to it, without however asserting the contrary. Contrary unbelief is the absence of faith in one who, though sufficiently instructed concerning the faith, not only refuses to embrace it, but even asserts the contrary and maintains a positive error against the faith.

You will ask 1° whether unbelief is a sin.

I answer. 1°. Merely negative unbelief is not a sin, but a punishment of sin².

Proof. 1° Christ, Ioann., XV, 22, says of the Jews: If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin. Expounding this, Aug., Tract. LXXXIX in Ioann., says that Christ speaks of the sin by which they did not believe in Christ. But Christ spoke to negative unbelievers neither by himself nor through his ministers, at least not sufficiently. 2° No one sins by omitting what he cannot do.

How shall they believe in him whom they have not heard? It is just as if he had said: « They cannot believe. » 3° This proposition, the 68th among those of Baius: « Purely negative unbelief, in those to whom Christ has not been preached, is a sin, » was condemned by St Pius V, October 1, 1567, by Gregory XIII, January 29, 1579, and by Urban VIII, March 6, 1641.

I answer. 2°. Privative and contrary unbelief is a sin³.

1° Because no one is condemned except on account of sin. But he who will not have believed shall be condemned, Marc., XVI, 16. 2° Because faith is the necessary medium unto salvation. Therefore he to whom it is sufficiently proposed is bound to accept it.

You will ask 2° whether all the works of unbelievers are sins.

I answer. Negatively⁴. We weighed this question expressly in the treatise on Grace, dissertation III, § 1. Look for it there.

You will ask 3° how many species of unbelief there are.

I answer. That three are commonly assigned, namely paganism, Judaism, and heresy⁵. For the sin of unbelief consists in resisting the faith. But one can resist the faith in three ways. For either one resists the faith which he has not yet professed himself to receive as true, and this is the unbelief of the pagans, who are so called from the pagi into which, expelled from the cities by command of the Christian emperors, they withdrew to worship their idols: before that time they were called gentiles. Or one resists the faith which he professed in figure, and this is the unbelief of the Jews. Or finally one resists the faith which he professed in the manifestation of the truth, and this is the unbelief of heretics.

I said: « Which he has professed himself to receive; » because for Judaism or heresy there seems not to be required that one have truly received the faith in figure or in manifested truth, but it suffices if he have outwardly professed himself to receive it. Hence unbaptized infants of heretics, who therefore never received the faith, are called heretics because in estimation they profess together with their parents the faith of Christ.

To paganism belong atheists, deists, and Mohammedans; because they have never professed themselves to receive the faith of Christ, whether in figure or in truth. For although the Mohammedans acknowledge Christ as a prophet, they do not acknowledge him as God.

Apostasy seems not to be distinguished from heresy except according to more and less; for the apostate abandons the whole faith which he professed, the heretic only a part: understand this objectively. Similarly other forms of unbelief can be reduced to one of the aforementioned.

[You will ask 4° whether unbelievers are to be compelled to the faith.

I answer. Those who have never received the faith, whether they be subject to Christian princes or not, are by no means to be compelled to embrace the faith; they can, however, be compelled not to impede the faith and the preaching of the faith by blasphemies, wicked persuasions, or open proclamations.

The first part is clear; because the Church has no jurisdiction over those who have not received the faith, according to that saying, I Cor., V, 12: What have I to do to judge those who are without? And the Council of Trent, session XIV, chapter 5, declares that « the Church exercises judgment upon no one who has not first entered her through the door of baptism. » Christian princes likewise have no jurisdiction over foreigners, but over subjects they have jurisdiction by which they govern them politically; this jurisdiction nevertheless does not include the right of compelling them to the faith. And although they can compel subjects to abandon idolatry, which is against the natural law, of which every prince is the guardian, their power nevertheless does not extend to the law of faith, which is of the supernatural order.

This conclusion is confirmed by the decisive words of Leo XIII, in the Encyclical Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885: « If, he says, the Church judges it unlawful that the various kinds of divine worship hold the same right as the true religion, she does not on that account condemn those moderators of commonwealths who, for the sake of obtaining some great good or preventing some great evil, patiently bear by custom and usage that each of these things hold a place in the state. — The Church likewise greatly takes care that no one be compelled to embrace the Catholic faith against his will; because, as Augustine wisely admonishes, Tract. XXVI in Ioann., n. 2, man cannot believe unless he is willing. »

The second part is also clear. For the Church has from Christ the command, and consequently the right, of preaching the Gospel in the whole world, Matth., XXVIII, 19. If therefore barbarians impede this preaching, Christian princes can, and at times must, wage war against them and subdue rebels, that they may guard the violated rights of the Church and defend the innocent, both those who have the right of preaching and those who have the right of hearing.]

What is heresy, and how manyfold?

Heresy is a Greek word importing choice, because the heretic by his own judgment chooses to believe what he wills.

I say 1°: Heresy is « a pertinacious error manifestly contrary to the faith, in one who has professed the faith of Christ in truth. »

It is called error, that is, a positive assent to the false, or dissent from the true.

It is called manifestly contrary to the faith, because if anyone held something contrary to the faith about which it were not certain and manifest that it was contrary to it, he would not be a heretic, at least a formal one. That, moreover, is certainly and manifestly of the faith which is manifestly and certainly revealed by God, whether privately, or in Scripture, or in the definitions of the Church, and which all Catholics hold as of faith.

It is called pertinacious error. Pertinacity is an obstinate adhesion to one's own opinion against the faith sufficiently manifested: for this neither length of time is required, nor that one be canonically admonished several times; but voluntary dissent from the faith sufficiently proposed by the Church suffices, which can occur in an instant.

That such pertinacity is required for heresy is clear partly from the very name; for it is, as we said, a choice: partly because, just as for faith there is required the pious motion of the will inclining the intellect to assent with certainty to truth obscurely revealed, so for heresy, which is opposed to faith, there is required the perverse affection of the will to dissent pertinaciously from the truth proposed by the Church: partly from the law, cap. Dixit, cap. Qui in Ecclesia, cause 24, q. 3, and Clement. Ex gravi, book V, title 5, on usuries, where those only are acknowledged as heretics who have been pertinacious in denying some article of faith. Hence that saying of Augustine: « I may err, but I shall not be a heretic, » namely through want of pertinacity. The same St Thomas, q. 8 de Malo and on chapter 11 of I Cor., lecture 4. Hence you will infer that one who through ignorance, even culpable, crass, and supine, yet not affected, withstands the faith, being ready to assent if instructed, is not a formal heretic; for although he sins mortally against the affirmative precept of the faith by voluntarily ignoring what he ought to know, he would not nevertheless be pertinacious. Nay, he would not even sin, if his ignorance were involuntary and inculpable, as happens among uneducated Catholics, or those neglected through the carelessness of parents and pastors, and even among those brought up among heretics, who have never heard anything of the Catholic faith except mockeries and blasphemies against it, nor are they beset by any doubt in this matter; so that, if they hold what must be believed under necessity of means, and are disposed in mind to believe the rest if duly proposed, they do not seem to be outside the way of salvation. Nor does it stand in the way that outside the Church no one is saved; for these, by reason of baptism, likewise of the faith which they have, and of their interior disposition to believe the rest, can be said to be in the Church.

Nor does it stand in the way that for other sins voluntariness in the cause suffices: thus one who kills a man through culpable ignorance is truly a homicide. For the disparity is that other sins are not said to arise from election, as heresy is, for which the common voluntariness, whereby every sin must be voluntary, does not suffice, but there is required a special and pertinacious voluntariness opposed to the faith.

You will ask whether one doubting in the faith is a heretic.

It seems that he is not; because the doubter has no error in the intellect, since he neither assents nor dissents; for doubt is a suspension between assent and dissent.

Before the resolution, a twofold doubt must be distinguished: one negative, the other positive. Negative, which some call in actu exercito, is when someone, having apprehended both opposite sides, whether this be true or false, assenting to neither, remains suspended without any positive act. Positive, which others call in actu signato, is when someone likewise, having apprehended both opposite sides, assenting to neither, judges by a positive act that the thing is doubtful and uncertain.

I answer. 1°. Whoever deliberately doubts with a positive doubt concerning some article of the faith sufficiently proposed by the Church, v. g., whoever judges it doubtful whether there is a Purgatory, whether Christ is in the Eucharist, while knowing that it is so handed down and believed by the whole Church, is formally a heretic; because, although he does not deny the truth about which he doubts, he nevertheless judges positively that it, and the infallibility of the Church, are not certain: and thus he has a positive and pertinacious error in the intellect, if not explicitly against the truth of faith about which he doubts, at least against the firmness and certitude of the Church's infallibility, which is of the essence of the faith. By which the argument set down at the beginning is answered. And of one so doubting is verified what is said in the law: « Doubting in the faith, he is an unbeliever, » and he incurs the excommunication reserved to the Pope, no otherwise than other heretics.

I answer. 2°. Whoever doubts with a merely negative doubt about some article of the faith sufficiently proposed by the Church, that is, precisely suspends judgment without any positive act, because, v. g., he wishes now to attend to other things, or does not wish at the moment to fatigue his head in a matter so great, or wishes to inquire more fitly and agreeably into the motives for assenting, or on account of like motives, is not formally a heretic; because, since he has no judgment, for he suspends it, he has no positive error in the intellect. Nor does he seem to sin of itself, at least mortally, setting aside the danger of consenting to a positive doubt, unless the affirmative precept of the faith then press.

If, however, such suspension of judgment proceeded from a motion of the will on account of difficulties propounded by the intellect, which nevertheless does not judge, as though terrified by them and beguiled about the truth: some hold, not improbably, that the malice of heresy is included therein, so that the suspension ensuing upon that evil motion of the will is a kind of virtual and implicit judgment concerning the uncertainty of the object of faith. Moreover, the matter is exceedingly perilous, and there is no doubt that voluntary negative doubt can easily pass into positive, or arise from it.

[That every doubt concerning things that are of the faith is grave sin the Vatican Synod defined by the following canon: « If anyone shall say that the condition of the faithful and of those who have not yet attained to the one only true faith is equal, so that Catholics may have a just cause for calling into doubt, with suspended assent, the faith which they have already received under the magisterium of the Church, until they shall have completed a scientific demonstration of the credibility and truth of their faith: let him be anathema. »]

I say 2°: Heresy is divided 1° into material and formal. Formal is that which we defined and have explained hitherto. Material is the error of a baptized man against the truth of the faith arising from ignorance, and without pertinacity. This is clear from what has been said.

2° Heresy is divided into internal only, external only, and internal and external together. Internal only is the voluntary error against the faith abiding in the mind alone and manifested by no exterior sign. External only is when one denies by mouth or by deed the faith retained in the heart. Internal and external together, which is complete heresy, is that which, conceived in the mind, is outwardly manifested by word or sign, even if no one be present; provided only the sign be such that, if anyone were present, he would straightway understand that an article of the faith is denied, of which more presently.

3° External heresy is divided into occult and manifest. Occult is that which becomes known to none or to few; manifest, that which is known to many.

§ II. On the punishments of heretics.

The punishments of heretics are of twofold genus. Some are spiritual, as excommunication, irregularity, deprivation of every benefice, jurisdiction, and ecclesiastical dignity, likewise of ecclesiastical burial. Others are corporal, as confiscation of all goods, exemption of subjects from the oath of fidelity, infamy, and capital punishment. The temporal punishments belong to the secular forum. Wherefore, omitting these, we shall speak only of the spiritual ones.

I say 1°: Neither the material heretic, nor the merely internal, nor the merely external heretic incurs the excommunication and the other spiritual punishments of heretics.

The first part is clear; for the material heretic is not truly and formally a heretic, because he is not pertinacious.

The second part is likewise evident; because, although the merely internal heretic is in the forum of conscience and before God truly a heretic, he is not such in the external forum and before the Church, which does not judge of interior things, and therefore he is not subjected to the punishments decreed by her against heretics.

The third part is likewise evident; because the merely external heretic, as one who either through fear, or hope of gain, or anger, or some other like motive, retaining faith in the heart, utters a heretical proposition, tramples upon the crucifix or the images of the saints, exhibits worship to an idol, shares in the banquets of heretics, etc., although he sins most grievously, is not nevertheless truly a heretic; because heresy is an error of the mind. Ecclesiastical punishments, however, are inflicted only upon those who are truly heretics.

Nor does it matter that one who kills a man through fear or hope of gain is truly a homicide. The disparity is that for homicide the slaying of a man without legitimate authority suffices; for heresy, however, error in the mind is required.

And all these consequently can be absolved by any confessor; unless the external heretic has been publicly denounced as a heretic by the Church (which judges nothing but exterior things, and from exterior things presumes the interiors); for then, on account of scandal, he would have to be avoided, nor ought he to be absolved unless reconciled to the Church.

I say 2°: The internal heretic, by this very act whereby he manifests his heresy outwardly, distinctly, and assertively, even if no one hear or see him, incurs excommunication reserved specially to the Pope alone. Cap. Excommunicamus, de haereticis; cap. Noverit, de sent. excommunicat.; and in the Bulla Coenae.

I said: « Even if no one hear or see him; » for it suffices that the sign be such that, if anyone were present, he would straightway understand that the faith is denied. For such heresy belongs to the outward forum of the Church, and thus it lies under excommunication, which is of the external forum; but that it cannot be proven is not because of itself it is not of the external forum, but per accidens, through defect of witnesses.

[From the constitution of the Apostolic See, 4° idus octobris 1869, promulgated by Pius IX, « all apostates from the Christian faith, and each and every heretic, by whatever name they be accounted and of whatever sect they exist; their believers, their receivers, favorers, and generally any defenders whatsoever of them, » lie under the excommunication latae sententiae reserved in a special manner to the Roman Pontiff. The Bulla Coenae, § 1, accords plainly. — Likewise, by the same constitution, « all and singular those knowingly reading, without the authority of the Apostolic See, the books of the same apostates and heretics upholding heresy, as well as the books of any author prohibited nominatim by apostolic letters, and retaining, printing, and defending those same books in any way whatever, » are excommunicated. So the bull Coenae, § 1, and reg. X of the Index. — The articles mentioned above will be expounded in the treatise on Censures.]

As to the other spiritual punishments of heretics, some hold that manifest heretics are not by this very fact deprived of their benefices, but that the sentence of a judge is required, because in cap. Ut commissi, de Haeret., in 6°, the Pontiff says they are to be deprived, or declared deprived. Others hold that by this very fact they are deprived of the title of benefice, but not of the possession.

[Indeed, from the prefaced chapter it seems that deprivation of all dignity, benefice, and office is incurred by the law itself, but that only after a declaratory sentence is this deprivation to be brought into execution¹]

As to ecclesiastical burial, Sylvius here holds that a manifest heretic ought to be deprived of it before the sentence of a judge; because in cap. Quicumque, de Haereticis, in 6°, it is decreed indefinitely that heretics, believers, harborers, defenders, and favorers are to be deprived of burial, and that those who presume to do otherwise are excommunicated. Yet, supposing the truth of this opinion, I judge it must be understood of heretics and of the others designated insofar as they are so manifest that by no tergiversation and by no plea of law could they be excused, which I deem rare in practice; otherwise material would be furnished for lawsuits and contentions.

[This interpretation agrees with the text of the chapter; for the punishment of excommunication is decreed against those who knowingly presume to hand over heretics to ecclesiastical burial. Now only they truly violate this law knowingly who concede ecclesiastical burial to manifest heretics. The aforesaid excommunication is not enunciated so generically in the constit. Apostolicae Sedis, but is comprehended limitatively in the following, which is the 17th among the excommunications simply reserved to the supreme Pontiff: « Clerics knowingly and spontaneously communicating in divine things with persons excommunicated nominatim by the Roman Pontiff, and receiving them in offices. » This excommunication, therefore, is incurred, and by these alone, who knowingly and spontaneously concede ecclesiastical burial to heretics excommunicated nominatim by the Roman Pontiff, because they receive them in liturgical offices, of which mention is made here.

By the same constit., « those ordering or compelling notorious heretics, or persons excommunicated or interdicted nominatim, whether by the Pope or by the bishop, to be delivered to ecclesiastical burial, » lie under excommunication latae sententiae reserved to no one. Alexander VI, cap. Quicumque, de Haereticis, in 6°; Clement V, cap. Eos qui, de sepult.

But whoever admitted to ecclesiastical burial one excommunicated nominatim by a bishop would be punished with simple interdict, according to the same constit.: « Those knowingly... admitting those excommunicated nominatim... to ecclesiastical burial incur by the law itself interdict from entrance into the church, until they have made due satisfaction to the arbitrament of him whose sentence they contemned. »]

As to irregularity, some hold that it is incurred as soon as heresy becomes external, although it remain occult, from the same chapter Quicumque. Others hold that it must be noted and manifest, because Boniface VIII, cap. Statutum 2, on the same title de Haereticis, seems to interpret the praised chapter Quicumque, as regards irregularity, of manifest and proven heretics.

Nor do heretics alone incur irregularity, but the believers themselves, their harborers and favorers, nay, even their children, unto the second generation, if the father die in heresy; unto the first, if the mother die in heresy, from both chapters cited above, Quicumque and Statutum.

[It must be noted, however, that in regions where heretics are constituted in religious society, and heresy is not held as an infamous crime, the children of heretics are not irregular from this source²

Irregularity arisen from heresy is reserved to the supreme Pontiff.]

As to the deprivation of jurisdiction, the difficulty is graver. It is certain by the ancient law that all manifest heretics are deprived of jurisdiction. Thus St Thomas resolves it, below q. 39, a. 3, o. But the question is of the more recent law in the Council of Constance. Hence

I say 3°: Heretics, even manifest ones, unless they be denounced nominatim, or unless they themselves withdraw from the Church, retain jurisdiction and absolve validly.

Proof. From the bull Ad evitanda scandala of Martin V, in the Council of Constance, wherein, as related by St Antoninus, III p., lit. 25, c. 2, it is thus enacted: « To avoid scandals and many perils which can befall timorous consciences, we mercifully grant to the faithful of Christ, by the tenor of these presents, that no one henceforth be bound to abstain from communion with anyone, in the administration or reception of the sacraments, or in other divine things whatsoever, or outside them, on pretext of any sentence or censure ecclesiastical promulgated generally by law or by man, or to avoid anyone, or to observe an ecclesiastical interdict, unless such sentence or censure has been published and denounced specially and expressly by a judge against a person, or against a college, or community, church, or place, or a certain land; notwithstanding the apostolic constitutions and whatsoever others making to the contrary. » Then it excepts only the notorious assailants of clerics. From which it is argued thus. The Church grants to the faithful that they may receive the sacraments from heretics not denounced expressly and nominatim. Therefore she leaves to them jurisdiction for the valid administration of the sacraments; otherwise the concession made to the faithful would be null.

Confirmation. From the practice of the whole Church today. For no one thinks today that Lutherans and Calvinists, notoriously heretical and excommunicate, are to be avoided. No one avoids his own pastor, even as regards the reception of the sacraments, so long as he is left in his benefice, although he be manifestly, in the judgment of all or at least of many, a Jansenist and rebellious against the definitions of the Church. And so of the rest.

I said in the conclusion: « Or unless they themselves withdraw from the Church; » partly because by this very act whereby they withdraw from the Church they renounce its jurisdiction, which therefore the Church is not considered to continue to them; partly because the council speaks of heretics living among Catholics, insofar as, if manifest heretics were to be avoided before denunciation, dangers of souls and anxieties of consciences would be bred while it was not established that they were manifest, some affirming it, others denying it, as in fact occurs in the case of Jansenism, and it would be most difficult for a layman to discern with certainty whether anyone is manifestly a heretic or not, since the matter of heresy for the most part surpasses their grasp. For which reasons the council rightly enacted that only the denounced are to be avoided. These causes, however, cease while the heretics themselves withdraw from the Church.

You will say: This bull is not found in the acts of the Council of Constance. Therefore.

I answer. It is related by St Antoninus, a contemporary of the council, and by all authors everywhere.

I insist. 1°: This bull is related partly by the Council of Basel, session XX, and the Fifth Lateran, session XI, with the greater exception; for it declares that all notoriously excommunicated persons, for whatever cause they be excommunicated, are to be avoided. Therefore.

I answer. That this addition made by those councils has not been received in usage. Hence Dominic Soto, in IV Sentent., dist. 22, q. 1, a. 4, after relating these councils, says: « By the custom and usage of the Church it is most received that we avoid only those two species of excommunications (namely those denounced nominatim, and the notorious assailants of clerics), which the aforesaid council (of Constance) commanded... And thus it must be held without any fear. » And it is clear from the confirmation of the conclusion.

You will ask 1° who can absolve from heresy.

I answer. The Council of Trent, session XXIV, chapter 6, de Reformat., grants to bishops the faculty of absolving by themselves, or through a vicar specially deputed for this, from all occult cases reserved to the Holy See, and from the occult crime of heresy by themselves alone.

But this faculty seems revoked by the bull Coenae, as issued after Trent by Sixtus V, Gregory XIII, Clement VIII, and Paul V, not only as regards heresy, but even as regards the other cases contained in this bull; hence in places where this bull prevails, it seems that, apart from danger of death, the Pontiff alone, or he to whom he commits it, can absolve from occult heresy and the other occult cases of the bull Coenae.

[And indeed, by the constit. Apostolicae Sedis, « all apostates from the Christian faith, and each and every heretic, by whatever name they be accounted and of whatever sect they exist; their believers, their receivers, favorers, and generally any detainers whatsoever of them, » incur the excommunication reserved in a special manner to the Roman Pontiff. This excommunication is renewed by the bull Coenae, § 1. Hence bishops cannot absolve from it, even if they have obtained the general faculty of absolving from the cases reserved to the Holy See, unless it be enunciated specially and expressly in the indult.

Nevertheless, since excommunication is not incurred except on account of contumacy, which must be proven in the external forum, any confessor can absolve both the guilty of merely internal heresy and heretics who, by reason of ignorance, have incurred no censure.]

You will ask 2° what punishment those incur who read the books of heretics.

[I answer. They are excommunicated with excommunication latae sententiae, reserved in a special manner to the Roman Pontiff: « all and singular those knowingly reading, without the authority of the Apostolic See, the books of apostates and heretics upholding heresy, as well as the books of any author prohibited nominatim by apostolic letters, and retaining, printing, and defending those same books in any way whatever. » So the constit. Apostolicae Sedis, after the bull Coenae and several constitutions of the Pontiffs, namely of Pius IV, constit. 77, of Sixtus V, constit. 74, of Clement VIII, constit. 36, in Cherubin. See what has been said concerning the authority of the Index of prohibited books, in the treatise on Laws, dissertation III, art. 1, You will ask 3°.]

Apostasia in Greek means the same as discessio or desertio, departure or desertion, in Latin. It is taken here for a withdrawal from a good which one has solemnly professed. And apostasy is threefold: from the faith, from religion, and from order¹

I say 1°: Apostasy from the faith is the desertion of the whole of the faith. And by this it is distinguished from heresy, which is a desertion of the faith as to a part only.

[Nor indeed does the crime of apostasy require the profession of some false religion. Hence under the name of apostates come those who vindicate to themselves the liberty of thinking and of admitting whatever pleases them, by that very fact rejecting Catholic doctrine: among whom must be numbered rationalists, deists, naturalists, pantheists, spiritists, and in general all who, after receiving baptism, have withdrawn entirely from the Christian faith, even if they have not passed over to Protestantism, or Judaism, or Mohammedanism, or paganism.

From what has been said it is clear that apostasy does not differ from heresy essentially, but only according to more and less, which does not diversify the species. For, as the Angelic Doctor says, this q. 12, a. 1, ad 3, « apostasy looks to infidelity as the term to which the movement of one withdrawing from the faith tends. Hence apostasy does not import a determinate species of infidelity, but a certain circumstance aggravating it, according to that of 2 Pet., II, 21: It had been better for them not to have known the way of truth, than, after they have known it, to turn back. »

Apostates are bound by the same excommunication as heretics, as was related above, de Poenis haereticorum.]

I say 2°: He who abandons an approved religion which he has professed tacitly or expressly, without the legitimate license of his superiors, with the intention of not returning, even if he does not lay aside the habit, is an apostate²; because, as the habit does not make the monk, but the profession of the religious life, so the laying aside of the habit does not make the apostate, but the withdrawal from the religious life. Those who laid aside the habit were formerly excommunicated by that very fact, by the chapter Ut periculosa, tit. Ne clerici et monachi, in 6°, lib. III. But he who does not lay aside the habit is not excommunicated by the common law; each one, however, ought to consult the laws of his own Order. In our Order of Preachers he is excommunicated by that very fact, dist. I, cap. 20, litt. A. Likewise, if he rashly lays aside the habit, that is, with the mind of wandering about, even though with the will of returning, he is indeed not an apostate, yet he is excommunicated by that very fact by the cited chapter, Ut periculosa.

But if he lays aside the habit not rashly and for the sake of wandering about, but for a legitimate cause, either within the cloister, for instance for the sake of sleep, rest, infirmity, etc., or outside the cloister, for instance for fear of death while traveling through the lands of the infidels, or for the sake of avoiding scandal while traveling by night, or for some other reasonable cause, he does not sin, nor does he incur excommunication; because the celebrated canon is directed only against the rash laying aside of the habit, whereby there would be matter apt for wandering about.

[By the constitution Apostolicae Sedis, « regulars or nuns who presume to contract marriage after a solemn vow of chastity » incur excommunication latae sententiae reserved to their Ordinaries, that is, their major superiors. This crime includes not only a violation of the vow of chastity, but also involves apostasy from the religious life. — It must be observed that this censure was decreed only against those solemnly professed.]

I say 3°: He who withdraws from sacred orders back to the secular state without legitimate dispensation is an apostate and sins mortally; because he abandons the state to which he had been solemnly bound over by the Church, and which many canons forbid him to abandon, penalties being imposed against transgressors.

[The aforesaid constitution, with excommunication latae sententiae reserved to bishops or ordinaries, punishes « clerics constituted in sacred orders who presume to contract marriage ». For such men despise more than the law of chastity, and are held as apostates. And it suffices for incurring this censure that the attempt at marriage be made before a civil magistrate, in places where the Tridentine decree on clandestinity is in force. So pronounced the S. Congregation of the Holy Office on December 22, 1880.]

[By liberty of worship there is understood today, on the part of private individuals, the faculty of embracing any form of worship whatever, among dissident and opposed ones, and even of rejecting them all alike; but on the part of the state, the right of publicly professing no religion, and of attributing the same value to all forms of worship, or at least to many, and of conceding them the same rights.

I say: Liberty of worship is altogether to be reprobated.

Proof. 1° from the unhappy and never sufficiently deplorable outcome of this system, namely that through the use of such liberty men are cast outside the way of salvation. For,

That the Catholic faith alone is true, alone salvific, alone imposed by divine law upon all and each man, together with the obligations and duties which flow from it, and that it shines marked with notes of credibility so splendid that its divinity cannot be doubted, no one using reason will sincerely deny. Moreover, liberty or equality of worship evidently sets itself against so excellent and necessary a good. Through it indeed, as Pius IX testifies in the Encyclical of 9 November 1846, there is thrust into Catholic kingdoms « that horrible system, most repugnant even to the natural light of reason itself, of indifference towards any religion whatsoever, which, every distinction between truth and error being taken away, holds that men can attain eternal salvation in the worship of any religion. » But this indifference casts man outside the way of salvation. Therefore.

Proof. 2° from the bond by which society is bound to God. This Leo XIII expounds most beautifully in the encyclical letter Immortale Dei: « Nature and reason, he says, which command every individual to worship God holily and religiously, because we are in his power and, having proceeded from him, must return to him, bind by the same law civil society. For men joined together in common society are no less under the power of God than individuals; nor does society owe less grace to God than individuals, by whose author it coalesced, by whose nod it is preserved, by whose benefit it has received the innumerable abundance of goods with which it abounds. Wherefore, just as no one is permitted to neglect his own duties towards God, and it is the greatest of duties to embrace religion in mind and morals, not that which each one may prefer, but that which God has commanded, and which by certain and by no means doubtful signs is established to be the one true religion among all: in the same way states cannot without crime conduct themselves as if God in no way existed, or cast aside the care of religion as something foreign and of no profit, or take up indifferently out of several kinds whichever they please; and they must altogether adopt in worshipping God that manner and mode by which God himself has shown that he wills to be worshipped. » But liberty of worship breaks this bond of society towards God. Therefore.

Proof. 3° from the ultimate end of civil society. If indeed its proximate end is to provide for the temporal goods and felicity of its members, its ultimate end is the same which was appointed by God for rational creatures, namely that individual men attain eternal salvation.

The same Pontiff proves this in the same place thus: « Holy must the name of God be held among princes, and it must be placed among their chiefest duties to embrace religion with favor, to guard it with benevolence, to shield it with authority and the sanction of laws, and to institute or decree nothing contrary to its welfare. This they owe also to the citizens over whom they preside. For we are born and received into being for a certain supreme and ultimate good, towards which all counsels are to be referred, placed in the heavens beyond this frailty and brevity of life. But since upon this depends the felicity of men, everywhere complete and perfect, therefore to attain the end mentioned is of such great concern to each one that nothing can be of greater concern. Civil society, therefore, born for the common utility, in safeguarding the prosperity of the republic must consult citizens in such a way that, by obtaining and acquiring that supreme and unchangeable good which they spontaneously desire, not only should no disadvantage ever accrue, but every opportunity possible should be brought forward. Of these the chiefest is that care be given to religion, to be preserved holy and inviolate, whose offices join man to God. » But liberty of worship subverts this end. Therefore.

Proof. 4° from the condemnation repeatedly inflicted upon this doctrine by the supreme Pontiffs.

1° Pius VI, in the epistle addressed to Cardinal de la Rochefoucauld and the other prelates of France, on 10 March 1791, exclaims: « What more insane thing could be devised than to establish such equality and liberty among all [forms of worship]? »

2° Leo XIII commemorates the doctrinal judgment delivered against liberty of worship by Gregory XVI, sanctioning it, in the above-praised Encyclical: « Thus Gregory XVI, by the encyclical letter beginning Mirari vos, of 15 August in the year 1832, struck down with great weight of judgment those things which were then being preached: that no choice need be employed in divine worship; that it belongs integrally to each one to judge of religion as he prefers; that each one's conscience alone is his judge. »

3° There was related above the judgment of Pius IX, by which he calls that system « horrible », and « repugnant in the highest degree even to the natural light of reason itself ».

4° The same Leo XIII, in the same place, equates the principle of the equality and liberty of worship with indifferentism and atheism: « To think concerning religion, he says, that there is no difference between dissimilar and contrary forms, this plainly has this outcome, to refuse to approve any by judgment, to refuse any by use. But this, if it differs from atheism by name, differs nothing in reality. For those who are persuaded that God exists, provided they wish to be consistent and not utterly absurd, necessarily understand that the customary forms in divine worship, so great is their difference, and their dissimilarity and conflict even about the greatest matters, cannot all equally be probable, equally good, equally acceptable to God. »

5° This system is condemned most expressly in the Syllabus of the principal errors of our age, whose value and authority the same Leo XIII expresses thus, in the same place: « Pius IX, as opportunity offered himself, marked several of the false opinions which had begun to prevail most widely, and afterwards ordered the same to be gathered into one collection, so that, namely, amid so great a flood of errors Catholic men might have what they might follow without offense. » Further, in the Syllabus, among the errors which are referred to the liberalism of today, the three following propositions are enumerated and noted as condemned: LXXVII: « In this age of ours it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion be held as the one religion of the state, to the exclusion of all other forms of worship whatsoever. » Alloc. Nemo vestrum, 26 July 1853. — LXXVIII: « Hence it has been laudably provided by law in some regions bearing the Catholic name, that it shall be lawful for men immigrating thither to hold the public exercise of their own respective form of worship. » Alloc. Acerbissimum, 27 September 1852. — LXXIX: « Moreover, it is false that the civil liberty of every form of worship, and the full power given to all of manifesting any opinions and thoughts openly and publicly, conduce to the corrupting of the morals and minds of peoples more easily, and to the spreading abroad of the pestilence of indifferentism. » Alloc. Nunquam fore, 15 December 1856. Which proposition is related by Leo XIII as condemned among the notes with which the Encyclical Immortale Dei is adorned.

Hence resolve:

1° A Catholic prince or legislator is bound to impede the free exercise of the worship of sects by all the means he can.

The truth of this conclusion is clear, both from the preceding arguments and authorities, and from this reason, namely that, if it is not permitted to the legislator to indulge lesser vices, much less can he favor those which universally pervert minds, corrupt morals, undermine the very foundations of the republic, and moreover, which is the gravest of evils, turn subjects away from their ultimate end, that is, from the attainment of eternal felicity.

2° But since in human affairs it is not permitted to pursue a good except insofar as the circumstances of things allow, if greater evils ought to arise from the violent suppression of an unhappily introduced liberty, it can be tolerated by the public authority, provided it be restrained within due limits, until it can be wholly removed without grave danger. Thus is to be understood what Pius VI wrote in the above-praised epistle: « Let us consider the difference which intervenes between men who have always been outside the bosom of the Church, such as infidels and Jews, and between those who subjected themselves to the Church herself through the sacrament of baptism received. For the former ought not to be constrained to the profession of Catholic obedience; but on the contrary the latter are to be compelled, » supposing indeed that good ought to prevail over evil. And the same Leo XIII says without limitation in the Encyclical Immortale Dei: « Nor does a just cause arise, he says, for anyone to accuse the Church, either of being confined more than is right in lenity and facility, or of being hostile to that liberty which is genuine and legitimate. In truth, if the Church judges that it is not licit for the various kinds of divine worship to exist by the same right as the true religion, she does not therefore condemn those moderators of commonwealths who, for the sake of attaining some great good or of prohibiting some evil, patiently suffer by custom and usage that those forms each have place in the state. And she is accustomed to guard this also most greatly, that no one be compelled unwillingly to embrace the Catholic faith, because, as Augustine wisely warns, Tract. XXVI in Ioann., n. 2, « Man cannot believe unless he wills. »

This the Angelic Doctor likewise teaches and excellently demonstrates, this q. 10, a. 11, c.: « Human government, he says, is derived from divine government, and ought to imitate it. God, however, although he is omnipotent and supremely good, nevertheless permits certain evils to come to pass in the universe, which he could prevent, lest, those being removed, greater goods should be taken away, or even worse evils should follow. Thus therefore in human government those who preside rightly tolerate certain evils, lest certain goods be impeded, or even lest worse evils be incurred, as Augustine says in book II de Ordine, cap. 4, num 2: « Remove the prostitutes from human affairs, and you will confound everything » with lusts. Thus therefore, although infidels sin in their rites, they can be tolerated, either on account of some good which proceeds from them, or on account of some evil which is avoided. From the fact, however, that the Jews observe their rites, in which of old the truth of the faith which we hold was prefigured, this good proceeds, that we have testimony of our faith from enemies, and that there is represented to us as it were in figure that which we believe: and therefore they are tolerated in their rites. But the rites of other infidels, who bring no truth or utility, are not to be tolerated in any degree, except perhaps to avoid some evil, namely to avoid the scandal or discord which could proceed from this, or the impediment to the salvation of those who, thus tolerated, are gradually converted to the faith. For this reason the Church sometimes tolerated the rites of heretics and pagans, when the multitude of infidels was great. » That which is said here of the Jews is confirmed by example; for the Roman Pontiffs have always, on account of the reasons here set forth, tolerated them in the city of Rome and have even protected them with their protection.]

Blasphemy is a Greek word signifying the same as in Latin malediction. It is taken by theologians for a malediction detracting from the excellency of goodness, especially divine goodness. Hence I say 1°: Blasphemy can be defined¹: « A speaking of the heart or of the mouth by which, in the manner of an insult, something is said derogating from the excellency of the divine goodness. » Or more briefly: « A contumelious utterance against God. »

It is explained. It is said 1° « of the heart or of the mouth; » because we speak with both, and the demons, who speak only in mind, blaspheme.

It is said 2° « in the manner of an insult. » By this it is distinguished from simple infidelity, which consists in assent against the faith. For blasphemy does not require assent against the faith, but it suffices that something be said of God in the manner of an insult.

Nor is there required for this, mark well, an explicit and express intention of insulting and dishonoring God, but virtual and implicit suffices, insofar as by words, or by the manner of pronouncing them, according to the common apprehension, God is dishonored and contemned. Hence I do not assent to those who say that it is not blasphemy but only a vain use of the divine name, when someone, out of indignation against man, not against God, utters his head, his death, his blood, and the like. For those words so pronounced are contumelious to God, though uttered on occasion of another. Consequently there is there a virtual and implicit intention of dishonoring God. And otherwise blasphemies would be exceedingly rare, whereas they are reckoned most frequent. Hence St. Thomas, this a. 2, ad 3, says that he who suddenly breaks out into blasphemous words from some passion, adverting to their signification, commits mortal blasphemy; but he who utters these and the like words not only contumeliously, but either recitatively, or historically, is not a blasphemer: whence special attention must be given to the manner of pronouncing.

It is said « derogating from the excellency of the divine goodness. » And this is done not only when something contumelious is said directly against God, but also against the saints and sacred things; not indeed per se (for thus it would not be properly blasphemy, but the vice of irreligion, opposed to dulia), but with some relation at least virtual to God. For just as, says the Author, God is praised in his saints, insofar as the works which God works in the saints are praised, so also blasphemy committed against the saints redounds consequently to God. Therefore he who would say that St. Peter was impious and damned, that the Blessed Virgin was a harlot, would be a blasphemer. But he who spoke of them, not as saints, but as they were men on earth, e. g., if he called St. Peter bald, St. Crispin a shoemaker, would not be properly a blasphemer, since here there is no respect to God. But if he uttered these things out of hatred and indignation, he would sin mortally against dulia and the observance due to the saints; if however out of jest or levity, it would be venial sin.

Therefore blasphemy is committed: 1° by denying to God what befits him, or asserting of him what does not befit him: and this whether it be done enuntiatively, optatively, imperatively, or in imperfect speech; 2° by attributing to him what befits him, but mockingly and as something blameworthy, as by naming contemptuously the members of Christ and of the saints; 3° by attributing to a creature what is proper to God, as omnipotence; 4° by deeds equivalent to contumelious words, as spitting upon a crucifix.

I say 2°: Blasphemy is divided into heretical and non-heretical². Heretical is that which asserts something contrary to the faith, or denies something pertaining to the faith. Non-heretical is that by which, although nothing openly contrary to the faith is contained, nevertheless the things that are of faith are uttered contemptuously and contumeliously, as if they were blameworthy.

I say 3°: Blasphemy is of its genus the gravest mortal sin³, nor can it become venial from smallness of matter, but only from involuntary indeliberateness of the act.

The first part is clear, 1° from the gravest punishments by which it is punished⁴. In the old law, Lev., XXIV, 16, the blasphemer was stoned. In canon law several punishments are established against blasphemers; and if they despise these, they are to be deprived of ecclesiastical burial, cap. Statutum, tit. de maledicis, lib. V Decretal., and elsewhere. 2° Because it gravely repugns charity, since it is against the excellency of the divine goodness; likewise it is opposed to faith and religion, as I shall say presently.

The second part is also clear; because, however slight anything may be per se, that God should be dishonored and held in contempt is always the gravest evil.

The third part is clear in like manner; because in every species of sin involuntary indeliberateness excuses from the whole or grave sin, because from it it comes about that the act is not perfectly human.

I said « involuntary indeliberateness; » because, if it arise from a habit which the blasphemer does not care to eradicate as far as he can, it does not excuse from mortal sin, because it is voluntary in its cause, namely in that voluntary habit. Let confessors attend to this.

You will ask against what virtue blasphemy is opposed.

I answer. Insofar as it contains implicitly or explicitly something false concerning God, it is opposed to the confession of faith; insofar as it is a dishonoring of God, it is opposed to religion, whose formal object is worship, honor rendered to God.