Page:Disciplinary Decrees of the General Councils.djvu/205

Rh Clermont (1130) and Reims (1131). These thirty canons are all that we have of the acts of this council.

'Text.'' We decree that if anyone has been ordained simoniacally, he shall lose the office thus illicitly obtained. '''

'Text.'' If anyone, impelled by the execrable vice of avarice, has by means of money obtained a prebend, priory, deanery, or any ecclesiastical honor or promotion, or any ecclesiastical sacrament, as chrism, holy oil, or the consecration of altars and churches, he shall be deprived of the honor thus illicitly acquired, and buyer and seller and intermediary agent shall be stigmatized with the mark of infamy. Neither for provisions nor under pretense of some custom shall something be demanded from anyone either before or after, nor shall anyone presume to give, because it is simoniacal; but freely and without any price shall he enjoy the dignity or benefice conferred on him. '''

''Comment. ''This canon is directed against simony in the acquisition of benefices and ecclesiastical promotions and in the matter of certain sacramentals. Those guilty are to lose what they illicitly obtained; buyer, seller, and intermediary, that is, the one who conducts the transaction between the contracting parties, are to be branded as infamous. Nothing shall be demanded for chrism, holy oil, or the consecration of altars and churches. This is an old prohibition. In 813 a synod held at Châlons-sur-Saône in canon 16 ruled: Omnes uno consensu statutmus, ne sicut pro dedicandis basilicis et dandis ordinibus nihil accipiendum est, ita etiam pro balsamo sive luminaribus emendis, nihil presbyteri chrisma accepturi dent. And then added: Episcopi itaque de facultatibus ecclesiae balsamum emant et luminaria singuli in suis ecclesiis concinnanda provideant. Neither before nor after the bestowal of a benefice or the consecration of an altar or a church is anything to be demanded. Some there were who maintained that ___