It is always a mistake to close comments – for the sake of real pearls of wisdom a few people are able to write. In the ordinariate movement, most of the lay people involved have shown little concern for the clergy, especially those who fall under the category of having been Roman Catholics and wanting to return as part of a corporate reunion scheme.

The more critical of the commentators ascribed the failure of the TAC’s attempt to become a kind of “uniate” church to the fact that many of the clergy had been Roman Catholics whether they were originally in that Church or had converted at some point.

I have written several articles recently on As the sun in its orb and some have been picked up on Fr Smuts’ At the Start of a New Blogging Week… and This Blog…. The trolls went to work and I wrote Wind for my Sails in a similar vein to the lugubriously-named Three Steps to the Gallows.

From one of these postings, I will quote some comments by the (civil) lawyer posting under the pseudonym Mourad. He is a convinced Roman Catholic, but kind, courteous and charitable. His subtlety in the most recent comments has not gone unnoticed.

I think it is not irrelevant to point out that one of the complicating issues in this whole story is the position of [Roman] Catholic clergy who have received major orders in the Catholic Church and then excercised ministry in other churches.

Father Chadwick’s own account of his personal history on Introduction sets out with candour his own history and from the account he gives it is self-evident (i) that he received valid diaconal orders in the Catholic Church; (ii) that his priestly ordination may have been by a prelate in schism but nonetheless effective (iii) that he will have incurred automatic canonical penalties under Canon Law and therefore, like Hepworth, he would not have been able to return to communion with the Catholic Church and continue any ministry via the Anglicanorum Coetibus process.

As things stand, as with Hepworth, it is not likely that he or other priests in the like position would be able to return to communion with the See of Rome otherwise than on terms that they live in the lay state.

There are undoubtedly many former Catholic clergy in the same position and not a few of them exercise ministry in different parts of the Anglican Communion and in Churches claiming to be Anglican continuing bodies. Indeed, every time the newspapers print some story or other about CofE clergy joining the OLW ordinariate, some spokesman or other will pop up with a story about Catholic priests who are now ministering as Anglicans.

Comparatively few such former Catholics seem to gravitate to the extreme evangelical positions held by some in the very broad spectrum of Anglicanism. Most feel the need to be in communion with a bishop and many will be just as concerned about recent developments in the theological positions adopted by the CoE (not to mention the US Episcopal Church) as are the many priests and laity who have either switched from Anglican Communion churches to “continuing Anglican” jurisdictions or who are seeing communion with the Catholic Church by one of the different routes now open to them.

I think the time is fast coming when the Latin Church will have to revisit the whole question of universal priestly celibacy. It may not be in my lifetime but I think the time is coming when the Church in the West will have to adopt the discipline of the Eastern churches.

More importantly, I think the time has come for the Church to adopt a more pastoral approach to those former priests who are out of communion and make it easier for them to be reconciled. That is why I was interested in Father Chadwick’s notion of a solidarity or some other kind of support network. I think the Church has been over anxious to maintain clerical discipline as opposed to pastoral care and further, I believe that many of these priests had and still have a genuine ministerial vocation and ways and means should be sought to enable them to have a role in the life of the Church.

Naturally, some commentators sprang up to mention that there had been dispensations, notably for those who had left the Roman Catholic Church as children – but that there had also been a priest who left as a seminarian in the 1960’s and was ordained an Anglican. Does that not prove that those who do not receive the dispensation are truly guilty and deserving of the canonical equivalent of the death penalty?

Mourad pointed out:

I agree. The actual prohibition is contained in the Complementary Norms at 6.2 “Those who have been previously ordained in the Catholic Church and subsequently have become Anglicans, may not exercise sacred ministry in the Ordinariate.”

In this context “ordained” must refer to the conferral of major orders: diaconate or priesthood. The absolute prohibition is therefore quite limited.

But of course the complementary norms of Anglicanorum coetibus are only a small part of canonical legislation and jurisprudence. The most relevant canon of the 1983 Code is 1041 § 2:

The following are irregular for receiving orders: §2 a person who has committed the delict of apostasy, heresy, or schism;

Article 6.2 of the complementary norms only repeats the general canonical discipline, perhaps in view to the belief many of us entertained that there would be generous dispensations.

Another person, known for his intransigent attitude, called Wayfarer, comes in with his opinion, which I will resume rather than quote.

The only cause for leniency would be invincible ignorance, for example a Roman Catholic child being taken by his parents to an Anglican church. Adults are assumed to be perfectly free in their choices, so therefore in bad faith if they foul up. They incur the full weight of the law, commit scandal and cannot be allowed to return as clerics or priests.

These clerics are men who have not just been formed as Catholics in their formative years, but that they are men who have been to seminary, have studied for years, have discerned a vocation, and who are freely choosing to be ordained and public leaders of the Catholic community. They are entrusted with the most sacred of the Church’s gifts – that of its sacraments and its people. It is serious when a Catholic leaves the Church. For an ordained cleric to leave the Church, it is viewed as an act of self-excommunication, schism, a grave and profound breach of trust, and the cause of great scandal – done with full knowledge of the seriousness of the act. To subsequently join another community and function publicly as a cleric is seen as adding to the scandal.

He tempers his judgement, as any good Vatican bureaucrat would by sympathising. It’s sad and painful for you, but the bottom line is that you’re dead! The Church’s position is constant, and we need to retain this fact. However, constant doesn’t always mean right. The Sabbath is made for man and not man for the Sabbath.

I added a comment

This kind of argument does not wash. In civil society and the penal system, every attempt is made to rehabilitate prisoners and those to be released from jail. In the Church, there could be diocesan offices for helping to rehabilitate clerics either in clerical life or in some other fulfilling vocation.

I don’t want to sound bitter, but if civil courts and judges practised the law the way the Church does, we would be back to the days of hanging judges.

The law here in France, as in England and elsewhere, judges a penal case by examining mitigating circumstances and not simply applying a “flat rate” law to cover all cases without any examination. There are more guarantees of justice under civil law than under canon law, because judges and lawyers are accountable for malpractice. That is my point. Any offender has the possibility of rehabilitation after purging his sentence.

Wayfarer responded:

I would very respectfully disagree with you. In using your own analogy – it isn’t as if the the ones who would be rehabilitated are not able to be brought back into and welcomed back into society. It is just that once you have someone who has been convicted of embezzling funds from the bank, you don’t return that person to being bank manager. You welcome them back, but they have lost the trust that was placed in them when they initially took the position. In civil society, it would be unthinkable to return the bank manager to his former position.

The analogy is apt, because the Catholic Church would view the act of a cleric committing schism in the same way and with the same seriousness. A “felony” has been committed, and you do not put someone who has broken the trust of the community in a position where they could decide to or have the opportunity to do it again. They were entrusted with the most valuable assets the community possesses, and then profoundly broke that trust. So no “hanging judges” here to be found – I think when put in context the actions of the Church make sense, though I do not in any way deny that it would be very painful to be on the receiving end of Church discipline. It may seem like a harsh penalty, but the offense is comparatively grave, and in the eyes of the Church it is a fitting, fair, and sensible penalty for a cleric who with full knowledge committed the offense.

I think finding lay positions for clerics who find themselves in this positions would be a good thing – though I wonder how difficult it would be to be in such close proximity to the office they used to hold, but not to be able to hold it. Would it not be better and less painful for the person to do something else altogether?

Again, I do not post this to cause pain. But it is important to have the Church’s perspective on this. It is not that the Church is trying to be unnecessarily harsh, unjust, arbitrary, or punative and this “side of the story” needs to be explained.

Would it not be better and less painful for the person to do something else altogether? That is indeed a question to ask. There is no reason to stay in the Church. Often someone like the fraudulent bank manager who had done his time and is out of a job has one option – emigrate to another country. There he might find a new job involving what he is good at – administering money – but with less temptation to steal it. His punishment may have been enough to deter him from committing the same offence again, if his first motivation was one of desperation rather than a simple desire to get rich. Why not give the man a new chance if there is no recidivism? The best thing for a former Roman Catholic cleric in this logic of vindictive punishment would be to make his way definitively in another church not in communion with Rome or give up on churches altogether. After all, there is evidence that not all people who have given up church go to hell when they die. Many mediums affirm the contrary! The Roman Catholics cannot have it both ways. I remember a canon law professor at my alma mater saying that it is never legitimate to use the law to leave any person without hope of a solution.

Mourad returns with his sense of moderation:

While I accept that Wayfarer’s post represents the traditional justification for the approach the Church takes to schismatic clerics, I question some of the premises he puts forward.

For example, I can think of quite a number of priests of my generation where the issue of whether the choice was truly a “free” choice must be questionable. The Church has in recent years made some quite radical reforms in how it assesses the suitability of candidates for ordination including the use of psychological assessment to determine whether a candidate has the right temperament for the priestly life and is more ready to defer ordination to test a vocation than was formerly the case. Candidates are encouraged to take a “gap year” before their higher education. Precautions worth taking rather than trying to force square pegs into round holes. Likewise the Church has made it easier than once was the case for a priest to apply to be dispensed from his vows so as to be able to live in the lay state and perhaps marry. Not uncommonly, a sensible bishop will encourage a priest to take a sabbatical as part of the process of discerning what is the right personal solution.

I suspect many of the problems of schismatic priests were exacerbated when some bishops stopped regarding their priests as a spiritual extended family and running their dioceses as if they were corporations.

I do not doubt the need for discipline when a member of the clergy commits as grave an offense as schism. But while one should hate the sin one should love the sinner. Justice should be tempered with mercy. Just as it is the case that whole life sentences for murder are rare, a whole life deprivation from ministry should be equally rare. Why not the kind of graduated approach which is adopted in many penal systems ? As a rough example, (i) return to the Church and live a life as a layman for a period – with the guidance of a spiritual director; (ii) undertake a prescribed number of periods on retreat in a monastery or other house in the lay state – living in a community but benefiting from the daily group observance of the canononical hours; (iiI) be permitted to progresss to (say) assisting in a parish under the supervision of an experienced pastor mentor (iv) graduating to diaconal functions (v) eventually assistant priest under supervision or whatever might be prudent.

Some of the readers may remember “the Nun’s Story” with Audrey Hepburn. Remember the Belgian priest who had had an illicit carnal relationship and received an appropriate sanction – but who was permitted to resume his priestly function on terms that he went to minister to a leper colony. “Once a priest, always a priest” means what it says. I’m certainly not for making re-integration easy – but NEVER is too harsh. And very possibly a waste of a precious resource.

Wayfarer replied:

Mourad, I respect what you say, and think you likely have a point. Times and methods of seminarian evaluation have come a long way, and I think our seminarians are much better prepared these days for the ministry they undertake.

However, the only problem with questioning whether the priest was truly free in choosing his ordination is that if it really is the case that he was not free, then you have a case of invalid Catholic orders, in the same way that if you enter into marriage but it is not freely chosen, you have an invalid marriage. And if the cleric’s orders are invalid, then ever sacerdotal act that he ever performed that required the exercise of orders is equally invalid.

This leaves the Church with a bit of a quandary – with that reasoning you either have a case of invalid orders from the get-go, or you have a case of clerical schism with the penalties that go along with it. Both unfortunately lead to the same place.

Again, I don’t think that this has anything to do with “loving or hating the sinner.” It has to do with the gravity of the offense that leads to a very grave penalty. There may be extraordinary circumstances that would mitigate this permanent penalty, but given the gravity of the offense I can only think that Rome would exercise that option infrequently.

In another posting, Mourad affirms “We can agree to disagree about the need for a perpetual prohibition on ministry after schism”.

We have two convinced Roman Catholics of a mind to protect the integrity of the Church and the Sacraments. One is a rigorist, and the other calls for a pastoral reform of this position, especially in view to the Church’s general desire to minister in the modern world since Vatican II.

* * *

One unfortunate consequence of the notion of tradition is trying to use laws devised in another age and in different necessitating circumstances to apply principles to analogous situations today. In civil penal law, if that tradition were applied, the death penalty and transportation to penal colonies would still be on the books. The law adapts to the passing of time and to new circumstances. If I were to apply the principle church people often use, then I would myself compare this attitude to the historical heresy of Donatism.

The history of Donatism is situated at the demise of the Roman Empire in north Africa and could be compared to France in 1944 at the end of the Occupation. There were resistants and there were collaborators, and the vast majority of people just kept quiet, did what they could to help people in distress, and got on with life. In the summer of 1944, as the Allies arrived, those suspected or proven to have collaborated with the enemy were usually taken out and shot. Whose fault was it? Man’s history is bathed in blood vendettas.

The Church emerging from persecution was no exception. Some Christians had collaborated with the enemy, and some repented and wanted to return to the Church. I will not go into the history of Donatism here, because it can be found on:

• Donatism
• Donatists from the Catholic Encyclopaedia
  
• Cyprian, Donatism, Augustine and Augustana a 30-page pdf file

The tradition of maintaining a perpetual bar from ministry on a cleric who has for some reason defected from his diocese seems to be based on little more than vengeance. The punishment is not medicinal but vindictive, like the penal colony and the gallows in civil law.

This is what needs to be reformed in the Church, along with the discipline of clerical celibacy and the whole concept of a distinction between clergy and laity rather than the sacramental character of ordination. Donatism is also widespread in the eastern Orthodox Churches, though they have the notion of oikonomia, a pastoral and merciful way of applying tradition and law.

The Catholic tradition remains torn between Augustinism and Donatism in the application of canon law and the notion of Tradition. Until something is done about this, defections will continue, and those who do not go to other churches will lose faith or adapt to an unchurched existence. The pastoral responsibility falls on the shoulders of Church authorities, especially when they preach forgiveness and the need to rehabilitate rather than crush under the weight of vindictive punishments.

I believe that such a cause for the reform of ecclesiastical discipline in this area and others correlates with the cause for the abolition of capital punishment where it is still legal. Logically, the only moral justification for killing a person is direct self-defence. There are other ways for society to defend itself against those who commit heinous crimes, namely the prison system or a humane revival of penal colonies from which escape is truly impossible. The only coherent argument for retaining capital punishment is vindictive.

Punishment by imprisonment protects society and deprives the convict of freedom, which can be a means for rehabilitation and finding redemption. If there are grounds for believing that the redemptive process is complete and the convict can be rehabilitated, the laws of most countries provide for parole or conditional freedom. The punishment serves its purpose but leaves the convict with hope.

Another purpose of punishment is deterrence. In the case of the Church and irregular clerics, the fear of opening the flood gates for thousands of priests who left and got married is tangible. Maintain the tight ban and priests will think twice about reneging on their commitments. Right? Then you don’t need lawyers – just a book of law and an executioner! There is a question of proportion. You can deter by hanging children for stealing a loaf of bread, which has been done in history within the last two hundred years. The Taliban kills children for no reason at all. Human beings have rights, even when they sin.

Yet another justification for punishment is to have the offender pay back for the damage he has committed. You kill the convict, and he can no longer pay back his victims because he is dead. In the case of the Church, it might be more of a punishment, and a redemptive one, to have a priest serve in the missions or a poor parish than be banished and unchurched.

For the Church to “kill” its wayward priests does not restore right. It only maintains the illusion of a “pure” and “undefiled” clergy.  Two wrongs do not make a right. Vengeance belongs to God, not to man.

Vos estis sal terræ. Quod si sal evanúerit, in quo saliétur ? Ad níhilum valet ultra, nisi ut mittátur foras, et conculcétur ab homínibus.