The arguments with which penance is excluded from the number of the sacraments: First, it has no external element.
The arguments with which penance is excluded from the number of the sacraments: First, it has no external element.
§ 23. Now that we have taken care of these points first, we go on to the arguments by which we prove that penance is not a sacrament in the proper sense of the word.
(I) In every sacrament truly and properly so called, an external, visible element is required besides the word of command and promise, as a sufficient enumeration of all the sacraments shows. Augustine (on John, tract. 80): “Let the word come to the element, and it becomes a sacrament.” Yet in penance there is no external, visible element. Therefore penance is not a sacrament in the proper sense.
Bellarmine counters (De poenit., bk. 1, ch. 11, col. 1205): “In general one does not do badly in investigating the nature and property of sacraments from Baptism and the Eucharist, which by the consent of all are true sacraments.” This confession of his we note carefully, but he adds: “There is present in the sacrament of penance an external sign to represent aptly a spiritual disposition, namely, the confession of the penitent and the absolution which the priest declares aloud.”
We respond. (1) We note the disagreements of the Papists concerning the external element or material that is to be assigned to this sacrament. Thomas ([ST,] p. 3, q. 84, art. 2): “The immediate material of this sacrament is the acts of the penitent; the remote material is sins over which he grieves, which he confesses and for which he makes satisfaction.” Article 3: “Those things which are on the part of the penitent act as the material; those things which are the responsibility of the priest act as the form.” Article 7: “The material of this sacrament existed before its institution by Christ, but because such material is assumed for this sacrament, it lacks this determining institution. The form and power of this sacrament are totally from Christ’s institution, whence the Lord at the beginning of the Gospel said that people not only should be penitent [poeniterent] but also that they should do penance [poenitentiam agerent], signifying the determined modes of acts which are required for this sacrament.” (This comparison is ridiculous because in the Greek it reads μετανοεῖτε [“repent”], where the distinction between being penitent and doing penance ceases [to exist]. Erasmus, Annotat. on Matthew 3, p. 16: “Our common people think that doing penance is the payment of debt by a prescribed punishment, because among Christians who had sinned publicly they were punished openly by being removed from the fellowship. This satisfaction or punishment began to be called ‘penance’ [poenitentia], and because of this development a not insignificant error befell theologians.”)
The Compend. theol. (6, ch. 20) claims: “ ‘Material’ or ‘element’ here must be taken broadly for anything, whether an external substance or human action. Accordingly, in the sacrament of penance the element is the exterior actions of the penitent, the contrition of his heart, the confession of his mouth, the satisfaction of his work; but now, if a priest has spoken the word of absolution, then from that it becomes a sacrament.” The Censura Colon. has the same thing under the article De poenitentia.
The Catech. Rom. (part 2, ch. 5, q. 12): “As we say that wood is the material of fire and is consumed by the power of the fire, so sins which are removed by penance can correctly be called the material of this sacrament.”
Biel (Sentent., 4, dist. 24, q. 1, art. 1), whom Bellarmine follows, argues that only “the exterior act of confession is the material of this sacrament.”
Richard [of Middleton] (Sent., 4, dist. 16, art. 1) wanted to reconcile all of those in this way: “There are three materials here: the very remote, and these are sins; the remote, and this is the sinner who now believes; and the near, and this is the confession itself.” Yet in all this there still remains a discrepancy: (a) Some say the absolution alone belongs to the essence of this sacrament—for example, Scotus, Occam, Almainus, etc. (Sent., 4, dist. 14)—while some argue that this sacrament consists of two intrinsic parts: the priest’s absolution and the actions of the penitent, for example, nearly all more recent theologians.
(b) Some want all the actions of the penitent (contrition, confession, and satisfaction) to be the material or element of the sacrament while some want only confession.
(c) Some assign the priest’s absolution to the external element or symbol, but some assign it to the form of the sacrament. Lombard (Sent., 4, dist. 22, C):
Some say that the sacrament here is only what takes place outwardly, namely, exterior penance, which is the sign of interior repentance, namely, of contrition of the heart and of humility. Yet if this is true, not every sacrament of the Gospel brings about that which it figures, for exterior penance does not cause interior repentance, but rather the interior is the cause of the exterior. But they say that this must be understood in reference to the sacraments which were instituted in the New Testament. But some say that interior repentance and exterior penance are a sacrament, not two sacraments but one, as the species of bread and wine are not two sacraments but one. In this sacrament, the sacrament is only one thing, namely, exterior penance; another thing, namely, inner repentance, is [part of] this sacrament; another thing is not a sacrament, namely, the remission of sins.
(2) If Bellarmine’s opinion should be maintained, Augustine’s rule will have to be formed in this way: “Let the Word come to the word, and it becomes a sacrament.” The confession of sins is a word and the priest’s absolution is a word; how, then, does an element come to the word in penance? Bellarmine vainly counters that Augustine is speaking only about the sacrament of Baptism, though we should take that as the general rule for all the sacraments in the proper sense of the word. That is why he (Contra Faustum, bk. 19, ch. 16) gives the general definition that they are “the visible signs of invisible grace.” But are the penitent’s confession and the priest’s absolution visible signs which meet the eye?
Bellarmine responds: “There are many visible signs in the sacrament of penance, namely, the priest who lays on his hand, the penitent down at the priest’s knees and shedding tears.” But since these are seen so commonly that the sacrament of penance can nonetheless exist even without them, therefore he responds in a different way: “Anything that is perceived by any external sense is called a visible sign, even if it is not the sense of seeing but of hearing.” [He says this] since Augustine says (Confess., bk. 10, ch. 35): “See what tastes, see what smells, see what sounds, see how hard it is.” Yet sight is not the same thing as a sense, nor is one species the equivalent of several species of a genus. The word “see” is sometimes used for knowing, but it must be understood here properly for the sense of the eyes; this is proved clearly by the analogy of all the other sacraments. Augustine (Sermon de bapt. ad Neoph.): “A sacrament is so called because one thing is seen;11 another is understood. What is seen has a physical appearance, and what is understood has spiritual fruit.” So, then, we conclude: the sacramental symbol is always a substance. Yet the signs of repentance and the word of absolution are not substances but actions. Therefore they do not constitute a sacramental symbol.
(3) Every full [integrum] sacrament is administered by a minister, and that full sacrament is received by a receiver. Yet in penance, confession is only an action, not an external element; and that confession is an act of the penitent, not of the minister. Absolution is only between the minister and the penitent. This argument is pressed also by those who follow Scotus and place the entire essence [ratio] of this sacrament in absolution alone.
Bellarmine responds (De poenit., 1, ch. 16): “The penitent is not a minister but one who cooperates with the minister, because his action is not part of the sacrament except insofar as it is subject to sacerdotal power and is directed or ordered by the priest. We have a similar situation in the healing of a physical ailment if by chance the physician should order the patient to walk back and forth after taking his medicine.”
We respond. The one who partakes (as such) in a sacrament properly so called is neither the minister nor one who cooperates with the minister, because there is a perpetual opposition between giving and receiving [inter δόσιν καὶ λῆψιν]. The former befits only the minister; the latter, only the partaker. It is very clear how the actions of the penitent will not be part of the sacrament, though Bellarmine himself assigns them to the external symbol; this is very clear from the fact that Bellarmine himself is still uncertain as to whether sacramental power consists solely of absolution or partly in the priest’s absolution and partly in the penitent’s action. He says (De sacramentis in genere, bk. 2, ch. 11): “We have followed the first opinion, but we think the second is no less probable, though it appears a bit more difficult to defend it.” Those are Bellarmine’s words, who halts between two opinions. The argument from similarity about the healing of a physical ailment is to a great degree a dissimilarity, because sacraments are not beneficial just by working the work [ex opere operato], like natural medications, but they require faith, as we shall demonstrate in its own place [On the Sacraments (Commonplace XXI), §§ 78–86].
(4) Absolution pronounced with a physical voice is not a visible, external element, because the same absolution is pronounced to the repentant in the promise of the Gospel and in the public preaching of the Word. Thus it is not a symbol of nor a part of nor the form of penance; rather, it is a word of consolation and of efficacious witnessing concerning God’s grace and the forgiveness of sins, a word which corresponds to the repentance which has occurred earlier.
(5) The external material or elemental part in any sacrament is the instrument or means through which both the other essential part (namely, the heavenly and invisible part) and the actual effect or grace of the sacrament come to believers, as is clear from the example of Baptism and of the holy Supper. Through the water of Baptism, regeneration comes to us; through the bread and wine, the communion of the body and blood of Christ comes to us.
Therefore, according to the hypothesis of those who establish the penitent’s three acts as the material for this sacrament, the one essential part—namely, the heavenly—will be united with those actions, and man will no longer be the subject to whom grace comes but rather will be the efficient cause of spiritual grace itself, something which Bellarmine does not disbelieve, for he writes (De poenit., 1, toward the end of ch. 16): “The sacramental power resides partly—and, indeed, chiefly—in the Keys, by whose power the priest absolves, and partly in the penitent’s action insofar as God uses that action as an instrument to signify and effect justification.” This opinion he attributes to Thomas and calls it probable.
From the hypothesis of those who say that sins are the material of this sacrament, a greater absurdity follows, namely: the other part (the heavenly) is united sacramentally with sins, and, in fact, sins are the means through which spiritual grace comes to us.