Conferences on the Virtues
By Fr. Bruno Cocuzzi, ocd
Number 81
Sins against the Virtue of Religion:
Perjury, Sacrilege and Simony
We go on now to
consider, in this section on the Sins against the virtue of Religion, the next
after Tempting God, that is:
Question
2 – Perjury
We all know
from what we said about Oaths in a previous conference, that perjury is the
very serious sin of calling upon God to be a witness and accomplice in the
bearing of false witness. That is, it
is deliberately telling a lie under oath.
Another reason for its horrendous malice, in addition to its asking God
to cooperate in falsehood, lies in the fact that it utterly perverts the
purpose for which oaths are taken, namely to discover the truth about a
given situation.
It turns out
though; that there is a kind of perjury that one may fall into as a
result of swearing an oath when circumstances do not require it, or because
charity or justice would forbid it.
This kind of perjury is really an illicit (not justified) oath.
Perjury in the
strict sense is gravely sinful because it is a grievous offense against one of
God’s Chief attributes, namely, that He is uncreated Truth. As such, He can neither deceive nor be
deceived. To ask God to be a partner in
telling a lie is the equivalent of asking Him to stop being God, to deny and
destroy His Very Nature.
The first of
the other kinds of perjury, that is, the indiscreet or uncalled-for taking
of an oath is ordinarily a slight sin of irreverence toward God. It amounts to asking God, the Supreme Truth,
to be a co-witness to something that is far beneath His Infinite Dignity and
Majesty. This could become grave,
though, were it to cause others to be gravely scandalized or cause them to hold
God in contempt.
The second of
the other kinds of perjury (an illicit oath) involves asking God to be a
co-witness when what is stated is really true, but the truth is made known only
as a means of causing harm to another.
The harm could be to one’s reputation, or to injure that person in his
goods or social relationships. Here,
God is asked to be an accomplice in an unjust or uncharitable deed. This too, is contrary to His Nature as
Justice and Charity.
Though
objectively very serious, the gravity of this sin is usually diminished by ignorance
or lack of full deliberation of the guilty party. But even here, it can be very serious when the harm done to the
injured party is very grave.
Closely related
to the above is the sin of taking a promissory oath to do something
wicked at a future date. As you recall,
in such oaths God is called upon by the promisor as a means to firm up his
resolution to carry out the promised future deed. God becomes a kind of Patron of the conduct.
This is also a
grave sin because it grievously offends God’s Infinite Goodness and Holiness to
ask Him to be a partner in even very slight sins, unless, of course, it is done
out of inculpable ignorance or lack of full knowledge and consent.
If what is
promised at a future date is not sinful, but merely vain, inept, silly, or
otherwise not really harmful to anyone, to call upon God to be its patron
would be a venial sin of irreverence.
Failure to
carry out a promissory oath to perform a good and laudable action at the
specified future date is not a sin against the virtue of Religion under this
heading, but is rather a sin of omission.
Question
3 – Sacrilege
According to my
author, the word sacrilege comes from the Latin sacrum legere,
which means to gather in something sacred in the sense of stealing
it.
By extension,
it came to have its current meaning, namely, to do violence to something
sacred. Violence here is not restricted to physical violence. It includes any indecent or irreverent
treatment of something that is holy (sacred).
Treatment here
includes in turn not only what is done to what is holy, but also the use
of something holy in a manner repugnant to its holiness.
Sacrilege is
included among the sins of Irreligion (contrary to the virtue of
Religion) because only those things are considered Sacred and Holy, which are
in some way identified with or related to God Himself.
Among the
things identified with or related to God are objects (or persons) that
symbolize, represent or otherwise cause others to be mindful of God and divine
realities.
Still others are
those things that pertain to Divine Worship.
As we have
seen, Religion is the virtue inclining us to give due honor and reverence to
God. Irreligious deeds are those, which
fail to render Him the honor that He rightfully deserves from us. That is why sacrilege is one of the sins of
Irreligion.
Traditionally,
the types of sacrilege are distinguished into personal, local, and real. That is, violence can be done to holy
persons, holy places and holy things (objects).
Personal
sacrilege consists in doing violence to a juridically
sacred person. To be juridically
sacred means to be deemed sacred by operation of law.
Ordinarily, we
equate Sacredness with Holiness. But as
you are aware, a person is objectively and authentically holy only when that
person’s will is completely and totally conformed to God’s Will in love, or to
say it another way, when that person is free of sin in virtue of having
attained the fullness of charity.
Juridically
sacred persons are those who pertain to the clerical state in virtue of having
received Holy Orders, or persons of either sex who have pronounced vows of
Poverty, Chastity and Obedience in approved Religious Orders and
Congregations.
To do violence
to a person who is actually holy is also a sacrilege, obviously, but so very
few human beings are free of at least some degree of sinfulness while living on
earth, that we would have to believe that whatever violence we do suffer in
this life is in some way merited.
Personal
Sacrilege is committed in various ways.
1. Inflicting
serious injury on a juridically sacred person, whether it is physical or
corporal injury, or whether it does grave harm to his/her dignity or liberty.
2. Violation
of a sacred person’s rights and immunities.
At
one time, in Catholic countries, clerics and religious were declared by Canon
Law (which the civil state respected) to be immune to civil suit in secular
courts, and exempt from certain civil obligations and responsibilities, such as
serving on juries.
In
our country Canon Law is not given that kind of respect, so that this second
type of Sacrilege would be committed by, say, physically preventing a priest
from offering Mass, from hearing a confession, or from administering any of the
other sacraments when any of the faithful so requests.
3. By
unchaste conduct with regard to a sacred person, whether by thought, word or
deed. When the sacred person is a free
and deliberate party to any of the above, that person is equally guilty of
sacrilege, whether acting alone or with others.
Local
Sacrilege is committed by doing violence to a Sacred Place, as we have
said. Only those places are Sacred,
which have been publicly consecrated or solemnly blessed by Religious authority
and set aside for the carrying out of sacred ritual. Thus, Churches, Public Oratories and Consecrated Cemeteries are
Holy Places.
Certain
heinous deeds committed in holy places contract the malice of sacrilege in
addition to being serious sins in themselves.
Such
acts include: murder, attempted murder,
carrying on sinful practices such as prostitution, or immoral dancing.
Other
practices which are not in themselves sinful become so because gravely
offensive to the dignity and holiness of these places, as for example, to use a
church as a barn or garage, to bury a public [and unrepentant] sinner in sacred
ground, and the like.
Another
type of sacrilege would be to steal the sacred vessels, or other sacred images
located in sacred places.
Still
another (formerly in officially Catholic countries) would be to violate the
privilege of sanctuary, which protects criminals from physical harm or arrest.
Acts
of vandalism perpetrated upon holy places is another form of sacrilege, both by
inflicting physical damage to the structure or [non-sacred] furnishings, or by
means of graffiti.
Actually,
any sin committed in a holy place or on sacred ground would also contract the
malice of sacrilege, because repugnant to the character of the place.
Indeed,
anything that is profane, such as conducting a business or carrying on worldly
amusements and activities would also be a sacrilege if conducted in a holy
place.
A Real
Sacrilege is the violation of sacred objects, that is, objects set aside
for use in divine worship or for holy purposes.
First among
these are the unworthy reception or administration of the
sacraments.
Also
sacrilegious would be to pretend to administer a sacrament, and to make profane
use of sacramentals (holy water, holy pictures and statues of saints, rosaries,
etc.)
Particularly
sacrilegious would be the profanation of relics of Saints, which are especially
holy, obviously, because still personally identified with
(hypostatically united to) the Saints whose souls are enjoying the Beatific
Vision in heaven.
According to my
author, the element of time is not ordinarily considered sacred, because,
ordinarily, it is not formally consecrated to God. Thus even though one were to commit a very serious sin on a
Sunday or Holy Day of obligation, he would not thereby also commit a sin of sacrilege.
Nevertheless,
if Catholics were to participate knowingly and willingly in worldly amusements
and profane activities (sporting events) on Holy Thursday or Good Friday, which
are held sacred by Christians, that would indeed be sacrilegious
conduct.
Question
3 – Simony…
This sin against
the virtue of Religion takes its name from Simon the Magician, who
wanted to buy from Saint Peter the power to confer the Holy Spirit. (Acts 8:18).
It is defined
as: The deliberate intention of buying
or selling something divinely spiritual or connected with what is divinely
spiritual.
Buying
or selling in this definition does not require the mutual
consent to a contract of sale, as is the case in ordinary buying and
selling (as we saw in a previous conference).
It suffices that either of the parties has the interior intention of
binding the other to enter into the transaction.
The essence of
the sin of Simony consists in the intention of exchanging something that has
only temporary value for something that has inestimable spiritual
value. This sin is committed even
though the guilty party may not be successful in realizing his intention.
The spiritual
entity involved in this sin has to be divine and supernatural in nature, or
somehow associated with the divine. To
give money or something that has temporal [not eternal] value for
something that is spiritual but not supernatural, such as natural
knowledge or skills, is not the sin of Simony.
Simony embraces
those supernatural, spiritual entities that are ordained by God toward the
eternal salvation of souls.
Examples of
entities that are supernatural and divine are:
Sanctifying Grace, Actual Grace and the Gifts of the Holy Spirit. These are said to be formally
supernatural and divine.
Some entities
things are said to be only causally divine and supernatural: They are, for example, the Sacraments,
Sacramentals, Prayer, and the powers flowing from Orders or Ecclesial
Jurisdiction.
Among the
latter are the powers to consecrate, to absolve, to bless, and to grant
dispensations and indulgences.
Things that are
somehow associated with the divine include items such as consecrated chalices,
or any other physical object that has been set apart for God and divine worship
in virtue of the exercise of the powers of Ecclesial Jurisdiction. To ask or want to give money for the
consecrated aspect of a consecrated chalice would be the sin or Simony.
The reason why
Simony is a sin of Irreligion lies in the want of due reverence for God and
divine realities. The irreverence is
three-fold.
1. Because
Divine things infinitely surpass in value any temporal good.
2. Because
the one guilty of Simony arrogates to himself authority and dominion over
divinely supernatural realities.
3. Because
God Himself has given divine realities to us gratuitously, that is, freely and
without cost to us out of the Goodness of His Mercy. As Jesus has instructed: What
you have received as a gift, give as a gift. (Matt. 10:8).
From what has
been said, it is clear that Simony is objectively a serious sin. But like other sins whose matter is grave by
nature, the seriousness can be diminished by whatever diminishes full
deliberation and free consent.
A couple of
questions are raised as a result of the above.
E.g.,
1. Why
do priests ask for Mass Stipends and otherwise require a stated amount as an
offering for the presiding at Baptisms, Weddings and Funerals?
The
answer to that is found in the words of Our Lord who told the Disciples that He
had sent out on Mission: Take
nothing with you… Eat what they set
before you… The workman is worthy of
his hire. The Mass stipends and the
Stole fees are intended to provide the sacred minister with a decent
living. Thus they are only suggested
offerings (which ordinarily lie within the financial means of most
Catholics). Should circumstances
require it, they are obliged in conscience to offer Mass and confer those
sacraments gratis.
2. Is
it all right to sell a blessed or consecrated object for no more than the
temporal value of the materials and workmanship?
The
answer is yes, because there is no attempt to sell the consecrated aspect of
the blessed or consecrated object.
However, if rightful use of the object had acquired indulgences
along with the blessing or consecration, these would be lost as a result of the
sale, according to my textbook.