|
NEITHER presbyter, deacon, nor any of the ecclesiastical
order shall be ordained at large, nor unless the person ordained is
particularly appointed to a church in a city or village, or to a martyry, or to
a monastery. And if any have been ordained without a charge, the holy Synod
decrees, to the reproach of the ordainer, that such an ordination shall be
inoperative, and that such shall nowhere be suffered to officiate.
NOTES.
ANCIENT EPITOME OF CANON VI.
In Martyries and Monasteries
ordinations are strictly forbidden. Should any one be ordained therein, his
ordination shall be reputed of no effect.
VAN ESPEN.
The wording of the canon seems to
intimate that the synod of Chalcedon held ordinations of this sort to be not
only illicit but also invalid, irritis and cassis. Nor is this to be wondered
at, if we take into account the pristine and ancient discipline of the church
and the opinion of many of the Scholastics (Morinus, De SS. Ordinat., Parte III., Exercit. V., cap
272
HEFELE.
It is clear that our canon forbids
the so-called absolute ordinations, and requires that every cleric must at the
time of his ordination be designated to a definite church. The only titulus
which is here recognized is that which was later known as titulus beneficii. As
various kinds of this title we find here (a) the appointment to a church in the
city; (b) to a village church; (c) that to the chapel of a martyr; (d) the
appointment as chaplain of a monastery. For the right understanding of the last
point, it must be remembered that the earliest monks were in no wise clerics,
but that soon the custom was introduced in every larger convent, of having at
least one monk ordained presbyter, that he might provide for divine service in
the monastery.
Similar prohibitions of
ordinationes absolutoe were also put forth in after times.
According to existing law, absolute
ordinations, as is well known, are still illicitoe, but yet validoe, and even
the Council of Chalcedon has not declared them to be properly invalidoe, but
only as without effect (by permanent suspension). Cf Kober, Suspension, S. 220,
and Hergenrother, Photius, etc., Bd. ii., S. 324.
BRIGHT.
By the word marturiw
("martyry") is meant a church or chapel raised over a martyr's grave.
So the Laodicene Council forbids Churchmen to visit the "martyries of
heretics" (can. ix.). So Gregory of Nyssa speaks of "the
martyry" of the Holy Martyrs (Op. ii., 212); Chrysostom of a
"martyry," and Palladius of "martyries" near Antioch (In
Act. Apost. Hom., xxxviii. 5; Dial., p. 17), and Palladius of "the martyry
of St. John" at Constantinople (Dial., p. 25). See Socrates, iv. 18, 23,
on the "martyry" of St. Thomas at Edessa, and that of SS. Peter and
Paul at Rome; and vi. 6, on the "martyry" of St. Euphenia at
Chalcedon in which the Council actually met. In the distinct sense of a visible
testimony, the word was applied to the church of the Resurrection at Jerusalem
(Eusebius, Vit. Con., iii. 40, iv. 40; Mansi, vi. 564; Cyril, Catech., xiv. 3),
and to the Holy Sepulchre itself (Vit. Con., iii. 28), Churches raised over
martyrs' totals were called in the West "memorioe martyrum," see Cod.
Afric., lxxxiii. (compare Augustine,
De Cura pro Mortuis, VI.).
This canon is found in the Corpus
Juris Canonici, Gratian's Decretum, Pars I., Dist. lxx., can. j.
|