DEPOSITION. - It is one of the most serious ecclesiastical penalties that can be inflicted on a cleric, though less severe than reduction to the lay state (v.) and degradation (v.): it is classified among the vindictive penalties (v.).
Examples of it are found from the earliest centuries, though often under the name of degradation (or, more rarely, under other designations); it could be of various degrees, sometimes involving only deprivation of office, at other times deprivation of office and transfer to a lower order, at still other times a simple transfer to a less important office, or other less serious effects; but generally it was the most serious of the penalties that could be inflicted on clerics, since it involved the loss of all offices and of all rights, including honorary ones, inherent in the ecclesiastical state, and placed the cleric in the same juridical condition as laypersons, with only the privilegium canonis and the privilegium fori remaining to him (v. PRIVILEGI DEI CHIERICI).
In the 12th century (cf. in the CIC the decretals of Lucius III, of Celestine III and of Innocent III: c. 8, X, II, 1; c. 9, X, V, 7; c. 10, X, II, 2; c. 7, X, V, 20), following the insistence of the civil authorities that they be able to judge clerics guilty of the most serious crimes, deposition was clearly distinguished from degradation: the former involved neither reduction to the lay state nor loss of privileges.
With few differences of detail, this distinction has remained down to our own days (in the Eastern Church a distinction is rather made between major deposition and minor deposition, the term degradation being little in use).
In the CIC, deposition involves, for the cleric who is struck by it: a) suspension (v.) from office; b) incapacity for any office, benefice, dignity, pension, or ecclesiastical charge, and the loss of those he may already hold. The loss of the office, benefice, etc., occurs even if it constitutes for the cleric the so-called title of ordination (v.); but in that case, if the cleric has insufficient means to live, the Ordinary must endeavor to procure for him some means of support, so that the decorum of the ecclesiastical state be preserved (can. 2303 §§ 1-2).
A deposed cleric retains all the obligations deriving from his ordination, and likewise retains his privileges (can. 2303 § 1). If he gives no signs of amendment, and especially if he persists in giving scandal and does not repent even though admonished, the Ordinary can deprive him perpetually of the right to wear the ecclesiastical habit (v. ABITO ECCLESIASTICO): and with
DEPOSITION - D. attributed to Dirck Bouts (15th century). Detail of the triptych in the Royal Chapel - Granada, Cathedral.
this the guilty party also loses the privileges, and the Ordinary's obligation to ensure that he does not lack sustenance also ceases (can. 2304).
Deposition cannot be inflicted except by means of a sentence, issued following a regular trial, by a panel of five judges (can. 1576 § 1, no. 2); and it cannot be applied except for those crimes for which it is expressly provided (can. 2303 § 3), which currently are: 1) heresy, though only after a double admonition (can. 2314 § 1, no. 2); 2) sacrilege against the sacred species (can. 2320); 3) simulated celebration of Mass or Confession, on the part of a cleric who is not a priest (can. 2322 no. 1); 4) violation of a corpse or of a tomb (can. 2328); 5) abortion (can. 2350 § 1); 6) grave crimes against persons or property (can. 2354 § 2); 7) grave crimes of lust (can. 2359 § 2); 8) prolonged transgression of the obligation to wear the ecclesiastical habit and to bear the tonsure (can. 2379); 9) unlawful persistence in an ecclesiastical office (cans. 2394, no. 2 and 2401).
For the crimes that entail the penalty of deposition, neither judicial reproach (v.) nor conditional suspension of the penalty is applicable (can. 2288).
Bibliography6 works
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