Excommunicated Saints

[Vianney33]

No he does not have to do so. There have been many cases when popes have bypassed Canon Law. The law does not bind him. I’ll give you a simple example.

In the cases you cite the popes did not bypass canon law. There are two different mechanisms for canonization, formal and equivalent. These popes chose equivalent rather than formal. Canon Law provided the procedures for the formal method.

newadvent.org/cathen/02364b.htm

Canonization, therefore, creates a cultus which is universal and obligatory. But in imposing this obligation the pope may, and does, use one of two methods, each constituting a new species of canonization, i.e. formal canonization and equivalent canonization. Formal canonization occurs when the cultus is prescribed as an explicit and definitive decision, after due judicial process and the ceremonies usual in such cases. Equivalent canonization occurs when the pope, omitting the judicial process and the ceremonies, orders some servant of God to be venerated in the Universal Church; this happens when such a saint has been from a remote period the object of veneration, when his heroic virtues (or martyrdom) and miracles are related by reliable historians, and the fame of his miraculous intercession is uninterrupted.

Popes can add, delete, dispense with and ignore canon law at their own discretion.

I agree they can add, delete, amend, and revise canon law bound only by the Natural and Moral laws and dogma. However it is a universal legal principle that laws cannot be changed ex post facto. They are changed from that point forward. Otherwise people could never be certain whether the existing canons will apply to them or some unforeseen future canon applied retroactively.

A pope cannot “ignore” his own Canon Law. If this were the case Canon Law could not be relied upon in the slightest. It would gut any legal force of the entire Code and turn the Pope into an absolute monarch.

The sovereign pontiff is the most fruitful source of canon law; he can abrogate the laws made by his predecessors or by Ecumenical councils; he can legislate for the whole church or for a part thereof, a country or a given body of individuals; if he is morally bound to take advice and to follow the dictates of prudence, he is not legally obliged to obtain the consent of any other person or persons, or to observe any particular form; his power is limited only by Divine law, natural and positive, dogmatic and moral. Furthermore, he is, so to say, the living law, for he is considered as having all law in the treasury of his heart (“in scrinio pectoris”; Boniface VIII. c. i, “De Constit.” in VI).

As St. Boniface handed down, the pope is not bound by canon law.

This quote adds support to the fact that a pope can abrogate excommunications laid down by his predecessors as I said previously.

However this quote does not say that a pope can “ignore” Canon Law. It says he can change it and he has broad powers to do so but ONLY looking forward, He can’t retroactively change laws because it, for one, would be against natural justice,

 

[Vianney33]

At the same time I declare that, as of today’s date, the decree then issued is devoid of juridical effect.

“The decree then issued” That decree excommunicated ABL. That same decree is now devoid of juridical effect.

 

[TheDoctor]

“The decree then issued” That decree excommunicated ABL. That same decree is now devoid of juridical effect.

My dear friend, this is the main point that you do not understand.

The decree did not, did not, did not excommunicate anyone. Let me try to walk you through it slowly:

1. Look at the decree here: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/jo…ia-dei_en.html . The part you want to key in on is (3) (bolded part is mine):

1. In itself, this act was one of disobedience to the Roman Pontiff in a very grave matter and of supreme importance for the unity of the church, such as is the ordination of bishops whereby the apostolic succession is sacramentally perpetuated. Hence such disobedience - which implies in practice the rejection of the Roman primacy - constitutes a schismatic act. In performing such an act, notwithstanding the formal canonical warning sent to them by the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops on 17 June last, Mons. Lefebvre and the priests Bernard Fellay, Bernard Tissier de Mallerais, Richard Williamson and Alfonso de Galarreta, have incurred the grave penalty of excommunication envisaged by ecclesiastical law.(4)
   Now, see that footnote (4) at the bottom? That refers to Canon 1382:
   Can. 1382 A bishop who consecrates some one a bishop without a pontifical mandate and the person who receives the consecration from him incur a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.
   A latae sententiae excommunication is one that the person incurs immediately by their performance of a certain act. When the archbishop performed the ordinations and the men accepted them, they immediately excommunicated themselves. No action of the Pope was needed. If you go and read Section (3) of the decree above, you will see that this is exactly what JPII is saying - he is NOT excommunicating them by the decree, he is agreeing that they excommunicated themselves under Canon 1382.

Compare this with, for example, Canon 1386
Can. 1386 A person who gives or promises something so that someone who exercises a function in the Church will do or omit something illegitimately is to be punished with a just penalty; likewise, the one who accepts such gifts or promises.
Acts committed under Canon 1386 can be grave enough to warrant excommunication, however in this case the ordinary hearing the case must issue a decree stating exactly what the penalty is because there is no automatic penalty associated with the action, as there is with Canon 1382.

Now, that last part of the Canon 1382 that says “reserved to the Apostolic See” means that only the Pope can lift the penalty from that Canon, in this case the automatic excommunications of the archbishop and the others. As many have pointed out, the decree from BXVI only lifted the exommuncations of the four.

If you really stop and think about it, if BXVI meant to lift the excommunication of the archbishop why did he not mention him by name in the decree? I think the decree is telling in who it omits as much as in who it specifies, is it not?

 

[Thomas_Casey]

Question correctly and satisfactorily answered.

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