Jump to content
An Old School Catholic Message Board

Suspended Priests


Aloysius

Recommended Posts

Can a priest who has had his priestly faculties removed say private masses alone? May they receive stipends for these masses to offer them for intentions?

I'm interested because a charity I've recently become interested in, Opus Bono Sacerdotii, seems to indicate that they have priests who they represent offer their private masses for intentions for stipends which benefit the work of Opus Bono Sacerdotii. I would like to help this charity, as they seem to do good and necessary work for good priests who are falsely accused, and even the necessary and ugly work of helping those who are struggling with perverse thoughts to find help and consolation within the Church (though obviously without public ministry for those who are truly sick in these ways) and I think it would be nice to have a mass intention through them to help their work. But I do question the status of stipends paid to priests who are suspended or whose faculties have been removed... I always thought the removal of faculties forbade them from saying mass at all, but are they allowed to say mass in private?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A faculty is a legal instrument or warrant in canon law.

In the Catholic Church, it is "the authority, privilege, or permission, to perform an act or function. In a broad sense, a faculty is a certain power, whether based on one's own right, or received as a favour from another, of validly or lawfully doing some action."[1] The most common use of the term is in the context of 'priestly faculties', which is the permission given to a priest by his diocesan bishop or religious superior, legally permitting him to perform the Sacraments. Normally, a priest's faculties only permit him to celebrate within his own diocese or religious order.

1.Meehan, Andrew B. (1909), "Canonical Faculties", The Catholic Encyclopedia, V, New York: Robert Appleton Company, http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05748a.htm,

[url="http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05748a.htm"]http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/05748a.htm[/url]

The relevant codes state firstly:

Can. 1336 §1 Expiatory penalties can affect the offender either forever or for a determinate or an indeterminate period. Apart from others which the law may perhaps establish, these penalties are as follows:

1° a prohibition against residence, or an order to reside, in a certain place or territory;

2° deprivation of power, office, function, right, privilege, faculty, favour, title or insignia, even of a merely honorary nature;

3° [b]a prohibition on the exercise of those things enumerated in n. 2, or a prohibition on their exercise inside or outside a certain place;[/b] such a prohibition is never under pain of nullity;

4° a penal transfer to another office;

5° dismissal from the clerical state.

Importantly canon Can. 1338 states in §2 [b]There can be no deprivation of the power of order, but only a prohibition against the exercise of it or of some of its acts;[/b] neither can there be a deprivation of academic degrees.

Therefore priests who are under suspension may say "private" masses whilst prevented by canonical censure to act publicly

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...