Questions in the Wake of Cdl. Coccopalmerio’s Comments on Anglican Orders [Catholic/Anglican Caucus]

Was Leo’s "Apostolicae curae" an exercise of the extraordinary papal magisterium, itself making infallibly certain the invalidity of Anglican orders and thus requiring Catholics to hold them “absolutely null and utterly void”?

A rock dropped into quiet waters produces a visible splash and observable ripples. The same rock thrown into a storm-tossed sea, however, passes unnoticed, for its effects are overwhelmed by larger and wider waves.

Before the splash of Cdl. Coccopalmerio’s startling comments toward recognizing Anglican orders disappears in the theological chop that is the new normal for Catholics, let’s record some questions deserving of consideration.

Note, the only source I have for Coccopalmerio’s comments is The Tablet and, as that site sets the stage for its report by recalling “Leo XIII’s remarks [on] Anglican orders”—as if Leo’s letter Apostolicae curae (1896), which declared Anglican orders “absolutely null and utterly void”, simply conveyed, you know, some “remarks”—one is not reassured that The Tablet fully grasps what is at issue here. In any case, no Tablet quotes attributed to Coccopalmerio directly attack Leo’s ruling (we are not even told what language the cardinal was speaking or writing in, and I think that is an important point) so there is some room for clarification.

But, if Coccopalmerio said what The Tablet reports him as saying, the following questions would warrant airing.

1. Was Leo’s Apostolicae curae an exercise of the extraordinary papal magisterium, itself making infallibly certain the invalidity of Anglican orders and thus requiring Catholics to hold them “absolutely null and utterly void”? I think it was, and I think we must, but I am open to counter arguments.

2. Or, was Apostolicae curae a prominent exercise of the ordinarypapal magisterium which coalesced with several centuries of other ordinary exercises of papal-episcopal magisterium in rejecting the validity of Anglican orders to the point that Catholics must hold them invalid? I think they surely came together thus and so hold that Catholics must regard Anglican orders as null. I can scarcely see any counter argument, let alone a plausible one, here, but if someone wants to offer it, I would listen.

3. Or, finally, does Apostolicae curae, and the effectively unanimous rejection of Anglican orders by Catholic authorities over the centuries, and the express inclusion of the invalidity of Anglican orders by then-Cdl. Ratzinger in his doctrinal commentary on Ad Tuendam Fidem(1998) as something known with infallible certainty, and therefore as something to be held definitively by Catholics, leave any room whatsoever for speculating on, let alone defending, the possible validity of Anglican orders? Surely the question is rhetorical.

Next, if the answer to any of the above scenarios is Yes, do we not then face the situation anticipated by Canon 750 § 2 whereby one who rejects an assertion “proposed definitively by the magisterium of the Church” is in that regard “opposed to the doctrine of the Catholic Church”? And, if the answer to that question is Yes, would not ‘obstinacy’ (which, I hasten to add, can scarcely be proven by a few comments) in rejecting a “doctrine mentioned in can. 750 § 2” leave one, following fruitless admonition by the competent ecclesiastical authority, liable to a “just penalty” under Canon 1371, 1º?

Now, besides the possibility that Coccopalmerio did not say what The Tablet thinks he said, or that he said it but, on further consideration, he wishes to revise his remarks, the only other accounting I can come up with for his remarks is that, while Anglican orders are themselves invalid, some Anglicans are nevertheless validly ordained—not in virtue of their Anglican orders, to be sure, but in virtue of a post-Edwardian reintroduction of valid orders (conferred by break-away Catholic bishops or Orthodox prelates), such that a given Anglican minister might, by doing an ‘ordination pedigree’ search, be able to trace his orders back to a prelate possessed of valid orders. Such a query can be tedious, of course, and it might impact only a small number of Anglican ministers, but I think it only fair to acknowledge the possibility. (For what it’s worth, I think the Roman decision to ordain “absolutely” all Anglican ministers coming into full communion who wish to serve as priests—if applied without regard for the possibility that some could trace their orders to a bishop with valid orders—is problematic). Maybe this unusual source of sacramental validity is what the prelate had in mind.

If, by the way, our speaker above were not a credentialed canonist, I would pause to make it clear that the canonical-doctrinal conclusion of the invalidity in Anglican orders does not, repeat not, mean that “nothing happened” at, or as the result of, the rites undergone by Anglican ministers. Such rites can of course be occasions of great grace for their recipients and ministry conducted in their wake can, and doubtless has, helped many to grow closer to Christ. But canonists need no reminding that the power of a devotional rite to dispose one toward a closer cooperation with grace is not to be confused with whether a specific sacrament was (i.e., validly), conferred thereby, and so I mention this point only for the sake of others following this discussion.

In the end, though, perhaps the prelate said exactly what The Tablet claims he said, and perhaps he meant it just the way it sounds. If so, I grant, he would not be alone, at least not in, how to put this?,ruminating around the possible validity of Anglican orders.

That said, and as important as the above questions might be, the cardinal’s further statement, one directly attributed to him, also deserves a closer look: namely, that the Church has “a very rigid understanding of validity and invalidity: this is valid, and that is not valid. One should be able to say: ‘this is valid in a certain context, and that is valid another context.'”

I usually agree with and appreciate Peters opinions. Here, I don’t.

Any layperson, like myself, can read Apostolicae Curae, and see that proper form and intent are required for valid consecrations.

I encourage all Catholics and Anglicans to read Apostoicae Curae in full. There is no wiggle room as Peters implies.

>>30. For the full and accurate understanding of the Anglican Ordinal, besides what we have noted as to some of its parts, there is nothing more pertinent than to consider carefully the circumstances under which it was composed and publicly authorized. It would be tedious to enter into details, nor is it necessary to do so, as the history of that time is sufficiently eloquent as to the animus of the authors of the Ordinal against the Catholic Church; as to the abettors whom they associated with themselves from the heterodox sects; and as to the end they had in view. Being fully cognizant of the necessary connection between faith and worship, between “the law of believing and the law of praying”, under a pretext of returning to the primitive form, they corrupted the Liturgical Order in many ways to suit the errors of the reformers. For this reason, in the whole Ordinal not only is there no clear mention of the sacrifice, of consecration, of the priesthood (sacerdotium), and of the power of consecrating and offering sacrifice but, as we have just stated, every trace of these things which had been in such prayers of the Catholic rite as they had not entirely rejected, was deliberately removed and struck out.<<

What were these Catholic-turned-Anglican bishops actually doing, when they stood inside the former Catholic (newly declared to be Anglican) cathedrals of England, and ordained new clergy for the Anglican communion? This is the crux of the matter. For if they genuinely intended to do what they had always been doing during Catholic ordination ceremonies, and used the same ritual, we can only conclude that they ordained “Anglican” clergy who were in fact Catholic priests. If, on the other hand, they truly intended a full break with Rome in the sacramental sense—denying the institution of the clergy as the Catholic Church understands it, and desiring instead to create something new and different—then they did not effect valid ordinations. If the clergy—priests and bishops—that they purportedly ordained were not really ordained at all, this means that once the original ex-Catholic bishops died out, the new Anglican clergy were not valid clerics and Apostolic succession was broken.

Such was the official position of the Catholic Church, which soon asserted that the ordinations of Anglican clergy were ipso facto invalid. In the late 1800’s, however, Pope Leo XIII established a commission to investigate the matter further. Members were charged with examining the historical documents pertaining in any way to the ordinations performed during Henry’s era by those former Catholic bishops, looking particularly at the form and also at their intention. Did they really mean to ordain Catholic priests under another name, or what?

The results of the commission formed the basis for Pope Leo’s bull called Apostolicae Curae. Issued in 1896, it declared publicly that in the eyes of the Catholic Church, ordinations performed using the Anglican rite were, and always had been, absolutely null and void (36). In other words, Anglican clergy are not ordained priests like one finds in the Catholic Church. Interestingly, the break in succession was not traced back to the time of Henry VIII himself, but rather to changes made during the brief reign of his son, King Edward VI (1547-1553), who succeeded him. The commission found that the ordination ritual contained in the new Edwardine Ordinal, the Anglican liturgical book at the time, was substantially different enough that its administration did not confer the true sacrament of holy orders (3).

In the 20th century, scholars began to revisit this issue, noting that the members of Pope Leo’s commission were not unanimous in their findings, and raising the theoretical possibility that the papal bull might have been wrong. But in 1998 the Church officially laid this matter to rest. Pope John Paul II issued his motu proprio document, Ad Tuendam Fidem, primarily to assert that there are some doctrinal issues which the Church holds are not open to debate. (Other aspects of this document were discussed in “Have Pro-Abortion Politicians Excommunicated Themselves?”) Within a few weeks, a companion document was issued by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith—with the Pope’s advance knowledge and consent, of course—then headed by Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI. This second document provided a list of many theological issues which the Catholic Church holds to have already been settled once and for all. One of the examples of matters listed as “connected to revelation by historical necessity” and “to be held definitively,” is the invalidity of Anglican orders (11). This means that Catholic theologians, even in good faith, may not entertain discussions about the possibility that Leo XIII’s commission erred on this issue. The matter is closed.

http://canonlawmadeeasy.com/2011/01/20/the-validity-of-anglican-holy-orders/

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