CONSULTORS OF THE SACRED CONGREGATIONS. — Every Sacred Congregation for the study of questions of greater importance has a body of consultors: prelates, religious, and, exceptionally, also laypersons, from whom it requests reasoned votes or opinions. The consultors are appointed by the supreme pontiff by means of a letter signed by the cardinal Secretary of State, upon the proposal of the cardinal prefect or secretary of the respective Congregation. Such appointment is in itself for life. Consultors are ordinarily required to reside in the Curia. A large part of the affairs of the Congregations is entrusted to them and rests upon them; many of their votes have had very great scientific-canonical and practical importance. They generally receive no monetary compensation. Some are consultors by right:
CONSULTORI DELLE SACRE CONGREGAZIONI - CONSUMO
indeed, the CIC establishes, for example, that the assessor of the Holy Office, the secretary of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs, and the secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Seminaries are to be consultors of the Sacred Congregation of the Consistory; the assessor of the Holy Office, in turn, is a consultor of the Sacred Congregation of Seminaries (CIC cann. 248 § 2 and 256 § 2).
In general, the consultors write their opinions and send them in without appearing in person (although at times they take part in the congress or even in the plenary meeting of the Congregation): in the case of the Holy Office, however, only the “qualifiers” proceed in this way; the consultors, instead, meet every Monday in the so-called “consulta,” preparing the material that will subsequently serve for the meeting of the cardinals held on the following Wednesday, and on which the assessor reports to the pope at the weekly audience on Thursday. The consultors of the Sacred Congregation of Rites are distinguished according to the three sections to which they belong; the theological consultors (Section I) give their written opinion and participate in the ante-preparatory, preparatory, and general Congregations before the pope, for the examination of causes of beatification and canonization; the liturgical consultors (Section II) are called upon to give their opinion, case by case, on particular liturgical questions; the historical consultors (Section III) give their written opinion and participate in the plenary sessions of the Historical Section, in the historical causes of beatification and canonization, and also give their opinion, case by case, on individual questions of a critical-historical, hagiographical, and liturgical nature.