Easing the Rule of Law

By Richard N. Ostling

The Pope issues a new and more flexible code for Catholics

Rather like an American President signing a bill into law, Pope John Paul II, flanked by seven top-ranking aides, last week put his name to a document at a ceremony he proudly called "a historic event." The moment deserved such solemn words; the Pope was promulgating a new code of canon law, to take effect Nov. 27, that is intended to govern in detail the religious practices of 796 million Roman Catholics around the world.* It is the first revision of the statutes since 1917.

The code is the latest manifestation of the church renewal begun by the Second Vatican Council, which ended in 1965. Indeed, Pope John XXIII proposed a revision of canon law in the same 1959 speech that announced his intention to summon the council. The new document is infused with the liberalizing spirit of Vatican II; it is far more pastoral in tone than the 1917 code, recognizing the rights of Catholics and minimizing penalties. For example, the number of ecclesiastical offenses that call for automatic excommunication has been reduced from 37 to seven (one of them is having or procuring an abortion). Decision-making is decentralized; national councils of bishops may determine, for instance, the full list of holy days on which attendance at Mass is required and establish rules for mixed marriages. In all, the number of canons has been cut from 2,414 to 1,752.

In keeping with Vatican II, the new code emphasizes the role to be played by lay Catholics as part of the "people of God." Various provisions explicitly authorize them to perform certain liturgical functions, such as reading the Old Testament lessons and epistles at Mass, helping to administer a diocese, serving on marriage tribunals and even running parishes if no priest is available.

The changes vastly increase the role of women, allowing them to perform most of the lay functions that can now be handled by men. But the new code is still discriminatory: women may not be ordained as priests, and are even barred from being permanent lay readers and servers at Mass. Complains President Donna Quinn of the liberal National Coalition of American Nuns: "They say be happy and content with what you're given, but American society and Catholic women have moved beyond that. It's the same as excluding people on the basis of color."

Of special interest to American Catholics is jurisdiction over annulments. Under a special papal dispensation granted in 1970, U.S. and Australian Catholics have normally been able to get an annulment after an ecclesiastical trial within their own diocese. If the court decrees that the marriage was never validly contracted, the individuals are free to marry again. In both the U.S. and Australia the bishops' conference has the right to waive a second trial of the marriage's validity, which is required for Catholics elsewhere in the world. Nor does Rome review American cases as it might those from other nations. The revised canon law essentially endorses the American system, with some procedural modifications.

The new code allows serious psychological disorders as one of the many bases for annulment (among the others: impotence, fraud or a previous valid marriage). Recognition of such psychological impairment by church courts is one reason why annulments in the U.S. have increased from 338 in 1968 to about 36,000 in 1981. Remarriage after civil divorce is still prohibited.

Some U.S. Catholic bishops and theologians lobbied in vain against a provision that gives bishops the responsibility for authorizing scholars to teach theology at Catholic colleges and universities. The bishops feared that strict observance of this canon could conflict with the secular standards of academic freedom and ten ure that now prevail at church-affiliated schools. But, says Father Richard McBrien, chairman of the theology department at the University of Notre Dame, "the American bishops know that the rule is unenforceable and will have a purely symbolic significance."

The new code of canon law permits cremation instead of burial, drops excommunication for members of Masonic lodges, allows laypeople to preach in churches on certain occasions, and permits clergy to visit taverns. The code retains a ban on priests' holding political office. Church observers are intrigued by what John Paul will say about this on his expected March visit to Nicaragua, where two priests serve in the Sandinista cabinet.

Revising the code involved nearly 200 members of the hierarchy, 1,000 other consultants and 6,375 hours of committee meetings. It took 16 years for a draft to reach the Pontiff in late 1981. During numerous meetings over many weeks, John Paul and his own team of experts scrutinized the text in detail. After the commission approved its final draft last June, the Pope assigned three Cardinals to a line-by-line polishing, completed only days before the promulgation.

Despite its obvious and expected advances over the 1917 code, many Catholic liberals feel that the revision does not go nearly far enough. Johannes Neumann, a canon law expert at West Germany's Tubingen University, declared that the text clings to the church's "institutional apparatus," and puts observing of the law before meeting the needs of individuals.

Father James Provost, executive coordinator of the Canon Law Society of America, admits that the new code is a compromise, "only partially in tune with the times."

If only because the new code lags be hind practice, there is a question as to how seriously Catholics will take its dictates. One of the ironies of Vatican II is that it not only led to the creation of the code but set in motion the liberalizing forces that tend to undermine it. -- --ByRichard N. Ostling. Reported by Wilton Wynn/Rome

*Though only for the Latin Rite; 14 million Eastern Rite Catholics will later get a different code.

With reporting by Wilton Wynn/Rome This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.