The Conciliarist Tradition: Constitutionalism In The Catholic Church 1300-1870

The Conciliarist Tradition This page intentionally left blank The Conciliarist Tradition Constitutionalism in the Catholic Church 1300–1870 FRANCIS OAKLEY 1 3 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide in Oxford New York Auckland Bangkok Buenos Aires Cape Town Chennai Dar es Salaam Delhi Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kolkata Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Mumbai Nairobi São Paulo Shanghai Taipei Tokyo Toronto Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries Published in the United States by Oxford University Press Inc., New York © Francis Oakley 2003 The moral rights of the author have been asserted Database right Oxford University Press (maker) First published 2003 First published in paperback 2008 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this book in any other binding or cover and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Data available ISBN 978-0-19-926528-2 (Hbk.) 978-0-19-954124-9 (Pbk.) 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Typeset by Laserwords Private Limited, Chennai, India. Printed in Great Britain on acid-free paper by Biddles Ltd., King’s Lynn, Nafolk To Lo l and Suzanne This page intentionally left blank Preface In this book, which comes inadvertently to press at a moment of deepening crisis in the authority structures of the Western, Latin, or Roman Catholic Church, it is my purpose to draw out from the historiographic shadows and return to the bright lights of centre stage the robust if persistently underacknowledged tradition of constitutionalist thinking and aspiration which for long centuries tugged uneasily at the adamantly monarchical consciousness of that ancient and hallowed institution. By the last years of the nineteenth century, when it was finally consigned to oblivion by the First Vatican Council’s twin definitions of papal jurisdictional primacy and doctrinal infallibility, that tradition had endured already for more than half a millennium. And there still remain fugitive straws in the wind suggesting that not even the subsequent century and more of official disapprobation and theological disregard has succeeded entirely in negating the long preceding centuries of stubborn (though largely forgotten) affirmation. If the deepest roots of this Catholic constitutionalist tradition were engaged in patristic soil, in the communitarian nature of the ancient Church and its essentially conciliar mode of governance, it was to draw its legal clothing and the lineaments of its constitutional precision from the commentaries of the medieval canon lawyers. And it was to encounter its shaping moment in the great institutional crisis which the disputed papal election of 1378 and the subsequent persistence of rival lines of claimants to the papal office eventually engendered. Crystallized now in the form of what came later to be known as the conciliar theory, it gave powerful voice to the essentially constitutionalist conviction that side by side with the institution of papal monarchy (and in intimate connection with it) it was necessary to give the Church’s co