ENCYCLICAL OF POPE PIUS X
ON THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION
TO THE PATRIARCHS, PRIMATES, ARCHBISHOPS,
BISHOPS, AND OTHER ORDINARIES
IN PEACE AND COMMUNION WITH THE APOSTOLIC SEE.
ON THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION
TO THE PATRIARCHS, PRIMATES, ARCHBISHOPS,
BISHOPS, AND OTHER ORDINARIES
IN PEACE AND COMMUNION WITH THE APOSTOLIC SEE.
Venerable Brethren,
Health and the Apostolic Blessing.
Health and the Apostolic Blessing.
An interval of a few months will again bring round that most happy day
on which, fifty years ago, Our Predecessor Pius IX., Pontiff of holy
memory, surrounded by a noble crown of Cardinals and Bishops, pronounced
and promulgated with the authority of the infallible magisterium as a
truth revealed by God that the Most Blessed Virgin Mary in the first
instant of her conception was free from all stain of original sin. All
the world knows the feelings with which the faithful of all the nations
of the earth received this proclamation and the manifestations of public
satisfaction and joy which greeted it, for truly there has not been in
the memory of man any more universal or more harmonious expression of
sentiment shown towards the august Mother of God or the Vicar of Jesus
Christ.
2. And, Venerable Brethren, why should we not hope to-day after the
lapse of half a century, when we renew the memory of the Immaculate
Virgin, that an echo of that holy joy will be awakened in our minds, and
that those magnificent scenes of a distant day, of faith and of love
towards the august Mother of God, will be repeated? Of all this We are,
indeed, rendered ardently desirous by the devotion, united with supreme
gratitude for benefits received, which We have always cherished towards
the Blessed Virgin; and We have a sure pledge of the fulfillment of Our
desires in the fervor of all Catholics, ready and willing as they are to
multiply their testimonies of love and reverence for the great Mother
of God. But We must not omit to say that this desire of Ours is
especially stimulated by a sort of secret instinct which leads Us to
regard as not far distant the fulfillment of those great hopes to which,
certainly not rashly, the solemn promulgation of the dogma of the
Immaculate Conception opened the minds of Pius, Our predecessor, and of
all the Bishops of the universe.
3. Many, it is true, lament the fact that until now these hopes have
been unfulfilled, and are prone to repeat the words of Jeremias: "We
looked for peace and no good came; for a time of healing, and beheld
fear" (Jer. viii., 15). But all such will be certainly rebuked
as "men of little faith," who make no effort to penetrate the works of
God or to estimate them in the light of truth. For who can number the
secret gifts of grace which God has bestowed upon His Church through the
intercession of the Blessed Virgin throughout this period? And even
overlooking these gifts, what is to be said of the Vatican Council so
opportunely convoked; or of the dogma of Papal Infallibility so suitably
proclaimed to meet the errors that were about to arise; or, finally, of
that new and unprecedented fervor with which the faithful of all
classes and of every nation have long been flocking to venerate in
person the Vicar of Christ? Surely the Providence of God has shown
itself admirable in Our two predecessors, Pius and Leo, who ruled the
Church in most turbulent times with such great holiness through a length
of Pontificate conceded to no other before them. Then, again, no sooner
had Pius IX, proclaimed as a dogma of Catholic faith the exemption of
Mary from the original stain, than the Virgin herself began in Lourdes
those wonderful manifestations, followed by the vast and magnificent
movements which have produced those two temples dedicated to the
Immaculate Mother, where the prodigies which still continue to take
place through her intercession furnish splendid arguments against the
incredulity of our days.
4. Witnesses, then, as we are of all these great benefits which God has
granted through the benign influence of the Virgin in those fifty years
now about to be completed, why should we not believe that our salvation
is nearer than we thought; all the more since we know from experience
that, in the dispensation of Divine Providence, when evils reach their
limit, deliverance is not far distant. "Her time is near at hand, and
her days shall not be prolonged. For the Lord will have mercy on Jacob
and will choose one out of Israel" (Isaias xiv., 1). Wherefore
the hope we cherish is not a vain one, that we, too, may before long
repeat: "The Lord hath broken the staff of the wicked, the rod of the
rulers. The whole earth is quiet and still, it is glad and hath
rejoiced" (Ibid. 5, 7).
5. But the first and chief reason, Venerable Brethren, why the fiftieth
anniversary of the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate
Conception should excite a singular fervour in the souls of Christians
lies for us in that restoration of all things in Christ which we have
already set forth in Our first Encyclical letter. For can anyone fail to
see that there is no surer or more direct road than by Mary for uniting
all mankind in Christ and obtaining through Him the perfect adoption of
sons, that we may be holy and immaculate in the sight of God? For if to
Mary it was truly said: "Blessed art thou who hast believed because in
thee shall be fulfilled the things that have been told thee by the Lord"
(Luke i., 45); or in other words, that she would conceive and
bring forth the Son of God and if she did receive in her breast Him who
is by nature Truth itself in order that "He, generated in a new order
and with a new nativity, though invisible in Himself, might become
visible in our flesh" (St. Leo the Great, Ser. 2, De Nativ. Dom.):
the Son of God made man, being the "author and consummator of our
faith"; it surely follows that His Mother most holy should be recognized
as participating in the divine mysteries and as being in a manner the
guardian of them, and that upon her as upon a foundation, the noblest
after Christ, rises the edifice of the faith of all centuries.
6.
How think otherwise? Could not God have given us, in another way than
through the Virgin the Redeemer of the human race and the Founder of the
Faith? But, since Divine Providence has been pleased that we should
have the Man-God through Mary, who conceived Him by the Holy Ghost and
bore Him in her breast, it only remains for us to receive Christ from
the hands of Mary. Hence whenever the Scriptures speak prophetically of
the grace which was to appear among us, the Redeemer of mankind is
almost invariably presented to us as united with His mother. The Lamb
that is to rule the world will be sent - but He will be sent from the
rock of the desert; the flower will blossom, but it will blossom from
the root of Jesse. Adam, the father of mankind, looked to Mary crushing
the serpent's head, and he dried the tears that the malediction had
brought into his eyes. Noë thought of her when shut up in the ark of
safety, and Abraham when prevented from the slaying of his son; Jacob at
the sight of the ladder on which angels ascended and descended; Moses
amazed at the sight of the bush which burned but was not consumed; David
escorting the arc of God with dancing and psalmody; Elias as he looked
at the little cloud that rose out of the sea. In fine, after Christ, we
find in Mary the end of the law and the fulfillment of the figures and
oracles.
7.
And that through the Virgin, and through her more than through any
other means, we have offered us a way of reaching the knowledge of Jesus
Christ, cannot be doubted when it is remembered that with her alone of
all others Jesus was for thirty years united, as a son is usually united
with a mother, in the closest ties of intimacy and domestic life. Who
could better than His Mother have an open knowledge of the admirable
mysteries of the birth and childhood of Christ, and above all of the
mystery of the Incarnation, which is the beginning and the foundation of
faith? Mary not only preserved and meditated on the events of Bethlehem
and the facts which took place in Jerusalem in the Temple of the Lord,
but sharing as she did the thoughts and the secret wishes of Christ she
may be said to have lived the very life of her Son. Hence nobody ever
knew Christ so profoundly as she did, and nobody can ever be more
competent as a guide and teacher of the knowledge of Christ.
8.
Hence it follows, as We have already pointed out, that the Virgin is
more powerful than all others as a means for uniting mankind with
Christ. Hence too since, according to Christ Himself, "Now this is
eternal life: That they may know thee the only truly God, and Jesus
Christ whom thou hast sent" (John xvii., 3), and since it is
through Mary that we attain to the knowledge of Christ, through Mary
also we most easily obtain that life of which Christ is the source and
origin.
9.
And if we set ourselves to consider how many and powerful are the
causes by which this most holy Mother is filled with zeal to bestow on
us these precious gifts, oh, how our hopes will be expanded!
10.
For is not Mary the Mother of Christ? Then she is our Mother also. And
we must in truth hold that Christ, the Word made Flesh, is also the
Savior of mankind. He had a physical body like that of any other man:
and again as Savior of the human family, he had a spiritual and mystical
body, the society, namely, of those who believe in Christ. "We are
many, but one sole body in Christ" (Rom. xii., 5). Now the
Blessed Virgin did not conceive the Eternal Son of God merely in order
that He might be made man taking His human nature from her, but also in
order that by means of the nature assumed from her He might be the
Redeemer of men. For which reason the Angel said to the Shepherds:
"To-day there is born to you a Savior who is Christ the Lord" (Luke
ii., 11). Wherefore in the same holy bosom of his most chaste Mother
Christ took to Himself flesh, and united to Himself the spiritual body
formed by those who were to believe in Him. Hence Mary, carrying the
Savior within her, may be said to have also carried all those whose life
was contained in the life of the Savior. Therefore all we who are
united to Christ, and as the Apostle says are members of His body, of
His flesh, and of His bones (Ephes. v., 30), have issued from
the womb of Mary like a body united to its head. Hence, though in a
spiritual and mystical fashion, we are all children of Mary, and she is
Mother of us all. Mother, spiritually indeed, but truly Mother of the
members of Christ, who are we (S. Aug. L. de S. Virginitate, c. 6).
11.
If then the most Blessed Virgin is the Mother at once of God and men,
who can doubt that she will work with all diligence to procure that
Christ, Head of the Body of the Church (Coloss. i., 18), may transfuse His gifts into us, His members, and above all that of knowing Him and living through Him (I John iv., 9)?
12.
Moreover it was not only the prerogative of the Most Holy Mother to
have furnished the material of His flesh to the Only Son of God, Who was
to be born with human members (S. Bede Ven. L. Iv. in Luc.
xl.), of which material should be prepared the Victim for the salvation
of men; but hers was also the office of tending and nourishing that
Victim, and at the appointed time presenting Him for the sacrifice.
Hence that uninterrupted community of life and labors of the Son and the
Mother, so that of both might have been uttered the words of the
Psalmist"My life is consumed in sorrow and my years in groans" (Ps
xxx., 11). When the supreme hour of the Son came, beside the Cross of
Jesus there stood Mary His Mother, not merely occupied in contemplating
the cruel spectacle, but rejoicing that her Only Son was offered for the
salvation of mankind, and so entirely participating in His Passion,
that if it had been possible she would have gladly borne all the
torments that her Son bore (S. Bonav. 1. Sent d. 48, ad Litt. dub.
4). And from this community of will and suffering between Christ and
Mary she merited to become most worthily the Reparatrix of the lost
world (Eadmeri Mon. De Excellentia Virg. Mariae, c. 9) and Dispensatrix of all the gifts that Our Savior purchased for us by His Death and by His Blood.
13.
It cannot, of course, be denied that the dispensation of these
treasures is the particular and peculiar right of Jesus Christ, for they
are the exclusive fruit of His Death, who by His nature is the mediator
between God and man. Nevertheless, by this companionship in sorrow and
suffering already mentioned between the Mother and the Son, it has been
allowed to the august Virgin to be the most powerful mediatrix and
advocate of the whole world with her Divine Son (Pius IX. Ineffabilis). The source, then, is Jesus Christ "of whose fullness we have all received" (John
i., 16), "from whom the whole body, being compacted and fitly joined
together by what every joint supplieth, according to the operation in
the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying
of itself in charity" (Ephesians iv., 16). But Mary, as St. Bernard justly remarks, is the channel (Serm. de temp on the Nativ. B. V. De Aquaeductu
n. 4); or, if you will, the connecting portion the function of which is
to join the body to the head and to transmit to the body the influences
and volitions of the head - We mean the neck. Yes, says St. Bernardine
of Sienna, "she is the neck of Our Head, by which He communicates to His
mystical body all spiritual gifts" (Quadrag. de Evangel. aetern. Serm. x., a. 3, c. iii.).
14.
We are then, it will be seen, very far from attributing to the Mother
of God a productive power of grace - a power which belongs to God alone.
Yet, since Mary carries it over all in holiness and union with Jesus
Christ, and has been associated by Jesus Christ in the work of
redemption, she merits for us de congruo, in the language of theologians, what Jesus Christ merits for us de condigno, and she is the supreme Minister of the distribution of graces. Jesus "sitteth on the right hand of the majesty on high" (Hebrews
i. b.). Mary sitteth at the right hand of her Son - a refuge so secure
and a help so trusty against all dangers that we have nothing to fear or
to despair of under her guidance, her patronage, her protection. (Pius
IX. in Bull Ineffabilis).
15.
These principles laid down, and to return to our design, who will not
see that we have with good reason claimed for Mary that - as the
constant companion of Jesus from the house at Nazareth to the height of
Calvary, as beyond all others initiated to the secrets of his Heart, and
as the distributor, by right of her Motherhood, of the treasures of His
merits, - she is, for all these reasons, a most sure and efficacious
assistance to us for arriving at the knowledge and love of Jesus Christ.
Those, alas! furnish us by their conduct with a peremptory proof of it,
who seduced by the wiles of the demon or deceived by false doctrines
think they can do without the help of the Virgin. Hapless are they who
neglect Mary under pretext of the honor to be paid to Jesus Christ! As
if the Child could be found elsewhere than with the Mother!
16.
Under these circumstances, Venerable Brethren, it is this end which all
the solemnities that are everywhere being prepared in honor of the holy
and Immaculate Conception of Mary should have in view. No homage is
more agreeable to her, none is sweeter to her than that we should know
and really love Jesus Christ. Let then crowds fill the churches - let
solemn feasts be celebrated and public rejoicings be made: these are
things eminently suited for enlivening our faith. But unless heart and
will be added, they will all be empty forms, mere appearances of piety.
At such a spectacle, the Virgin, borrowing the words of Jesus Christ,
would address us with the just reproach: "This people honoureth me with
their lips, but their heart is far from me" (Matth. xv., 8).
17.
For to be right and good, worship of the Mother of God ought to spring
from the heart; acts of the body have here neither utility nor value if
the acts of the soul have no part in them. Now these latter can only
have one object, which is that we should fully carry out what the divine
Son of Mary commands. For if true love alone has the power to unite the
wills of men, it is of the first necessity that we should have one will
with Mary to serve Jesus our Lord. What this most prudent Virgin said
to the servants at the marriage feast of Cana she addresses also to us:
"Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye" (John ii., 5). Now here is the word of Jesus Christ: "If you would enter into life, keep the commandments" (Matt.
xix., 17). Let them each one fully convince himself of this, that if
his piety towards the Blessed Virgin does not hinder him from sinning,
or does not move his will to amend an evil life, it is a piety deceptive
and Iying, wanting as it is in proper effect and its natural fruit.
18.
If anyone desires a confirmation of this it may easily be found in the
dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary. For leaving aside tradition
which, as well as Scripture, is a source of truth, how has this
persuasion of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin appeared so
conformed to the Catholic mind and feeling that it has been held as
being one, and as it were inborn in the soul of the faithful? "We shrink
from saying," is the answer of Dionysius of Chartreux, "of this woman
who was to crush the head of the serpent that had been crushed by him
and that Mother of God that she had ever been a daughter of the Evil
One" (Sent. d. 3, q. 1). No, to the Christian intelligence the
idea is unthinkable that the flesh of Christ, holy, stainless, innocent,
was formed in the womb of Mary of a flesh which had ever, if only for
the briefest moment, contracted any stain. And why so, but because an
infinite opposition separates God from sin? There certainly we have the
origin of the conviction common to all Christians that Jesus Christ
before, clothed in human nature, He cleansed us from our sins in His
blood, accorded Mary the grace and special privilege of being preserved
and exempted, from the first moment of her conception, from all stain of
original sin.
19.
If then God has such a horror of sin as to have willed to keep free the
future Mother of His Son not only from stains which are voluntarily
contracted but, by a special favor and in prevision of the merits of
Jesus Christ, from that other stain of which the sad sign is transmitted
to all us sons of Adam by a sort of hapless heritage: who can doubt
that it is a duty for everyone who seeks by his homage to gain the heart
of Mary to correct his vicious and depraved habits and to subdue the
passions which incite him to evil?
20.
Whoever moreover wishes, and no one ought not so to wish, that his
devotion should be worthy of her and perfect, should go further and
strive might and main to imitate her example. It is a divine law that
those only attain everlasting happiness who have by such faithful
following reproduced in themselves the form of the patience and sanctity
of Jesus Christ: "for whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be made
conformable to the image of His Son; that He might be the first-born
amongst many brethren" (Romans viii., 29). But such generally
is our infirmity that we are easily discouraged by the greatness of such
an example: by the providence of God, however, another example is
proposed to us, which is both as near to Christ as human nature allows,
and more nearly accords with the weakness of our nature. And this is no
other than the Mother of God. "Such was Mary," very pertinently points
out St. Ambrose, "that her life is an example for all." And, therefore,
he rightly concludes: "Have then before your eyes, as an image, the
virginity and life of Mary from whom as from a mirror shines forth the
brightness of chastity and the form of virtue" (De Virginib. L. ii., c. ii.)
21.
Now if it becomes children not to omit the imitation of any of the
virtues of this most Blessed Mother, we yet wish that the faithful apply
themselves by preference to the principal virtues which are, as it
were, the nerves and joints of the Christian life - we mean faith, hope,
and charity towards God and our neighbor. Of these virtues the life of
Mary bears in all its phases the brilliant character; but they attained
their highest degree of splendor at the time when she stood by her dying
Son. Jesus is nailed to the cross, and the malediction is hurled
against Him that "He made Himself the Son of God" (John xix.,
7). But she unceasingly recognized and adored the divinity in Him. She
bore His dead body to the tomb, but never for a moment doubted that He
would rise again. Then the love of God with which she burned made her a
partaker in the sufferings of Christ and the associate in His passion;
with him moreover, as if forgetful of her own sorrow, she prayed for the
pardon of the executioners although they in their hate cried out: "His
blood be upon us and upon our children" (Matth. xxvii., 25).
22.
But lest it be thought that We have lost sight of Our subject, which is
the Immaculate Conception, what great and effectual succour will be
found in it for the preservation and right development of those same
virtues. What truly is the point of departure of the enemies of religion
for the sowing of the great and serious errors by which the faith of so
many is shaken? They begin by denying that man has fallen by sin and
been cast down from his former position. Hence they regard as mere
fables original sin and the evils that were its consequence. Humanity
vitiated in its source vitiated in its turn the whole race of man; and
thus was evil introduced amongst men and the necessity for a Redeemer
involved. All this rejected it is easy to understand that no place is
left for Christ, for the Church, for grace or for anything that is above
and beyond nature; in one word the whole edifice of faith is shaken
from top to bottom. But let people believe and confess that the Virgin
Mary has been from the first moment of her conception preserved from all
stain; and it is straightway necessary that they should admit both
original sin and the rehabilitation of the human race by Jesus Christ,
the Gospel, and the Church and the law of suffering. By virtue of this
Rationalism and Materialism is torn up by the roots and destroyed, and
there remains to Christian wisdom the glory of having to guard and
protect the truth. It is moreover a vice common to the enemies of the
faith of our time especially that they repudiate and proclaim the
necessity of repudiating all respect and obedience for the authority of
the Church, and even of any human power, in the idea that it will thus
be more easy to make an end of faith. Here we have the origin of
Anarchism, than which nothing is more pernicious and pestilent to the
order of things whether natural or supernatural. Now this plague, which
is equally fatal to society at large and to Christianity, finds its ruin
in the dogma of the Immaculate Conception by the obligation which it
imposes of recognizing in the Church a power before which not only has
the will to bow, but the intelligence to subject itself. It is from a
subjection of the reason of this sort that Christian people sing thus
the praise of the Mother of God: "Thou art all fair, O Mary, and the
stain of original sin is not in thee." (Mass of Immac. Concep.)
And thus once again is justified what the Church attributes to this
august Virgin that she has exterminated all heresies in the world.
23. And if, as the Apostle declares, faith is nothing else than the substance of things to be hoped for" (Hebr.
xi. 1) everyone will easily allow that our faith is confirmed and our
hope aroused and strengthened by the Immaculate Conception of the
Virgin. The Virgin was kept the more free from all stain of original sin
because she was to be the Mother of Christ; and she was the Mother of
Christ that the hope of everlasting happiness might be born again in our
souls.
24.
Leaving aside charity towards God, who can contemplate the Immaculate
Virgin without feeling moved to fulfill that precept which Christ called
peculiarly His own, namely that of loving one another as He loved us?
"A great sign," thus the Apostle St. John describes a vision divinely
sent him, appears in the heavens: "A woman clothed with the sun, and
with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars upon her head" (Apoc.
xii., 1). Everyone knows that this woman signified the Virgin Mary, the
stainless one who brought forth our Head. The Apostle continues: "And,
being with child, she cried travailing in birth, and was in pain to be
delivered" (Apoc. xii., 2). John therefore saw the Most Holy
Mother of God already in eternal happiness, yet travailing in a
mysterious childbirth. What birth was it? Surely it was the birth of us
who, still in exile, are yet to be generated to the perfect charity of
God, and to eternal happiness. And the birth pains show the love and
desire with which the Virgin from heaven above watches over us, and
strives with unwearying prayer to bring about the fulfillment of the
number of the elect.
25.
This same charity we desire that all should earnestly endeavor to
attain, taking special occasion from the extraordinary feasts in honour
of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin. Oh how bitterly and
fiercely is Jesus Christ now being persecuted, and the most holy
religion which he founded! And how grave is the peril that threatens
many of being drawn away by the errors that are afoot on all sides, to
the abandonment of the faith! "Then let him who thinks he stands take
heed lest he fall" (I Cor. x., 12). And let all, with humble
prayer and entreaty, implore of God, through the intercession of Mary,
that those who have abandoned the truth may repent. We know, indeed,
from experience that such prayer, born of charity and relying on the
Virgin, has never been vain. True, even in the future the strife against
the Church will never cease, "for there must be also heresies, that
they also who are reproved may be made manifest among you" (I Cor.
xi., 19). But neither will the Virgin ever cease to succor us in our
trials, however grave they be, and to carry on the fight fought by her
since her conception, so that every day we may repeat: "To-day the head
of the serpent of old was crushed by her" (Office Immac. Con., 11. Vespers, Magnif.).
26.
And that heavenly graces may help Us more abundantly than usual during
this year in which We pay her fuller honour, to attain the imitation of
the Virgin, and that thus We may more easily secure Our object of
restoring all things in Christ, We have determined, after the example of
Our Predecessors at the beginning of their Pontificates, to grant to
the Catholic world an extraordinary indulgence in the form of a Jubilee.
27.
Wherefore, confiding in the mercy of Almighty God and in the authority
of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, by virtue of that power of
binding and loosing which, unworthy though We are, the Lord has given
Us, We do concede and impart the most plenary indulgence of all their
sins to the faithful, all and several of both sexes, dwelling in this
Our beloved City, or coming into it, who from the first Sunday in Lent,
that is from the 21st of February, to the second day of June, the
solemnity of the Most Sacred Body of Christ, inclusively, shall three
times visit one of the four Patriarchal basilicas, and there for some
time pray God for the liberty and exaltation of the Catholic Church and
this Apostolic See, for the extirpation of heresies and the conversion
of all who are in error, for the concord of Christian Princes and the
peace and unity of all the faithful, and according to Our intention; and
who, within the said period, shall fast once, using only meager fare,
excepting the days not included in the Lenten Indult; and, after
confessing their sins, shall receive the most holy Sacrament of the
Eucharist; and to all others, wherever they be, dwelling outside this
city, who, within the time above mentioned or during a space of three
months, even not continuous, to be definitely appointed by the
ordinaries according to the convenience of the faithful, but before the
eighth day of December, shall three times visit the cathedral church, if
there be one, or, if not, the parish church; or, in the absence of
this, the principal church; and shall devoutly fulfill the other works
abovementioned. And We do at the same time permit that this indulgence,
which is to be gained only once, may be applied in suffrage for the
souls which have passed from this life united in charity with God.
28.
We do, moreover, concede that travelers by land or sea may gain the
same indulgence immediately they return to their homes provided they
perform the works already noted.
29.
To confessors approved by their respective ordinaries We grant
faculties for commuting the above works enjoined by Us for other works
of piety, and this concession shall be applicable not only to regulars
of both sexes but to all others who cannot perform the works prescribed,
and We do grant faculties also to dispense from Communion children who
have not yet been admitted to it.
30.
Moreover to the faithful, all and several, the laity and the clergy
both secular and regular of all orders and institutes, even those
calling for special mention, We do grant permission and power, for this
sole object, to select any priest regular or secular, among those
actually approved (which faculty may also be used by nuns, novices and
other women living in the cloister, provided the confessor they select
be one approved for nuns) by whom, when they have confessed to him
within the prescribed time with the intention of gaining the present
jubilee and of fulfilling all the other works requisite for gaining it,
they may on this sole occasion and only in the forum of conscience be
absolved from all excommunication, suspension and every other
ecclesiastical sentence and censure pronounced or inflicted for any
cause by the law or by a judge, including those reserved to the ordinary
and to Us or to the Apostolic See, even in cases reserved in a special
manner to anybody whomsoever and to Us and to the Apostolic See; and
they may also be absolved from all sin or excess, even those reserved to
the ordinaries themselves and to Us and to the Apostolic See, on
condition however that a salutary penance be enjoined together with the
other prescriptions of the law, and in the case of heresy after the
abjuration and retraction of error as is enjoined by the law; and the
said priests may further commute to other pious and salutary works all
vows even those taken under oath and reserved to the Apostolic See
(except those of chastity, of religion, and of obligations which have
been accepted by a third person); and with the said penitents, even
regulars, in sacred orders such confessions may dispense from all secret
irregularities contracted solely by violation of censures affecting the
exercise of said orders and promotion to higher orders.
31.
But We do not intend by the present Letters to dispense from any
irregularities whatsoever, or from crime or defect, public or private,
contracted in any manner through notoriety or other incapacity or
inability; nor do We intend to derogate from the Constitution with its
accompanying declaration, published by Benedict XIV, of happy memory,
which begins with the words Sacramentum poenitentiae; nor is it
Our intention that these present Letters may, or can, in any way avail
those who, by Us and the Apostolic See, or by any ecclesiastical judge,
have been by name excommunicated, suspended, interdicted or declared
under other sentences or censures, or who have been publicly denounced,
unless they do within the allotted time satisfy, or, when necessary,
come to an arrangement with the parties concerned.
32.
To all this We are pleased to add that We do concede and will that all
retain during this time of Jubilee the privilege of gaining all other
indulgences, not excepting plenary indulgences, which have been granted
by Our Predecessors or by Ourself.
33.
We close these letters, Venerable Brethren, by manifesting anew the
great hope We earnestly cherish that through this extraordinary gift of
Jubilee granted by Us under the auspices of the Immaculate Virgin, large
numbers of those who are unhappily separated from Jesus Christ may
return to Him, and that love of virtue and fervor of devotion may
flourish anew among the Christian people. Fifty years ago, when Pius IX,
proclaimed as an article of faith the Immaculate Conception of the most
Blessed Mother of Christ, it seemed, as we have already said, as if an
incredible wealth of grace were poured out upon the earth; and with the
increase of confidence in the Virgin Mother of God, the old religious
spirit of the people was everywhere greatly augmented. Is it forbidden
us to hope for still greater things for the future? True, we are passing
through disastrous times, when we may well make our own the lamentation
of the Prophet: "There is no truth and no mercy and no knowledge of God
on the earth. Blasphemy and Iying and homicide and theft and adultery
have inundated it" (Os. iv.,1-2). Yet in the midst of this
deluge of evil, the Virgin Most Clement rises before our eyes like a
rainbow, as the arbiter of peace between God and man: "I will set my bow
in the clouds and it shall be the sign of a covenant between me and
between the earth" (Gen. ix.,13). Let the storm rage and sky
darken - not for that shall we be dismayed. "And the bow shall be in the
clouds, and I shall see it and shall remember the everlasting covenant"
(Ibid.16). "And there shall no more be waters of a flood to destroy all flesh" (Ibid.15.).
Oh yes, if we trust as we should in Mary, now especially when we are
about to celebrate, with more than usual fervor, her Immaculate
Conception, we shall recognize in her that Virgin most powerful "who
with virginal foot did crush the head of the serpent" (Off. Immac.
Conc.).
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