INDECOROUS OCCUPATIONS. - In the CIC (can. 138), this term denotes those professions or trades whose exercise is expressly forbidden to clerics because it is deemed unbecoming to their state.
The legislator does not specify which occupations are to be considered precisely indecorous. Recourse must therefore be had to the sources, from which it appears that the prohibition concerns not only certain occupations properly so called, such as those of the comedian, stage or film actor, dancer, juggler, street musician, conjurer, etc., but must also be extended to certain trades, such as those of the butcher, tavern-keeper, public retailer, cattle-herder, professional hunter, and others besides, which, although honorable for a certain class of laypersons, are nevertheless unsuited to the clerical state.
Indecorous occupations should not be confused with the liberal arts and professions (such as, for example, those of physician-surgeon, advocate and procurator, notary, public or private administrator, etc.), which are likewise forbidden to the cleric unless authorization is granted by the competent authority (can. 139).
Zaccaria da S. Mauro