Thoughtful response; can you elaborate a bit more on the “issue of form and intent”?
I often have. Here’s a very abbreviated form. I have also done this in mind-numbing detail.
The undivided Church had developed a set of requirements for what constituted the confection of a valid sacrament. In brief, it required a valid minister, form, intent, matter (and subject, for some).
Apostolicae Curae concluded that Anglican orders were invalid, due to a break in apostolic succession, which occurred through the use of an invalid form, in the Edwardine ordinal, and of an invalid sacramental intent, expressed by the use of this Ordinal. While the Bull does not specify the precise point at which this occurred, the consensus is that it was at the consecration of Archbishop Parker, in 1559 (see Clarke, ANGLICAN ORDERS AND DEFECT OF INTENTION).
The defect in the form (the words said in the conveying of Holy Orders) was alleged to have been the failure to specify the priest’s role in offering the sacrifice of the Mass. The judgment of
Apostolicae Curae also faults the use of that particular form, as a means of judging the sacramental intent of those who used it. The Bull first faulted, then, the Edwardine Ordinal, holding that the form was invalid because it did not mention the authority of the priest to offer sacrifice. Additional problems were held with the form for consecrating bishops. Conclusion: the forms were sacramentally invalid.
But the judgement in
AC is not on the form alone, since it is not at all difficult to list other ordination rites, which are accepted by the Roman Catholic Church as conferring valid orders, which likewise do not refer to the sacrificing priesthood. What
AC asserts is not merely that the Ordinal fails to mention that particular office of a priest, but that since all mention of it was deliberately suppressed by the authors of the Ordinal, the concept of the priesthood mentioned in the Ordinal (it was asserted) was not that of the undivided Church. Hence, they who used it could not be proposing to ordain priests, in that sense. Hence, they did not do so.
This alleges invalid sacramental intent on the part of those who used (not those who wrote) the Ordinal. Intent is usually the easiest of the requirements for a valid sacrament to satisfy. Since intent is an interior state (as
AC says), if all exterior forms of the sacramental action are unexceptional, the sacramental intent is assumed to be valid; to do what the Church does in the sacramental action (
facere quod facit ecclessia). Otherwise, no sacrament could ever conclusively be proven to be valid.
However, if there is some external aspect that permits a judgment of the intent, permitting a
determinatio ex adiunctis, that may permit a judgment of invalid sacramental intent. In the logic of
Apostolicae Curae, that was the use of the Ordinal. Given the circumstances in which the Ordinal was written, when and by whom, it was assumed that the intent of anyone who used that form sacramentally was (by
determinatio ex adiunctis) considered sacramentally invalid. Thus, through the joined questions of form and intent, each leading to a determination of invalidity, the orders were declared invalid, due to a break in apostolic succession. Had the Ordinal not been written, and the
Pontificale Romanum continued in use, the logic of
AC would have been necessarily different. Not that the Orders would have been declared valid, necessarily, but some other point might have served.
So,
AC says that due to an invalid form, used with an invalid intent, Anglican orders were lost.
This subject is a complex one, and the story includes factors of personalities, history, and politics, as well as theology. Been a hobby of mine for years. Comes up often. Some of this is cut and paste, from previous replies of mine.Remember, the conclusion of
AC must be affirmed by all RCs. Sometimes I remind them.
GKC
